I belong to a family of seven. I have 4 siblings of which I'm the second oldest, our ages in order are 21-17-8-8-6. Looking back on my early childhood I often feel like I had a extremely basic first 9 years in a family of 4 following today's basic template for the American family. Since then our family dynamic has continually changed and adapted. My little brother Jesse was born and when he was three years old we adopted two sisters from the foster care system. Several years into the future and I belong to a boisterous, busy, and somewhat large family of 7.
When I was about 8 we left a start-up nondenominational protestant church. My dad was searching spiritually for something else, and he brought my older brother and I to visit a few orthodox churches. We happened to visit a local Russian orthodox church with a cradle-born priest and a lively parish community. After roughly a year attending the church and learning about this vastly foreign thing called "orthodoxy" my dad decided he was ready to come into the church. My older brother was at the point where he could pretty much also make the decision but at the age of 9 all I knew was I liked the church and wanted to convert with my dad and brother. I had a wonderful few years growing in the faith and never felt like I belonged anywhere else. I started singing in the church choir and taking on other activities. A few years later my three younger siblings joined my older brother, my dad, and I, getting baptized and chrismated. However, as the years progressed some families moved away and finally the priest who we joined the church under and grown attached to decided it was time to retire. We attended the church for about another year before we decided to try another one or two orthodox churches in the area.
It wasn't long after deciding to try another local orthodox church that we decided on an Antiochian Orthodox church called St. James. We visited one Sunday and then the next and decided we liked it enough we didn't want to leave. It's now been about a year and a half that we've been a part of St. James. The church has a monastic presence within walking distance in town. We had first heard of St. James through the head monk at the monastery who had previously given my older brother and I piano lessons. We enjoy the sense of welcome comradery in the growing parish community and at divine liturgy every Sunday.