Reminder to Myself

Many years ago, when dealing with holiday angst, I realized something vital and important. I'd been watching a movie where the family all came together on a snowy November Thanksgiving Day, gathered around the table and laughter arose. "WHY ," I cried out, "can't my family be like that one?" Well then it hit me. These people weren't family! They were merely actors being paid to portray an idealistic view of a family. Had it been a real family I am sure the air at the table would have been rife with petty annoyances, jealousies, unforgiveness, anger, hurt...Hidden, or not, under laughter and teasing and polite conversation.

This past month I've dealt with a head-on crash course in that reminder. I find myself angry, upset, aggravated, hurt, frustrated. And confused on so many levels, I could barely sort myself out. At this time of life, the last thing I need is more confusion! I get quite enough as it is with the hormonal (or as my daughter insisted on calling them "Horror moans") changes. And I mightily dislike the bitter, complaining, whining woman I become when I try to tell others of the sheer perfidy, the angst, the manipulations of family relationships by one family member or another.

Which leaves me wondering why we are born into a family? How is it we feel alienated from the very people who are related to us by blood and genetics? And how is it that we are formed by that family into a person alien to them? Why do I feel like a stranger amongst my own people?

True, even within my own home there are those children who feel alienated by our beliefs and philosophies and who seek to distance themselves physically, mentally, and spiritually...but in the end, aren't we all we've got? And in the end, shouldn't we all just try to get along? And why is it that some are expected to go far greater distances to get along than others who prefer to wallow in their mucky messes?

Family....Now there's a real mystery of life!