Boy oh boy have I been thinking about this lately. Little bit about me: I was born in Michigan, almost everyone I am directly related to still lives there, and I have spent 22 of my 25 years of life in Utah. Vacations, holidays, and Sunday dinners were spent with neighbors, friends from church, or someone my mom once met at a craft fair. (I’m not joking. Thanksgiving, somewhere between the years of 2010-2012.)
I think about this often - about how the people I would consider my family don’t share a name or DNA. How the ways they have been my mothers or my sisters or my cousins in ways my actual family never could.
My last grandparent passed away recently. I only ever knew two of the four to begin with, but now I am nobody’s grandchild. My maternal grandparents passed well before I was born and sometimes I wonder how much of them I carry around with me. If my grandmother would ever want to hear me laugh or if my grandfather would send me birthday cards. The grandparents I did meet aren’t much to write about. Their funerals weren’t well attended and I find myself trying to make sure I live my life in spite of them, rather than because of. In the 20 years we lived in the same house outside of Salt Lake City, they came to visit one time. I almost thought it was weird when my friends or classmates would talk about being with their grandparents and going on a trip or having dinner with them or their family visiting them much at all. That was so unfamiliar to me. We have a few Gold Star family members that have come to see us more than a few times - but other than that, the family we do have has been built.
Built through a lot of years of connection and conflict and time spent together. I try to remind people that I love them through baked goods. I wait in hospital waiting rooms, I bring meals when a burden needs to be relieved, and I decorate for the baby shower before everyone arrives. I have been on both sides of being hurt and both sought and offered forgiveness. Working through things - is this family?
I recently had the opportunity to make a wedding cake for a dear friend. I feel so deeply honored that she wanted me involved on her big day. I feel so lucky to know and love her. We met when I was around 10 years old. She is the reason I had friends in high school. She is inclusive to her core and she is a sister I never had. Watching her walk down the aisle felt like I was watching something so sacred. She is loved by so many and I am just one in a sea of people. She is one of many people who has and continues to choose to love me and chooses to be my family. I hope there is never a time where I can’t call her to hear her laugh. Is that what family is like?
A group of our friends plans adventures with us and pool parties and shows up for our birthdays. We can call them when we have a flat tire and they call us when they need help moving a couch. My coworker asks for my help when she needs someone to pick up her son from school. The boy I used to nanny asks me to pluck his eyebrows. (He’s 15 and honestly I can’t bear the thought of him walking around with a unibrow.) The intimate things that we get to share in life - is that family?
I’m very happy with the gaggle of people I have collected around me. I was thinking about ways that the different people in my life have been my family in big ways and little, and I would like to share the list I came up with. (Each she/he/they is a different person, but I figured I wouldn’t share their names. Yannow, for the thousands of people that ~obviously~ read this newsletter).
She feeds me with her family on a random Sunday night. She calls me every time she walks to Target, because, as she says, “I want to hear about your life as often as I visit my favorite store.” He flies out to visit every few years because he wants to see me and my life. I visited her after her surgery and we She hugs me every time she sees me because I, “look like I could use a hug from a mom.” She texts me every year, on the same holiday, because we both need someone to lean on on the same day. She knows my work schedule as well as I do. They care about my husband as much as they care about me. He calls me when he’s at a store near my house, to see if I need anything. He tells me it doesn’t matter where I am, if my car battery dies, I can call him and he’ll be there. She sends me haircare recommendations. She sends me Marco Polos to tell me about her kids. They call to sing me happy birthday, every year. They make me a latte every time I visit them, no matter what time of day. He asks what to get her for her birthday. She sends me a song she thinks I’d like, every time she hears one. Is this what family is? I think so.
So lovely, Shelby! And it’s making me think about how my people show up for me, and how I can better show up for them ❤️
I love this so much!