A Project in Audio Format

I have never really liked trying to find Christmas gifts for every member of my family. For some reason, I really love buying Ali things, but when it comes to aunts and uncles and cousins and grandparents, these things get more complicated.

I end up buying gift cards or something that ends up meaning very little.

Are you resonating?

This year, I really wanted to do something that would actually mean something to my family. On Thanksgiving, my grandparents were telling us about their first few months of marriage. How my grandfather was 25 and my grandma was 19 and they were living in a rented apartment above the home of an elderly couple, baring making the bills as grandpa taught at the local junior high school. Imagining my grandparents as young and unsure of their future was so interesting to me. Beyond this, it was really my grandparents who started the legacy of following Jesus fully in my family. Without them, I'm unsure how I would have heard the gospel, and the same goes for my mother and her siblings and my siblings. They were highly influential.

When I heard them telling their old stories, I thought, I have to get this on record.

I am a fan of stories. I love good stories, that's partly why I read. But I think more than written stories, I love when people tell stories orally.

So I sat down with Grandma and Grandpa for about 4 hours one Friday afternoon and we recorded everything they could remember that was of some significance. I managed to edit it down to about an hour, and I wanted to share it with you all. This took me a lot longer than I thought, but thanks to Christmas break and a brief stint in unemployment, I was able to put my time to good use.

I would encourage you to do something like this in your family, even if you don't like them at all. Make a movie, write a book, or whatever. Due to the information age, I think we assume historical record will happen for us. But I think the more options for technology we get, the less we care about what we actually use that technology for. So we update our status' but don't record our legacies.

Blogger has trouble posting audio, or maybe it's just because it's a LOT of audio...not sure. But I'm linking to my other blog that I don't really publicize, one I use for the purpose of another hard drive. I've cleaned it up a bit, and so here it is, the story of my grandparents, Gary and Norma Poppinga.

Click Here

Feel free to download it, share it, whatever. The volume changes because I'm an amateur. Disclaimer disclaimer.