Growing Up

I'm not going to spend a lot of time on this segment of my story in general. Growing up was a good experience for me. I had a very loving family and when it did get bad it was because I was a teenager who rebelled and went in the wrong direction. I just want to give a point of reference to the differences in the stages of my life.

If you've read my story entitled "Titles" then you know somewhat of my growing up.

I grew up in a church going household. My father was a preacher for all of my life and my mother a very loving preachers wife and mother. I have 3 older brothers and I was the baby of the family. I was very spoiled being the youngest and the only girl. That was fine for me, but my brothers resented me at times...but never hesitated to have me ask for things because they knew mom and dad would say yes to me.

I felt like my growing up was great. I always had a lot of friends and our family was very close. We had a lot of church friends and things to do. We were always involved in church and church activities. I was a very outgoing girl for the most part and loved to have fun.

I remember when I was young and my father and I were really close that my father used to get in his truck and tell the 4 of us kids to get in. Then we drove down our street and asked all the neighbor kids to get in the truck with us because my dad was going to take us all to ice-cream. Back then it was ok to drive in the back of a truck and back then most parents were ok with their kids going with the neighbor down the street down for ice-cream.

Another favorite story with my dad is when he used to bring home cherries in a bag and we would sit out on the side porch and eat them...spitting out the seeds in the lawn.

My brothers were fun, but I was mostly close to the youngest of the 3 brothers. Him and I were only a little over a year apart. My oldest brothers are 4 and 6 years older than I am. When your a kid that is a HUGE difference. But my parents were very busy with work and church and the 4 of us kids spent a lot of time together.

My mom was always there for us kids; picking us up from school, taking us to dr.'s appointments, feeding us and so on....I think that sometimes we don't remember the good things that mom did because she did so many. I remember the little things about my dad because his weren't an every day occurence. If that makes sense...

We sit around the table now when our family gets together and we have a lot of laughs. There were so many funny stories about when we were growing up. We pick on my dad some about things that he did and sometimes he denies it and sometimes he just laughs. My mom only remembers screaming at us all of the time, but I can honestly say that I don't remember that at all. But who wouldn't feel like they were screaming all of the time when you have 4 kids??? I just know that my parents were good parents and did the best they could trying to raise 4 children.

By no means were we rich, but we weren't poor either. I would say we were definitely rich in love and faith in the Lord. My childhood, before I hit that rebelious stage was very good and I couldn't have asked for a better life and foundation that my parents gave to me. I believe that foundation is why I am the person I am today and why it saved me so many times from falling into a life that could have been very bad. Especially as you read the story "Titles" and more stories to come.