Tellicious

Small families

Tonight we board a plane and travel to Ambergris Caye, a water taxi ride away from Belize City.  My daughter Sarah, will meet us in Houston before we journey on to Belize.  Our immediate family, the three of us, minus my son, will be attending the wedding of our nephew Shaun.  Destination weddings are popular now with the 20+ set.  We would go anywhere to be attending this event.  My partner's first family (mother, father, brother and sister) are all deceased and he is a sole survivor.  Too many heart heavy events have preceded this upcoming wedding day and we welcome the chance to all be together to celebrate with joy and happiness.   Last summer we were in Idaho for our daughter's wedding and this summer for Shaun and Jordan! 

In the graduate classes I taught many teachers came from large extended families, who were all living in Buffalo, in close proximity to one another.  I listened to their stories of attending obligatory Sunday mass, followed (more importantly) by the obligatory weekly pasta dinner at Grandma's house with 40 of their closest relatives.  Some of them had rejected "too much" family, moved away to teach in southern or western states, only to return back home.  Their eyes would fill with tears as they described how they had missed their family and were homesick on a daily basis.  As they talked about being around family again they seemed  completely comfortable in themselves....knowing you can go away and you can come home again.

When my own children were growing up we were isolated and living away from grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins.  We had to travel a minimum of 5 hours to see our nearest relatives.  We did our best to visit and make relationships with family a priority.  Visits to Shaun and his parents, Maureen and Bruce's home in Indiana, were a summer priority and meeting half-way for a long weekend together during the school year became a routine.  We created "family" relationships with some close friends and invited people who were without family to our home at holiday times to bring more of a celebration to the day.  We started our own traditions (like going out for Chinese food on Christmas Day).   But as the years continued our own family numbers became smaller and it was hard "not to notice".

Both my life partner and I grew up living near our extended families and have shared stories of both the functionality and dysfunction that is part of that package.  We agree we missed the abundance of that good and bad family stuff raising our own children. There was some but our kids focus was on us and all our craziness   .....It would have been nice to spread it out and give us a break!

Back in a few days with pictures of our family gathering.

Beginnings

My fingers (though suspended and frozen over the keyboard for several minutes) have finally begun to move. Hopefully my brain will catch some kind of a rhythm. If I can quiet my monkey mind long enough to jumpstart the wild mind, perhaps I'll be "off and blogging".  I keep reminding myself this is an experiment, it's personal, I don't have to share with anyone yet.  Just try it...you might like it!

After a cross country move I have been unpacking boxes of personal items and found several journals I kept at various tormented times throughout my life.  Most of them were hilarious to read....so full of angst and suffering that I was immediately inspired to throw them in the trash can. Journals of this pathetic nature should never be recycled and it should never be left to chance that after your death someone would open them up and read that drivel.  I'm relieved that the trash will be collected on Friday and that today is Wednesday.  OK, some of it was emotionally powerful and pretty revealing.  But, overall I was left with a giddy feeling of coming full circle and truly knowing myself. Turing sixty does something mystical to your inner psyche.  There almost seems to be an inner toggle switch that gets thrown and suddenly you have a perspective on your life that can't happen in your 40's or 50's. You keep trying to throw that switch but it  won't budge.  I believe it's a rite of passage attached to turning 60...a gift, a portal you pass through.  You are quite suddenly on the other side, looking back, smiling and wondering what all that suffering was about. It's not my intent to minimize the natural process of going through life crises.   I just finally understand what people are talking about when they say they wish they had the life wisdom they have in their sixties and could couple that with the physical capacity they had in their thirties and forties. 

There were some really lovely things that surfaced in the unpacking that made me incredibly grateful that I now have time to read through cards and notes I've collected over the years.  I wish I'd saved more of them.  But here is one that I found today that is worth posting and sharing.   It is from one of my women friends and speaks to all my women friends, who I miss and draw incredible support from at all times in my life.

For the Love of the World - by Charlotte Tall Mountain

For the love of a tree, she went out on a limb

For the love of the sea, she rocked the boat

For the love of the earth, she dug deeper

For the love of community, she mended fences

For the love of the stars, she let her light shine

For the love of spirit, she nurtured her soul

For the love of a good time, she sowed happy seeds

For the love of the Goddess, she drew down the moon

For the love of nature, she made compost

For the love of a good meal, she gave thanks

For the love of family, she reconciled differences

For the love of creativity, she entertained new possibilities

For the love of her enemies, she suspended judgment

For the love of herself, she acknowledged her worth

And the world was richer for her