New Year's Day

Well it's New Year's eve and I have been reminiscing a lot over the last few weeks. Growing up, we had a few traditions that really took hold of my heart. In reflection today, I noticed that all of these traditions had to deal with food and having patience. My sister and I were not allowed to drink soda/coke /pop (depending where you live) that often nor were we allowed to eat junk food. We always thought our parents were unfair when all of our friends were allowed these goodies.

Instead, we were only allowed these drinks or foods on very specially occasions. We were given cokes on Christmas eve when we had chili with our dinners. (I think these stemmed from when our paternal grandparents would share Christmas with us. The only other time we were allowed a coke or soda was when we had to go and stay at my mom's office. My mother was a professor at Emory and occasionally either because we were sick or there was no one to watch us we were taken to her office to sit while she taught class and given a coke in a glass bottle.

We were given junk food especially chips and dip only on New Year's eve. My family would eat a New Year's eve dinner and then after 9:00 p.m. the junk food would be placed on the coffee table in front of the college football game that was on the t.v.

Though out the year, I would crave chips, dip and cokes but knew that I could not partake until that special occasion. What this taught me was patience and the enjoyment of waiting and anticipating something that was oh, so good. I would not trade that experience for the world since it kept me healthy and made those occasions truly special to me. Why else would I long for those days and think of the occasions when partaking those special foods and drink today? I hope your New Year is a happy and blessed one. I also hope that you have childhood traditions that you can pass down to someone else or share with a sibling like I can.