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So, I missed this year's Superbowl - though I did catch the radio broadcast. Spent Saturday going down to Norfolk Naval Station for work, and Sunday driving up and back to Queens for a funeral.
Friday, my father's aunt Sarah passed away at the age of 93.
She'd been in declining health for some time, but this is not unlike losing another gandmother. For all the talk about how wonderful the families we make our own are, there are some things a good, loving, and large extended family that can give you, that no manner of developed family in adolesence or adulthood can replace. I can see it everyday when I look at my parents... At the wondeful extended family my father grew up in, and the considerably less wonderful family my mother came from.
My grandfather was one of seven siblings, and now only the two youngest (Aunt Zelda and Uncle Ray) are the only ones left. For most of my life, Aunt Sarah was the matriarch of our clan - summers when she would play hostess to as many of the cousins as possible. Where family meant hugs, food, card games, encouragement, and love. My Aunt had a wicked sense of humor, an eye for family tradition, and Yiddush expressions for every occasion. She crocheted blankets, and cooked. And she told us all that we were her favorite.
I have a pretty large number of cousins. We don't see each other all that often, but things are wonderful whenever we do. Even yesterday after the funeral. We ate, and reminisced, and talked about the things going on in our lives... I know how hard my aunts and uncle worked to keep the family close after kids grew up and moved away from New York, and as their brothers and sister died. No matter what had gone by, wherever my Aunt Sarah went - that was always home. And so when she passed, we came. Yesterday, at my cousin's home, we reminisced, we hugged, we cried, and we ate. Boy did we eat. And I know my Aunt would have smiled at that.
And it's a reminder to me, that I'm 29 and I don't have a wife or kids yet. And while I'm not particularly pressed or in a hurry - I want to be able to raise children as part of the sort of large, loving family that my father grew up in. That, through him, I grew up in. And it is times like this that I'll worry that I'll have my children so late in life that there will be so many wonderful relatives that they won't get to know. I don't know that it means I'll change my priorities. But it's something I think about.
But mostly, I think about what my cousins and I can do to carry on the legacy that my grandparents generation has left. And it makes me want to find more time for them.
Friday, my father's aunt Sarah passed away at the age of 93.
She'd been in declining health for some time, but this is not unlike losing another gandmother. For all the talk about how wonderful the families we make our own are, there are some things a good, loving, and large extended family that can give you, that no manner of developed family in adolesence or adulthood can replace. I can see it everyday when I look at my parents... At the wondeful extended family my father grew up in, and the considerably less wonderful family my mother came from.
My grandfather was one of seven siblings, and now only the two youngest (Aunt Zelda and Uncle Ray) are the only ones left. For most of my life, Aunt Sarah was the matriarch of our clan - summers when she would play hostess to as many of the cousins as possible. Where family meant hugs, food, card games, encouragement, and love. My Aunt had a wicked sense of humor, an eye for family tradition, and Yiddush expressions for every occasion. She crocheted blankets, and cooked. And she told us all that we were her favorite.
I have a pretty large number of cousins. We don't see each other all that often, but things are wonderful whenever we do. Even yesterday after the funeral. We ate, and reminisced, and talked about the things going on in our lives... I know how hard my aunts and uncle worked to keep the family close after kids grew up and moved away from New York, and as their brothers and sister died. No matter what had gone by, wherever my Aunt Sarah went - that was always home. And so when she passed, we came. Yesterday, at my cousin's home, we reminisced, we hugged, we cried, and we ate. Boy did we eat. And I know my Aunt would have smiled at that.
And it's a reminder to me, that I'm 29 and I don't have a wife or kids yet. And while I'm not particularly pressed or in a hurry - I want to be able to raise children as part of the sort of large, loving family that my father grew up in. That, through him, I grew up in. And it is times like this that I'll worry that I'll have my children so late in life that there will be so many wonderful relatives that they won't get to know. I don't know that it means I'll change my priorities. But it's something I think about.
But mostly, I think about what my cousins and I can do to carry on the legacy that my grandparents generation has left. And it makes me want to find more time for them.
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I cannot begin to understand what it's like to have such a large family around you, having lost my parents when I was very young. I do regret the fact that the children never got to meet them and that they missed the whole family interaction thing; neither my husband or I have much family, and those we do have prefer not to acknowledge us.
For the record, my partner was 36 when we had our first child, so don't feel that you have to rush into anything.
Children have a wonderful capacity to accept things the way they are.
no subject
And I certainly count my blessings, because of what I've been fortunate enough to have. My parents (and my immediate family) weren't close with their siblings (or their families) but we've had a wonderful extended family. I've been fortunate in that regard.
I don't feel an immediate rush to have children yet - many of my relatives have done so later in life, and some have not had children at all. But the urge to start a family does float in the background. My grandfather was 67 when I was born, and he didn't live to see my Bar-Mitzvah. As my own father nears the age of 60, it's something I'm increasingly aware of.
I know I'm not particularly ready or inclined to have a family anytime soon, but I do think I want one eventually, and I really don't want to contemplate raising a child, and not having my father or mother alive to be able to see them.
So at some point, I'll have to reassess what my priorities in life are, and whether I need to make changes to meet them. I like being an unattached bachelor... but I don't want to look back when I'm older and feel like I missed something either...