What it means to have family and to stay with your family means it has some sense of identity, even the crazy stories to tell.
I’ve watched what it’s like for friends to have no stories to tell about their families. Sometimes it’s a relief. Sometimes it leaves people feeling rudderless. Sometimes it’s crushing, to not have any family at all to be connected to. Some people don’t care.
I realized this weekend that just doing basic chores for my aunt, like helping her sort her closet now that her arms are weak, feels deeply connecting and real. I don’t feel I’m “missing out.” It feels like this is real life.
I don’t have to wonder if my time all afternoon made any difference or if I even enjoyed myself. I enjoyed myself because my aunt is charming, has always been there for me and has made a difference in my life. I was and am able to help her with some practical things that her illness has made harder for her to do.
So family. It’s complicated often. Rarely without triggers and pain. Hopefully full of connection, joy and richness. Hopefully full of that sense of tribe and meaning and an extension of yourself into other people. It doesn’t always work out that way.
I was talking to my aunt this weekend that at 52, I’ve realized it’s not easy to maintain relationships of any kind across the decades. The honeymoon wears off and you start to understand the other person’s strengths and weaknesses. Sometimes those are acceptable; sometimes they’re too painful. Usually people have to adapt in some way as everyone changes. Growth can make a relationship have a better chance of surviving, but less chance if the other person doesn’t expand or grow at all.
We’ve spent much of the weekend talking about relationships: siblings, parents, friends, childhoods, careers, dreams and hopes and failures. There are very few I can cover the spectrum with like I can with her. It feels like a gift.
My aunt has a home in San Francisco that she bought 35 years ago and has grown tremendously in value. She has decorated and remodeled it. She’s painted, put in a garden, transformed it to a chalet by the sea. I feel so privileged to just be around someone so wise and caring, someone who’s always had my back, someone who has made it through some of the greatest adversities of life, from a chaotic, love-starved childhood to a failed marriage, health issues and the need to reinvent herself to make a living in an expensive town. She did all this largely on her own strength, smarts and merit. She was willing to change, to grow, listen and buckle down over and over again. Who wouldn’t want to spend time w/ an elder like that?
I’m here another two days then flying back home. I’ll take the warmth and beauty with me, holding them in my heart for fire and inspiration, for warmth and courage. She’s a fire in my soul and is filling some of the holes the rest of the family has made.
How strange it all is.
San Francisco, CA