Photos of my time spent with family in Colorado.
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| This guy is REAL- he was standing just out side the car window when this was taken. |
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| "You don't want to touch them because the oils from your fingers will tarnish them...Plus you don't want to leave finger prints." |
I've been learning a lot about family this year. Over the last several months my entire outlook on family and what it means, and how it affects me has undergone a total metamorphosis. I had always grown up thinking that you could create family through close friendships. However last year I learned that friendships come and go; they are transient, rising and ebbing like the ocean tide. I feel like this past week I spent in Colorado I learned a lifetime of lessons. I experienced so much heartbreak within those first few days I wondered if I would ever be able to come up for air. Then I witnessed miracles; miracles that only family bonds could produce. Miracles such as sharing the same smile with a cousin you've never met before...Or the ability to forgive and comfort while still nursing old wounds.
I come from a family that for generations has not known their fathers. Distance, heartbreak, and betrayal has all left us wanting, hoping for a deeper connection. We were all left alone to fend on our own far too soon in life. Because of this, we have all had to make due with a pain in our hearts that no one ever intended us to suffer. I learned that in life the ones we tend to push away the most - hurt the most - can also be the very ones we need the most.
I have a family that loves me. It is everything in the world I ever needed.
