Elephant Family

When we were in Ghana I wanted to bring back a souvenir for each of our grandchildren that would remind them of their grandparents' mission to Africa. I spent quite a lot of time looking around the markets for something that was reasonably priced but authentic. Several of our grandchildren had asked about us seeing African animals and were excited when we finally sent back photos of the elephants we saw in Mole National Park - so I started looking at carved elephants. Some of my favorite carvers made tiny elephants (I needed something small as I wanted to bring back 25+ of the item) for Noah's Ark sets. I checked with them for the price of 1 elephant and was told quite a high price compared to the price of the entire set. Large elephants were very available in the market and didn't cost as much since they were easier to carve, but were too big. I often passed a carver who spoke no English on the way to Francis & Thomas's workshop and would buy a few things form him now and then (I have a turtle family), but one day I thought about asking him to carve tiny elephants and asked the price. He had some large ones and with the help of a shop keeper next to him I was able to explain that I wanted tiny elephants and he quoted the price of 1 cedi. He asked how many I wanted so I started out with 5 to make sure I liked what he did (I didn't care too much for most of his carving). When I returned he had the 5 elephants done and while the carving was rougher than I usually liked I thought they were cute - and recognizable as an elephant so I ordered 5 or 10 more. I kept ordering until I had 25. Meanwhile I was keeping my growing "herd" of wooden elephants on the display shelves of the entertainment center. I realized I really like my elephant herd so I decided to order more elephants. I figured I'd have some extra for future grandchildren. I kept ordering until I must have had a herd of over 40 elephants! Even though I have given elephants to each grandchild and need to give ones to the recent arrivals I still have a good sized herd.
I was thinking recently of the reason I like my elephants and want to keep a permanent herd. I think it is because they remind me of family. I'd like to keep all my family close, but our children have grown and have families of their own and need to be on their own. But just as elephants are not supposed to forget, I can still think of family members even though they may be far away. So when I see my elephant herd (divided into 2 groups with 5 under a baobab tree) I can think of how much my family means to me. The photos are of my remaining elephants although a few need to go to recent additions to our family. You may notice that each elephant is slightly different - color, shape, etc., just as a family is made of individuals so is my herd. This may seem obvious, but some of the carvers carved things so precisely that they looked like exact copies. Maybe that is the reason I chose the less skilled carver (besides him needing the work - and by the way a number of others ordered little elephants from him) as each of his elephants was an individual.