The Black Cashmere Sweater Vacation

I had a black chasmere sweater vacation. On Hilton Head Island, South Carolina.

We do this get away yearly. The "girls" in my family get away for a weekend or a week to be with each other, catch up on things, reminisce, and just do girl things together.

This year we, everyone- all eight of us, plus two resident aunts- were going to spend a whole week on Hilton Head Island just basking in the sun after a long, cold winter. (I was not actually going to bask, since I've had all the radiating rays that I can have for a lifetime but seeing the sun sounded good to me)

We left earlier than anticipated from the north country, hence I still had my black cashmere sweater on that I had worn to the freezing cold and rainy graduation of my neice from nursing school. Thank goodness! I had been packed for weeks, my suitcase FULL of shorts, bathing suits and cover ups and sandals. No warm clothes.

I wore my black cashmere sweater everyday.

I was freezing and needed warm clothes, not the sleeveless shirts that I had hoped to wear. It rained and was cold everyday. Even the locals seemed to be getting depressed. And for all the years that I have been going to Hilton Head, I have never seen it rain more than one day, then the beautiful sun would break through in all its glory.

But this was what we got and we had fun anyway. Some had pedicures done, we went to the movies, we played games; speed scrabble, canasta and uker, we went to the outlets and TJ Maxx, we put on swim suits and swam in the indoor pool and relaxed in the hot tub, we fixed food, we bowled, (no one reached even close to 100), we went out to eat at a great sea food restaurant, visited with local aunts and friends, and best of all we were introduced to the newest member of our "girls club", Adeyln, my neice's new daughter.

We had devotions with each other in the morning and shared concerns and issues and prayed with and for each other. And at the end of our time together we all said it was a great time, we enjoyed just being together and my neice commented that it was one of the best family vacations.

We had fun, we smiled, we laughed, and we have survived our many wounds.

How could that be? How could that be that we can still gather, and laugh and sing and have fun?

The secret to survival, I believe, is in the roots.

We have roots and they have gone deep. Down, always reaching down, like that tree that is planted by the rivers of water. We've lost mother, sister, aunt, husband, son and brother recently, not to mention the moving on of our older parents.

Our spirits and souls grow deep in God. Our strength, our healing, our health, our very survival, not to mention whether some in our group are aging successfully, is dependent on the depth and nourishment of our souls in God's soil. If we have roots deep in God then circumstances, loses, disappointments, trials and sicknesses may try to break us off, they may be able to maim and wound us temorarily, but they will not be able to destroy us.

And I see at the very place that we have been broken off and left to die a sprout is growing and we grow tall and strong again. Together.