Ahhh . . . Family

My family just got back recently from vacation and I've discovered that family is a wonderful thing. Especially extended family. I mean, there are so many stories when you expand outside your own family's experiences. Part of the reason for our vacation was to visit relatives on the east coast in South and North Carolina. I got to meet so many relatives who had previously been merely names and now have not only a face but also personality. Also, we discovered much about family long gone. For a while now, I've been interested in geneologies and thus did a lot of inputting with our family in the Carolinas. Families are never as simple as they might seem like they'd be. There are always surprises, both good and bad, waiting to be found, if you should so choose to look. I hope to do a lot of looking and finding out as much as I can about the blood that runs through my veins. Right now, I'm going to need to content myself with researching my Caucasian side, which will be a great adventure. So far, I've been able to trace us, through direct lineage, back to 1632 with an Englishman who landed at Jamestown. I can't wait to find out what else I learn about myself and family history.

One Reason I Love George MacDonald

I have discovered a new love in the form of George MacDonald. As of now, I have read The Princess and the Goblin, The Princess and Curdie, The Light Princess, The Giant's Heart, The Golden Key, Phantastes, and Lilith and have heard a dramatized version of At the Back of the North Wind. In my own humble opinion, he's an absolute genius. He seamlessly blends theological and philosophical ideas with wonderful fantasy. And he has an increadible ability with words. Take this quote I found in Lilith.

What a hell of horror, I thought, to wander alone, a bare existence never going out of itself, never widening its life in another life, but, bound with the cords of its poor peculiarities, lying an eternal prisoner in the dungeon of its own being!

Is that not only beautiful but brilliant. Mr. MacDonald so magically captures the horrors of what life would be if it were not for interaction with others, what a terror it would be if we did not share with others. Ahhh, George MacDonald, you have made my life so much better. And thank you, my dear friends (if any of you are reading this) for all the time that you have spent with me, pouring yourselves into my meager life. I pray that God blesses you all for your sacrifices for me.