by Jane Nelson

Created on: April 23, 2008

It was a bright, clear Saturday morning-the warmest spring day so far and my husband and I decided to take a walk. We live in rural Washington so walks involve a lot of sky and open fields and dirt roads. We soon came upon a field of sheep and noticed among the matted dusty ewes, many tiny white lambs. We watched them for several minutes before we couldn't stand it any longer. Our children had to see this!

We jogged all the way home and rousted everyone to the car-some in pajamas, one still holding the basketball he'd been playing with, one eating toast. As we pulled up to the fence, there were shouts of excitement. Little lambs were running, leaping and nursing everywhere. The farmer's wife was out tagging and recording the births and told us that sixteen had been born that morning! "And there's another one coming right there," she nodded and motioned to the fence just a few feet from where we were. We sat in the car with a front row view of the event. Everyone silently watched as the sack containing something emerged from the puffing ewe. Moments later, it burst and tiny legs thrashed the air, then the lamb took shape. The mother nudged and bleated a welcome and licked away the afterbirth. This lamb was the third of a set of triplets. Its siblings, only minutes old themselves, gathered around the wet little stranger in curiosity. Finally, after several attempts, the baby got to its knees and made its way to the food source. Our six year old Peter who was sitting silently beside me whispered, "It's a miracle."

This is family in its simplest form-sheep. The field was full of sheep families but each little lamb knew its mother and balanced its curiosity about the world with the safety of her warm body and food. Our ewe kept a wary and unflinching eye on us while licking, encouraging and feeding each baby. I wondered that all of the ewes seemed so nurturing and strong. "Well," responded the farmer's wife, "we've bred them that way. Once in a great while, we get one that's not a good mama, so we sell her off."

Now there was some food for thought. I pictured the little herd of unhappy sheep climbing the ramp and boarding the truck for the land of self-fulfillment. It was certain to be disappointing. The pasture couldn't be greener than this one. Perhaps we human beings, with all our capacity to feel and know could take a lesson from the gentle ewes who acted only on instinct.

For centuries, in every society, the family has been the most cherished and revered institution-the center of existence. But the title of this article is "How to learn to cherish Families". Why is it something we have to learn? When did we forget? Why has "the family" taken such a beating in the last twenty years? Why do we feel more distant from our children, more separate from our spouses?

Families require tremendous effort. They make demands of us and wear us out. A marriage, a new baby, a two-year-old, a teen-ager each stretches us in ways we couldn't have imagined. It seems easier at first to offload them or take separate, independent paths or at least to put ourselves and our own interests first.

But the truth is, we cherish the things for which we sacrifice. We are not down-trodden or pathetic if we choose to give ourselves over to our family. We walk the floor with a crying baby, we listen as a first reader spends twenty long minutes on a six page book, we set limits and gently hold the line. We try to be patient. We fail. We stay with it. And a few years into it, we don't have to read about how to cherish these people. We know that we do.

I know that driving home that day, I cherished my family a little more-not for any particular reason-just a field of sheep and another in a series of unexpected "miracles."

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