Sunday, July 11, 2010

Family Vacation


Friday begins our extended family's yearly vacation to the beach. Though not quite as messed up or as funny as the Chevy Chase version, I have begun pre-praying up for peace and fun to reign. I'm looking forward to walks together on the beach, games, reminiscing, maybe some silly dancing. It will definitely be fun, but it is always different combining three households just for the week.


When I was a kid, I didn't think about family much. Everyone's parents remained married. If my friends' families had steps, I didn't realize. I thought I lived in the perfect family, a supremely 'functional' family. I thought my parents were Ozzie and Harriet, and I really thought all families that were 'normal' operated just like ours. I now realize that all families are slightly dysfunctional, and anyone who grows up in a family loved is extremely blessed. I've heard Michelle Obama, our first lady, attributed with saying that the most important thing to do as a parent is to assure our children they are loved. I know, without a doubt, that myself and my only sister were, and are, extremely loved.


When I was in college, as a Psychology major at a liberal, brilliant college, aka UNC, I was exposed to some fascinating internships. An early one, at John Umstead Psychiatric Hospital, later became the fodder for a dead-on film, Shutter Island. (joking!)((about the film, not the internship)) I don't know who the genius psycho-therapist was who thought it was a good idea for college students to have social time in the dark dancing with people involuntarily committed. However, I did learn a smashing Electric Slide. But, I digress. Another internship was spent as a Guardian Ad Litem. This is a super advocacy program that pairs volunteers with children who have found themselves in the foster care system. A GAL has the express purpose of speaking only on behalf of the child, in court and in all settings. I am amazed, to this day, at the ignorant and unspeakable things parents will do to their children. It is indeed essential that a parent, first and foremost, love a child.


Back to my family. I'm not going to dish a bunch of juicy dirt. That'd be disloyal. I will say that I always thought that there was only one way of doing anything. It was the way we did it. The way the rest of ya'll did it was just weird! I have found, like many adult children do, I strived to do some things differently, and still have become my parents in unexpected ways. I have found it freeing to form our own 'family' rules with my husband. I have found it sad to realize my influence and decisions have limits with my own kids, probably not unlike my parents found. I have come to realize that my college thinking on nature vs. nurture was naive, uneducated. We don't enter the world a blank slate, ready to be written. We are formed in the womb, at least partly shaped by our heredity, our anatomy.


My kids amaze me daily with their inherent personality differences. They are exposed to the same pressure cooker, Kelly family life, with the same rules and priorities, but their reactions are as varied as they are similar. I love them ALL with a passion that is sometimes frightening, but they constantly weigh the love I dish out....each of them claiming they come up short. Wouldn't it be easy if they were each grown in a petri dish, and I (and my lovie) just had to measure the good stuff we doled out? Wouldn't it be nice if there was a formula for perfect families? raising perfect children...who grew up to be perfect people?


As I have aged, (like a fine wine;) BTW, those who read "Wine to Water"...the fast is over!) I have come to appreciate imperfection. I have come to appreciate it in myself, like battle scars, life memories, lessons learned. I think I have come to appreciate my less than perfect childhood family too. I hope I have, I hope I have learned to value what I have. I am loved. And, I undoubtedly, passionately, unconditionally, love them all back. I am blessed.




For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother's womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well. My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place. When I was woven together in the depths of the earth, your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be. Psalm 139:13-16

1 comment:

  1. Vacations are not perfect, but as I have told my grand-children, they are to create memories. Ones that will last a life time, I hope, and to remind all of the family how much they are loved and cherished. Time together that they will never get back.

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