Families, Forever

I was raised to believe that "Families are Forever". It is a fundamental tenet of the Mormon faith. Although I once told my mom that the doctrine, if true, was proof the there IS a Hell, it is something I still believe, in a back handed sort of way. Those we connect with carry that connection into other lives, and a piece of us carries into new worlds.

My children, and my friends, carry my influence in their lives, like a radioactively 'tagged' molecule, in their emotional DNA. And I carry in my DNA all of the love and hurt I've felt. Some of that love, and some of those hurts, can be identified at the source. Family of origin is undoubtedly the source of much of the early, and therefore very strong, emotional imprint I carry with me. But I have noticed, over the last year, that my family of origin no longer shapes my emotional life.

As I look at all of the people I have told "I love you" over the past year, as I look at all of the people who have shown love to me, it dawns on me-- very few of those people are blood relatives. My emotional family has grwon smaller, in some ways- few of my siblings make the list. But is actually much larger than it was the year before. As I have opened up emotionally, and shown and expressed love to people in my life who nourish my best self, I have expanded the scope, breadth, and depth of the familial love I feel.

It is not that I do NOT love my parents, and my brothers and sisters. But in may ways, they have become less relevant in my life, just as I have faded from their lives. It is normal, and natural. I have strengthened the bod with some of my siblings, and I have added to my connection with them, just as I have also added new levels of connection to friends that are part of my newer 'family'.

When my brother Joe first moved to college in Salt Lake, he lived with a group of friends that (he one day told me) were his 'real' family. I was a recent college grad, and I KNEW EVERYTHING. So I told him that they didn't really love him the way family did, and that family was a place where no matter what, if you go to them, they have to take you in.

I was partially right, but so was Joe. And as for that last part? When I contemplate the idea that someday I might have to go to my family and wait for them to take me in, I think to myself-- maybe there really IS a hell.