Family

My grandmother’s 103rd birthday celebration officially kicks off today with our weekly Wednesday Winers dinner being attended by a few out of town guests. The remainder of the party attendees will arrive tomorrow and the next day; by Saturday all of my aunts and uncles will be here for the birthday party.

It is hard to imagine a family gathering without my mother in attendance. The eldest of my grandmother’s ten children, gone now for almost twenty years, her absence will be hard to reconcile. No one loved a family reunion more than mom. It was she who instilled in me the respect and awe I have for family. I learned at a young age that family ties were the relationships that mattered – every letter, phone call or visit from a relative was cherished. Family trumped every other relationship.

My mother had a slew of wonderful friends, neighbors and co-workers, all vying to become a part of her inner circle, not knowing they lacked the “golden ticket.” In order to become one of my mother’s closest friends and confidants you had to be family. Mother had a knack for making others feel special and everyone wanted to be her best friend. Everyone wanted my mother’s light to shine upon them – to be her best friend. She was fun and outgoing, she was beautiful and charismatic but she never let anyone get as close to her as her family members. She held everyone else at bay, only letting kin, specifically her siblings, into the inner circle.

Spanning a twenty year time frame, my mother and her nine siblings were the clique everyone wanted to join, but couldn’t, because they didn’t have the requirements for membership – you had to be family. Cousins were allowed in, but ordinary people weren’t. Like a private club whose membership requirements were a secret – the family group was exclusive. Much like the Kennedy clan, we considered ourselves special and somehow, untouchable. All of that changed when my mother was diagnosed with cancer at an early age and passed away at fifty-seven. Suddenly the family was vulnerable. A year later my Uncle Ron died of the same cancer that took Mother; we were mortal after all.

On the opening day of my 103 year old grandmother’s birthday it is hard to remember that mortality is eminent. On the eve of my grandmother’s birthday I want to thank my mother for the legacy she left me; entrée into this special family circle and the sense to know what a fabulous family I had the good fortune to be born into.