After the dust settles......

byBrandyFriend

789 followers

11 years ago

My husband and I live out on his ' Family Ranch ' that his grandparents on his mothers side built when they settled here in the late 1800`s early 1900`s from Lebanon. His grandfather was 28 when his grandmother who was promised to his grandfather before birth~ arrived at the young age of 12. He waited for her to become an adult and fall in love with him before he ever took her in his bed. He built her a beautiful two story farm house and began building the most beautiful "BIG RED BARN" that anyone had ever seen in these parts. The Niobrara River runs through the front yard and the view is just 'pure beauty' as far as you can see every direction. He had built a ranch like no other around here and still until this day...the Joseph name is recognized and respected from everyone in the State of Nebraska. The Josephs continue to raise Black Angus beef and fill the surrounding grocery stores and restaurants as well as brought jobs to the majority of people in their home town by building Hotels and Restaurants that are family owned and ran to this day.

So let me back up a little to his 12 year grandmother coming over by ship alone to meet with her promised husband and to begin her life that had been laid out for her. She didnt understand any English at all so it made the the journey her even scarier. She got off in London to switch boats when she heard two men speaking Arabic, that helped her on the rest of the trip to New York and them on to Chicago, where family members brought her on down to her new home in Nebraska. She kept a journal that was full of poems about her journey, her life here, her new husband, the beauty of the land and eventually of her children. She wrote poems to God almost everyday that are just beautifully written and straight from the heart and it seems that not one prayer was left unanswered by this faithful servant to the Lord. I had a chance to read some of these poems this past week as my husbands cousin that he hasn`t seen for 21 years came through to visit and brought with her a stack of forgotten photos and poems that we spent the majority of the night going through them one by one as we relived the journey of a 12 year old girl that came so far to start her life with a total stranger 16 yrs her senior. Most of her children have went on to be with our Lord and her grandchildren who are of the "Baby Boomer" age have gathered what they could to put then pieces back together of this brave little girls journey in life.

After our tears had dried and the dust had settled, we all shared a smile and a hug as we all knew what the other one was thinking .....when you put your faith so deeply in our Lord and Savior, there is no journey too long, too hard, or too scary....not even for a 12year old girl thousands of miles from her mother....if its in His Will.