But it turns out that that insularity happens all on its own. Once your kids are in school--sooner if you actually try to keep your tots on a schedule--week nights find you and your family, at home, alone. There in the familial bosom, there are few dinners out, even fewer friends invited in, and nary a phone call answered or returned during the witching hours from 6:00 to 9:00 when baths must be given, books read, and bedtime enforced. Certainly when you're falling in love with your future mate no one tells you that raising kids, especially that forced march from food prep to night lights on, is the marital equivalent of driving through Kansas, where, as my father says, there's nothing to see but miles and miles of nothing but miles and miles. Anyone can be enraptured at the sight of the Grand Canyon. Now I know that the real trick is to enjoy the cornfields.
Wednesday, August 27, 2008
Doing Family Time
This first week of school reminds me how insular families can be. When I was single in the mid-1990s and new to Washington, I remember when a mom barked at me to move away from a monument where I was trying to read the inscription. Her family, I was told, needed a photo, but the subtext was that the mere fact of being a family trumped any experience I could possibly have. Standing to the side of that monument waiting for the shutter to click, I promised myself that if I ever had a family of my own, I would be inclusive.
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3 comments:
I enjoy driving through the cornfields with you.
We really are friends talking in the night, at least according to my clock here in London.
Our family of four is pretty insular right now (we don't have any friends in this new place yet). It's interesting... we're very excited about this adventure but feeling homesick at the same time. I didn't expect to feel this way, 30 years after my first sleep-away camp experience and with my own family in tow. Family cacoons are necessary and wonderful at times, but I prefer to keep the door open most days. Thank goodness for your new blog and for our talks in the night. xo Nancy
Your "cornfield"post addressed something that I struggle with and think about daily. Being such a small family - just me and Teddy - I often feel I am not enough. And I feel shut out from more "complete" families because they are busy being a clan. This life is something with which to reckon. A friend of mine says, about raising kids, the hours are interminable and the years evaporate. How true.
I love your blog, Linda.
Lisa
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