I'm channeling Ben Stein as the boring teacher. "The war of 1812 was fought in the year...? Anyone? ...Anyone?
I was reading the past blog posts and while I enjoyed writing them, only Ellie ever commented or tried to play with me!
Maybe because I'm the mom, but mostly because I have a tender heart, it is important to me for our family to grow closer. To me that means trying to know each other for who we are now, and not relying on old conceptions. I realize that part of being family is sharing a history. I think that is incredibly valuable. It at least gives some context for why we have become who we have become, as well as giving grounds for a kind of family shorthand. When a particular event or era is referred to, the whole story doesn't necessarily need to be told. A phrase or a single word communicates the shared idea of the experience.
I realize that it is MY need to grow closer that I am putting out here. How would all of you propose to accomplish that need? As a corollary, is there a need others feel, or is everyone else fine the way it is?
I've considered why I feel we are distant, and offer the following explanation as it applies to me. As we've transitioned into all adults, I find that I enjoy watching the changes, but that our ways of relating to each other haven't kept up. Maybe as a parent, you 'children' expect me to still consider you as I did when you were children. That would certainly affect our relationship. If one is expecting to be treated as the person they were in an earlier time, then the relationship could get stuck in the past, using past communication types. That is not satisfying for me, because I am continuing to change, and I hope as I grow, my ability to be genuine, to be warm, and to consider others' growth will also deepen.
Gotta go to choir now, but I want to post in hopes that more of you will respond.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
3 comments:
I think everyone is on Facebook so my suggestion would be to create a group for us to share our stories. It would make it easier to respond to each other and post stories since we all check it multiple times a week (if not during the day). The Facebook group also allows for short quips, much longer stories, photos, links, and videos. Another suggestion in the getting to know each other arena is to do a weekly happy list. Daniel and I used to do a daily 5 item happy list and that was so much fun to see.
I agree that as we've grown we have each changed in our own ways. Some of us are online all the time updating statuses and some just aren't and that's fine. I think it would be fun to share stories, things from our days and just little quips or photos, thoughts, whatever. Whether that's here or a Facebook group or somewhere else, that'd be great.
I've always been so terrible at keeping in touch or even starting conversation. I love talking to each of you so so much but find it so hard in my own nature, to start the conversation. Miss you all so much but just can't seem to bring myself to write or call or whatever. Lots of guilt behind that but maybe in a place where we are all comfortable and in a format we're all cool with, it would really work and perhaps even I could keep in touch! Love you each so much and thank you Sue for lighting the fire. It's so appreciated, esp for those of us in the family who just stink at starting it ourselves. :)
thanks--Victoria, Daniel, James & Ellie: Let's do facebook. I'll be happy to start it and set the privacy for just our group. Victoria, if you could model what you mean by a happy list, that would be cool. The daily life stuff would also be nice.In addition,I'm also interested in what people think and believe philosophically, because we pretty much all come from different places.
Daniel--no guilt necessary. We all share responsibility on that point! I AM encouraging open minds without pre-conceived ideas about who the other is. I'm not sure we've (collective--all of us--we)fully appreciated the current people we've become. Let's use what we have of our shared history (varied as that is!)but forge new ties based on ever-changing current conceptions of who we are.
Post a Comment