Body of Work: Inheriting an extended family
I missed my mom a lot this weekend. I mean, it was mother's day, so I am contractually obligated to miss her, you know, as a dutiful daughter who does not have a heart of stone. But I also realized that it's been about a month since I've seen her, and it's going to be another five months, probably, before I see her again, and that made me sad. I called her on Sunday, and got her voicemail; she called me back, and got my voicemail. We keep missing each other. You know what I mean.
I missed her a lot Sunday afternoon, when we went to E's family's barbecue--all twelve million people in his family, flying through the house with giant bowls of potato salad under their arms, and baskets of chips and dips and fruits and wine and more fruit and more kinds of salad. They were grilling steaks the size of my face. That is not an exaggeration for comedic effect. There were stacks of hamburgers and platefuls of hot dogs and a bunch of chicken and everything was covered in Cajun spices and more delicious than it had any right to be.
We drank a lot of wine and put a lot of food in our faces, yet more kept coming. We played badminton. I am very bad at badminton, and blame my poor depth perception, which I didn't know I had before, and for which I was mocked, which is rude. It is unfair to mock the handicapped. It is hard to play badminton with a glass of wine in your hand. I cut up pineapple for a four year old and helped the old dog down off the porch and talked about shorts with a cousin and sex with an aunt and growing hops with another cousin and making ice cream with an uncle and cut the tops off strawberries for a six year old. It was hard to sit down for longer than it takes to eat a hot dog. My wine glass was always full.
They are a big family, and it's pretty wonderful. We sat in the back yard (and ran and dodged and ate and whacked shuttlecocks) and I realized that really, this was the best of all possible worlds. That I lucked into this huge, crazy, incredibly kind family who love me almost as much as they love E, and that is a lot. I am as astonished as you are. I have always wanted a big family, and look at this. Look at them. That's a lot of family. That's a lot of kindness. Why do they all kick my ass at badminton?
But I missed my little family. We are a little family, and I think we do okay in the wonderful department. It makes me sad that I am so much a part of E's family, and he has not yet met the people who are so important to me. I can't wait for you to meet my mom, I tell him. I can't wait for you to meet my brother, and his wife, and my aunts. I really can't wait. They will love him, I think, as much as they love me, will be as good to him as his family is to me. I am impatient to--repay, I guess, this feeling I get when I am sitting in the midst of all of these people who are suddenly my extended family. Who make me feel so much less far away from my own family.
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