Thoughts on Family

Kira is in town visiting, so last night the family all headed over to her parents' house for dinner and chit chat. Lately, I've been asking about how my aunties and uncles found each other. Most of them were from different towns, so I wasn't sure. It's amazing how you can live most of your life without being curious about the origin of your family unit. Then one day you look around and think: How did this happen?

I've written before about how my grandparents met, but I love to tell the story, so I will again. Their first date was prom senior year. They were together forever after that. I do wish I knew how that date came to be. Did Grandpa call Grandma? Come to her house? How did they know each other? Perhaps one of the aunties or uncles can share that story some day.

I know I write a lot about marriage or lack of marriage. We'll, here's why... No one in my family is divorced. They've all been married for 35+ years. I know. Shocking, right?

To clarify, at the moment, I'm speaking about Pa's family. But Ma's is the same way. Her siblings had/have lifelong marriages as well. Pa is one of four. Two boys and two girls. They all met and married quite early. Ma and Pa were the last of the group, even though Pa is the second oldest. I started getting curious about how everyone met sometime last year when I was home, so I asked Pa to tell me how California aunt (the only one who moved away) met her husband. Then last week, I asked Kira's mom to tell me how she met her husband. And then last night I asked my godmother to tell me how she met hers. Godmother has been married to my uncle for 42 years. Dude. That's a long time. And to this day, she still has a sparkle in her eye for him. As we all passed around my cousin's new baby and cooed at him, I spied Godmother giving uncle a tiny back rub. Too cute.

Last week when I was talking to Kira's mother about marriage, I confessed that it makes me sad that I won't have the opportunity to have that kind of time with someone because I'm older. There will be no opportunity for a 50th wedding anniversary, etc. I remember going to the celebration for my grandparents' 50th. I was in 5th or 6th grade. The church filled up with so many friends and relatives and we all stood at the front of the room while Grandpa said a few words. By then, Grandma's Alzheimer's had kicked in, so it was a little sad. And Ma, precious Ma, was standing there in a wig because of her cancer. But we were all there, and even though I was very very young, I realized there was something magical about my grandparents' creation. I looked around me at this huge family and the matriarch and patriarch and thought: Wow. Look at what they made. They weren't just making babies. They were making solid, lovely family units that spread out their tiny branches all over the place.

At the beginning of the earthworm book I'm reading, Amy Stewart talks about an illustration of an apple tree she has in her office. She writes:

"The tree itself is only five or six feet tall, but the roots spread much wider than the outer boundary of the tree's canopy...

When I turn the picture upside down, so that the roots are on top and tree is underneath, a much more graceful creature emerges. The limbs run like rivers in every direction. The shape of the root system is perfect, as airy and symmetrical as any arborist could hope to achieve through years of careful pruning."

I like to think of my extended family this way--like all of those luscious roots spreading out deep into the farmlands of Iowa. And it saddens me from time to time that I'm not contributing my own knotty root system to the tree. Why is my little cousin, who is two years younger than me, having a child before I do? Why do I not have some fantastic story about meeting my husband at a dance in high school?

Now before you get all stirred up and start giving me marriage statistics about people who got married in high school and that I'll find the right man when it's time and blah blah blah, just hear me out.

I get to mourn this. I have that right. I have a giant, beautiful family full of aunties and uncles and little children all over the place. And I truly wish that I could share in this bonding process with them. They have not had the opportunity to welcome me in that way. Sure, they met ex at many family gatherings, and they were willing to bring him into the fold. In fact, I often felt like he enjoyed my family more than his own. But as far as having the opportunity to create more Blondersons or at least celebrate a new marriage with them? Nope. Didn't happen thus far. And even though they love me Just the Way I Am, I know they would love for me to find the right person, too. We all wish that happiness for our family. There is one other cousin out there who is like me--Chicago Cousin. So I am not totally alone in my singleness. We share that bond. I'm not sure whether it bothers her or not, and I certainly can't speak for her. But I know it does bother me, when I'm sitting there surrounded by all of their wedding photos and school photos and Christmas cards on the refrigerator. I realize there are no photos of me. Because I don't send any. Because I don't have any reason to send a photo of myself. It seems odd. Lonely.

Kira's father recently bought a new planter, so that was a topic of great discussion last night. As I stood talking to Kira and Oldest Male Cousin, I asked how the planter works. I said, "Do you dig holes?" He said, and I quote: "What have you been smoking?" He looked at me with total bewilderment as I shouted back, "Dad was a mechanical engineer!" Yes, all of my family members farm, but Pa went out and had a different career. Cousin fired back, "We were in your back yard that whole time!" Yes. Yes, they were. But I was little and I didn't understand. I didn't care about learning how to farm, I just wanted to ride the tractors and chase cousins. So Oldest Cousin calmly explained to me how a planter works. He dumbed it down, thank gawd. And so my education began. If I can't contribute to the Family Tree, at least I can learn more about it. So then I learned how he met his wife, too. And I tickled his children. And he told me I can come over and go out farming with him whenever I want. I will. Because I want to learn and Be a Part of It in whichever ways I can.

Oldest Cousin and I always got along, but he was a boy and he's older than me and he just kind of drifted off from the core group of girls and became Adult at a very young age. He always sat at the grownup table. He talked farming. And so I've gone through life without really knowing him very well. A few years back, he moved into his parents' house, so now he lives across from the road from the Nerds. I was asking him if I could have some corn for a project and he said yes. I told him I would need to grind it up and his two children piped up that they own two grinders. Well, at least SOMEONE's children know about farming. Sigh. So I will go over and learn all about it and tickle the children while I'm there. And maybe, slowly, I can figure it out after all.