A Small Miracle

Have you ever thought that a real miracle has just happened to you?

My family known as "the Swopes" is made up of my parents, three sisters, and a younger brother. These people, besides myself, are some of the smartest people I've ever come across and I truly mean this. I can't even single one of them out as the most knowledgeable because they all amaze me.

I think I speak for all my siblings in saying that we experienced the best childhood a kid could ever have. Sure, our parents got on our nerves, but the morals they instilled in us never left us wondering who the boss was. I hear stories from friends whose children talk back terribly and do such awful things to them. I can't even imagine doing any of those thing to my mother. We weren't perfect and did our share of misbehaving (especially me); however Mother put us in our place immediately. She had 'the look' that made us cringe and go crawl in a corner. We were afraid of her but at the same time, we knew we could come to her with anything and she would try to understand. My mother was the real discipliner of our family and she did a great job of it.  She never disciplined us in a way that was even close to abuse but my brother and I did get the occasional "hairbrush wack on the butt" from her. I think my dad slapped me a total of once my whole life and ten minutes after he did so, he apologized. But more importantly, my parents made our youth fun and filled with what sometimes seemed like "magic."

My family never seemed to lack having what we needed. We didn't have much money but our parents gave us just enough, while teaching us to be grateful, that I don't ever remember wanting for anything. I was never one who needed name brand stuff, if it was cute... I was happy!

One thing my family has been cursed with though, is that none of us will ever be rich. We all have the ability and skills to take care of ourselves, each of us has our special talents, and we've all worked hard on our careers, our education, and moved up the
ladder. But we are still cursed with not making all that much money.

However, we've received our riches from other sources. We've all had relatively good health and have really never experienced (knock on wood) any real live threatening experiences.

Probably not all of my family agrees with this but to me our family has been blessed with the small miracle of having three of us become published authors. Any of you writers out there know how difficult this is and how hard we have to work at it. Until five years ago, neither myself nor my sis and mom had any idea what this would mean to us, much less that it would actually happen.

So although becoming an author hasn't made us rich in wealth, rich in fame, or rich in books (yet), we have had the small miracle of finally becoming rich in pride.

Ordinary riches can be stolen; real riches cannot. In your soul are infinitely precious things that cannot be taken from you.
Read more at http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/o/oscar_wilde_3.html#vWDCM3VEdFHiVKBB.99

Ordinary riches can be stolen; real riches cannot. In your soul are infinitely precious things that cannot be taken from you.
Read more at http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/o/oscar_wilde_3.html#vWDCM3VEdFHiVKBB.99

Ordinary riches can be stolen; real riches cannot. In your soul are infinitely precious things that cannot be taken from you.
Read more at http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/o/oscar_wilde_3.html#vWDCM3VEdFHiVKBB.99

Ordinary riches can be stolen; real riches cannot. In your soul are infinitely precious things that cannot be taken from you.
Read more at http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/authors/o/oscar_wilde_3.html#vWDCM3VEdFHiVKBB.99