A gift that will keep on giving

My brother, Mark, and his wife, Stephanie, have, for the last several years, treated the men in our family to some sort of outdoor-related activity as a Christmas present. The first few years it was a released-quail shoot. This year the two of them decided to make the annual event a family-oriented occasion and invite the women of the family along for the fun. Instead of quail hunting, however, Mark and Stephanie invited us to all join them at Rock's Pond Campground for a weekend of fun, fellowship and fishing.

My wife, Robin, and I showed up that Friday afternoon and were soon joined by my daughter, Rachel, as well as her boyfriend, Tommy, and his two sons, Dominic and Rylee. My son, Wesley, wasn't expected as he had to work, but we got a call shortly after arriving that he wasn't needed at work on Saturday so he would be there later that night, just in time to get a few hours sleep before a full day of fishing. My brother, Troy, his wife, Cindi, and their young son, Wesley, were there when we arrived as was my sister, Deeann, her husband, Rob, and their two boys, Jackson and Harrison, a.k.a. Mutt. My other sister, Melody, and her husband, Chris, and their son, little Chris, rounded out the group. So you can see we had enough people there to make it a family reunion.

Mark and Stephanie stay at Rock's Pond often. There is a group of campers there who stay either over the weekend or live at the campground pretty much permanently. If you know my brother, Mark, you know he has never met a stranger and soon we found out that he knew everybody there and that almost every weekend, the group got together for a community cookout for supper. The only people I knew were the ones related to me, but it didn't take long to feel right at home with the fine folks who were kind enough to invite us to eat with them. After several hours of eating and running our mouths, we headed off to bed to get a good night's sleep before a full day of fishing.