We Are Family

Most of my writing efforts are externally motivated and based upon issues or events which only peripherally affect me.  Whether it is gay marriage, legalizing marijuana or gun control, these things are not personal issues.  I'm not hoping Prop. 8 gets settled in California so I can move there, marry the man I love and get stoned, without having to first go to Massachusetts to get married.  The things I spend my time on are other people's problems.  When it comes down to it, I have no reason to care,.  Today, I've decided to write about something personal and painful, something that may very well offend and alienate the people I most want to reach, if they actually read it.

Every person goes through life alone.  Certainly we share our lives with many people, and if we are fortunate, at some point we find the one person who will share the rest of our lives.  However, there is still some little part of us held in reserve.  It may be nothing more than a buried memory, or an embarrassing event from the distant past, or it may be something important that we just can't bring to share.  These tiny hidden nuggets of truth are what keep us separate and help maintain our sense of self.  At the same time, they keep us from fully experiencing the joining together into something greater than the sum of its parts.

Have you ever noticed how, after long relationships, people seem to grow more alike?  This even happens with pets.  The pets seem to take on a few facial characteristics of their owners and even some of their personality.  This is caused by a closeness that transcends simple physical contact.  For the religious you may look it as a joining of souls.  Others might think of it as enhancing your chi with that of another or of a combining of auras.  However you may view it, this joining is potentially the most powerful force in the universe.  It is the source of miracles and has the power to not only move mountains, but to move the world.  To give it a name, it is love.

For all of my life I've understood that love comes in many forms, there is the love of family and the love of friends, the love of children and the love of a partner.  All sharing some similarities, but all different.  For some time now, I've been wondering about this.  Are they all different?  My belief is that love simply is, it has no variations, no flavors and no degrees.  These are all artificial constraints we are taught to surround ourselves with, to keep us apart.

I've often been told there is no love to compare with the love of a mother for her child and the deBeers people would like us to believe there is no love to compare with the love that somehow needs you to spend 3 years salary on a tiny rock to symbolize your love.  Certainly, we all know the importance of family love, after all, blood is thicker than water.  Just for the record, so is tar, but water is a much better thirst quencher and doesn't stain (hard water stains are caused by impurities in the water such as iron and calcium, not the water itself, smartass).

If closeness and love bring people together, and make them more alike, the love of family should be the strongest of them all.  From an early age we sleep, bathe, eat, play and grow together.  This should form bonds of love which are unbreakable, but it doesn't.  We are taught that we have to love our brothers and sisters.  Forget the bloody noses, the scratches and bruises, forget the emotional torture and all the tears, they are family and everyone loves everyone or else.  Now this may not describe your family, but it does describe mine.  Perhaps you and your siblings overcame the bickering and fighting and developed that bond which keeps you together.  I know many families that have, and I can tell you, those families make the best friends, because when you love one of them, then you join in the love of the entire family. 

Sadly, not all families are this way.  My own family is an excellent example.  Don't get me wrong, we all love each other, we have to, we're family.  But, it's not a love that is based upon a mutual respect and drawing closer through shared experiences, it's love at arms length, it's let's agree to disagree love, or I'll help you if you really need it, but I'd rather you asked someone else love.  Ultimately, it's a love of echoes, rather than something to embrace, it is something just out of reach.

Inside, I've always been an extremely emotional person, but I rarely show that to the world.  I laugh and I smile and I make jokes.  I tell stories and occasionally, go on rants about whatever I may feel is important at the time, but the pain and the tears, and the love I keep caged, locked away with the anger and the fear, only occasionally letting one of them stick its head between the bars so someone can pet it or coo over it.  In the past, the love ran free, but that always brought out the tears and the pain, and also the anger and fear, so I locked it away.  Except for family, I kept the love inside, because I knew family could be trusted.

For 22 years I was separated from family, often by a thousand miles or more.  Our contact was extremely limited, a rare phone call, a card for Christmas and my birthday and even rarer visits when I returned to Indiana.  Those 22 years contained the bulk of my adult experiences and 100,000 words would not begin to do them justice.  Those years were also the years and experiences that made my brothers and sisters who they are today.  Some of those experiences were shared, but mostly we each went through our true growth and development alone.  The end result is that in many ways we are strangers.

Since returning to the fold, I have tried to embrace their lives and who they have become.  I've become interested in their hobbies, tried to find out all I've missed and tried to share some of my experiences so they can get to know me.  But, I have neither the time nor money to fully join in their lives, and now I'm 100 miles away from all (and 1000 miles away from one), I have to come to realize my efforts have been wasted.  All those years apart have formed a gulf that will always keep us apart.

The love is still there and I still respect those things about them that are worthy of respect, but now the love is for the individual, based not upon a relationship but upon the person.  I no longer expect any favoritism from anyone simply because of a genetic connection.  If any of them happen to be passing through, I no longer expect a phone call, not that I've gotten very many calls in the past.  Maybe we'll get together on the holidays.

To my family, I'm proud of each of you for your abilities and accomplishments.  Shannon, I often brag about your cooking and all the incredible things you make and have made and I'm amazed at all that you've been through to get to where you are.  Dennis, you've built a successful company and raised an amazing family all by working harder than anyone should.  I show off pictures and videos of your racing and am proud to say "that's my brother".  Colleen, you chose a path in life that took you to hell, yet somehow you made it through and have come out a much better person than I ever thought you capable of being.  While I will never share your beliefs, I am proud of how you've found happiness and learned to truly love.  Bill, you have had it harder than all of us combined.  I know only a fraction of what you have been through and just having survived it all is something to be proud of.  At times you have vexed all of us, but I know that you've always just wanted to love and be loved in return.  Know now that you are loved and that I'm proud of how you are always willing to give anything and everything to help those in need.

For all my nieces and nephews, I don't know any of you as well as I would like to.  I haven't been there to see the skinned knees and the trophies, the tears or the laughs.  If I can give any advice to you, it is to let go of the pain and to love everyone you can.  If you can, learn to love people, not because of who they are, or what they do, or even how they make you feel, love them simply because they exist.  You may not like what they do, who they are, or how they make you feel, but if you can, accept that for all their faults and wrongs, they need love as much as you do.

I'm opinionated, strong-willed and stubborn.  I make inappropriate jokes and often what I have to say goes against everything you have been taught or come to believe in.  I don't expect you to throw away your beliefs and worship what I say, I have at least as much right to be wrong as the next person.  All I'm asking is that you take a look at my words, without any prejudice.  Examine my thoughts, give them at least as much consideration as you would the menu at your favorite restaurant.  You might end up ordering the same thing you always do, but perhaps you'll find something else that you might like to try someday.  If nothing was accomplished, at least for a few minutes, you were thinking and not just reacting.  Who knows, maybe someday more of you will tell someone "You should read this.  My brother/uncle/friend wrote it.  I'm really proud of him". 

If you are reading this, know that I love you.  Whether you are family, friend or complete stranger, I love you.  I love you not because we are alike or different, not because we compliment or contradict, but because you and I are worth loving.  By loving you, I hope you can come to love me and together we can love everyone, and everyone can love us, and together we can change the world.

"I'd like to teach the world to sing..."