German Fellowship

Don and I so seldom get to see family. It is really about the only complaint that we have from living in LA, though anywhere else we have lived has not ever been truly "close" to our relatives before this either. But the lack of vacation and minimal time spent with family is a loss we truly feel. The real magic of this trip is not just that we get to travel to a foreign country and experience a new culture, but that we get to experience it with family that we never get to see. I've only met Jim and Sharon (Don's dad and stepmom) twice, at the wedding and a family reunion 5 years ago. And Chuck & Heike I had met only once at the same reunion. Yet they have welcomed us so warmly and openly that I am already lamenting how many years may pass until we see them again. As we have experienced in our short travels so far, getting to meet a variety of people from various cultures (German, Hungarian, Puerto Rican, Czech, and others), people are generally the same. They all like to eat, drink, and be merry, and we are having a blast being merry together. My favorite moments have been those around the table communicating through a mixture of German and English (Germlish), story telling, laughing, and having so much fun. I thought it might be difficult being in a foreign country where we don't speak the language, that communication would be hard and awkward. But we have been so welcomed and language has been such a small barrier to the fellowship we have experienced here. Unfortunately, not everyone chooses to participate in this fellowship. We did have a small disruption this evening from a disgruntled neighbor who called the German police over a noise complaint. So Germans have their disfunctional neighborhood feuds like Americans and any other society. But even the police could see that we were inside our own home, with no music playing, and conducting ourselves civilly so just suggested we close a window and went on our way. On a night like tonight, where I feel so blessed to be surrounded at home and around the world by amazing people with warm hearts, I feel bad for those who close themselves off to the heartfelt fellowship of those around them. I'm happy to belong to a warm and open hearted family, and grateful for the time we have together.