Branded

My family’s not perfect. I’d be a blind idiot to think otherwise, because my family is comprised of people; by association, since people are imperfect, flawed-so is my family to a degree.

Family became that much more important to me when I buried my little sister. It was always important, but when I buried my sister, there was a thought that cut through the haze of mourning and grief like the light beam of a lighthouse: I was nineteen and all of that remained of my family was my mother. When I say family in this sense, I’m talking what most refer to as immediate family, I’m talking about the family members that were there while I grew up, that were a huge part of my life, people that have built memories with me. For me, that’s my mom, my dad and my sister. I’ve lost the people I could reminisce with about the things that happened while I was growing up. I’m not going to have the phone calls that my mom and my aunt have. I’m not going to have talks or discussions over DIY projects with my dad about life philosophies or how I can work on my mom in regards to updating some key electronics. I’m not ever going to know the people they were or were going to be. Ever.

What I have of my dad are the memories a twelve year old girl has of her her father and what memories my mom shares with me about the man he was. I have 17 years of the trials, tribulations and who can get who in the most trouble a sibling has of their sibling. I only have a handful of sisterly memories that are the keystones of sistership- time ran out to build them. It shouldn’t be any surprise the the relationship between my mother is one that is strong and treasured, helped by the fact that as a person, I actually like my mom.

All of the above is why I was so angry with my aunt and uncle when news of my cousin’s loss hit me. And while I heard them when we all talked that they got there as soon as they could, I don’t waver from my stance of..no you didn’t. But I’ll concede that my bias on this is huge. It may even be a little arrogant. I know what kind of pain is on the horizon and having been through both ends of the spectrum of not having a chance to say goodbye and having that chance, my own experience was talking loudly, ok shouting and waving flags in my head, that she needs someone NOW. To which a kind of helplessness crept on me because in the hierarchy of things, it wasn’t my place, my mom’s place. In that regard, we’re not part of the family, the people that make up a huge part of her life. But that fact didn’t keep up from hoping that the people who did understood that she needed them long before she told them the tragic news.

I thought I’d feel something walking into that funeral home. Leading up to it, I couldn’t help but recall flashes of events that happened when my dad and sister passed on. I recalled giving my sister’s eulogy, how much I didn’t want to place a rose on my dad’s coffin -no one asked me if that’s what I had wanted, sitting there choosing coffins, planning the services, making sure that family that flew in had places to stay- just bits and pieces of two very much intact span of memories. I thought that in the least, I’d feel some sort of aversion. I was as much an observer as I am in most situations among people I don’t know well or at all. I watched people. I watched my cousin, her sister, their parents, even the step parents [of which I got flashes back to my own hideous grandmother at my father’s funeral]. I could tell that my cousin just wanted to pick up her boy and hold him. I’d say I can’t imagine what it felt like, but I know what it felt like. I wanted to pet my sister’s hair at her wake, because she liked it and made her feel safe. ‘Safe now.’ My mom didn’t like being there. I don’t blame her.

The tears that welled in my eyes were more because of how much I knew they were hurting and how sorry I was that they now know that pain. How sorry I was that her sister and her parents knew the kind of helplessness that come with family that’s hurting and there is little you can do about it. How sorry they know those kinds of pain, that they’ll have those scars.

‘I just want him back’

I wanted to say a lot those days we were there. I couldn’t bring myself to say much, to tell her it gets easier in time, but it will still hurt, just differently. At the same time I did. It’s been well over ten years and ‘I just want them back.’