https://dailypost.wordpress.com/prompts/loyal/

WP The Daily Post Prompt—Loyal

I have the most loyal family in the world. When I give a party or cook a big dinner, I never have to worry. If not even one of my invited guests shows up, I can always count on my family to be there.

This loyalty didn’t just happen because we share blood. Growing up, our family sat down at the table for daily meals. We ate together whether we wanted to or not. We talked about our day and, for a short time, my mom even thought she could hold bible study around the table, after dinner. That idea didn’t live long, and I thank my dad’s loyalty to us kids for making it go away.

We children formed the bonds of love, respect, and trust for each other. Oh, we’d never say those words and there was nothing yucky like touching or hugging, but we knew there was loyalty and that we could count on each other.

If one of us had candy, potato chips, or anything good, we all had it. Even if it was the tiniest piece, given grudgingly. Each of us could be counted on to ban together against our parents and on numerous occasions we refused to speak to them, though we didn’t always understand why. We protested in unity. We were loyal.

I knew that I could count on my brothers and sister, and, to a lesser degree, on my cousins, who had been raised in the same manner. The kids in our family laughed together, talked, watched TV, and slept over with each other on weekends when our parents were out late. Lasting bonds were formed.

Over the years we argued about a lot of things and we’d stop speaking for a couple of weeks. We could never agree on who mama and daddy loved the most. We didn’t agree on who was the most spoiled, best looking, or smartest. We did agree on the funniest, and who we’d want with us in a fistfight.

As we grew older, we went our separate ways, but we were just a phone call away. We cried through illnesses, and we weren’t spared the deaths of two of us. Still, through it all, and despite distances, we came together, with our cousins, on holidays, birthdays, showers, graduations, and the Fourth of July (it’s a holiday unto itself). We wouldn’t have dreamed of missing these shared events.

Today, families aren’t as close as they used to be. There aren’t as many children and there are a lot of distractions that make some families dysfunctional.  But, ever since my girls were little, I’ve dragged them along to family outings. Their outraged little faces stayed glued to phones, and other devices, probably protesting and hatefully railing against my husband and me and the whole family thing. By the time they got to wherever we were going and had vented against us with their cousins, they were fine.

Sorry, kids. Loyalty is Family!