A family tradition
In the spring of 2000, everyone was wiping their brows after the Y2K scare, the last new Peanuts cartoon was published, and the first season of Survivor kicked off on CBS. Bryan and I were finishing up our freshman year at Sprague High School and our church youth group was preparing to go on a mission trip to Mexico that summer. While Bryan and I were far from being a couple at the time, we both decided to go on this trip. We went mainly because our friends were going and it sounded exciting to travel outside of the country without our parents. A trip that started as a “fun thing to do,” ended up shaping us in much bigger ways. For the first time, I experienced poverty. I was astounded at the houses made of plastic and plywood, bursting with smiling children. It was a wonder to me how they could be so happy yet have so little. Bryan worked to clean up a church which was an old storefront where they set up old folding chairs to worship God together. I learned how to strai