a year now…

It’s been a whirlwind year. I find it hard to believe it’s almost Thanksgiving again. Mike turned 40… in true Mike fashion, quite uneventfully. Griff turned 13… in true little Mike fashion, equally easily. Eliza turned eight, and it was a big, fat deal. Mike has presented at two conferences (we’re quite proud, if a little jealous of his travels), and I was promoted at work (and given the way things have gone thus far, quite convinced I made the wrong choice in moving up). My brother got divorced and remarried this year (he’ll always be able to refer to 2011 as his ultimate comeback year.

As always, I’m ready to get along to the Christmas season. I’ve finished most of my shopping, and I’m ready to start wrapping so I have things to put under my tree when we put in up in a week.

But this year, I find myself thinking a lot about my parents. It’s been 15 months since, on my 16th  anniversary, they sent me a letter telling me how my marriage was in danger. It’s been a year since they chose not to come visit us any longer because they cannot abide by the one request I made and set up as our ‘house rule.’ The House Rule is to keep whatever they think we’re doing wrong with our lives to themselves while they are with us. I don’t care who they tell when they leave us… tell my brother, my grandparents, their friends, church family, associates, people in the check-out line at the Piggly Wiggly. Just don’t tell me about how they feel I’m sinning by this or that. Don’t tell me how I’m a bad wife or mom because I do or don’t do this or that. I’m 41 years old, and I’ve been married 17 years now, and whether I’m a good or bad wife is between me and Mike. If I’m a good or bad mom is, unfortunately, yet to be determined. And it will be determined by my children.

But my parents weren’t able to agree to that. And so they haven’t been here to see us in 18 months. And it saddens me on multiple levels. I hate that they are missing out on these lovely little people living in my house. And it saddens me that they chose having the opportunity to be right over, well, me. I tell my kids all the time that there’s nothing they could ever do that would stop me from loving them, that would make me not want to see them.

A dear friend of mine was telling me about a bit of drama in his family’s life and about how upset he was with his parents for their interactions with his brother with whom he is upset because of his brother’s inappropriate behavior. He asked me, as a parent, how I would act. And I told him that I’d probably tell his brother, as his parents have done, that I didn’t approve of his behavior but that I would then do exactly as his parents had done… I’d bring him lovingly into my home and continue to be what I had always been. I reminded him that if his parents are doing this for his brother, they’ll be this way for him if he ever needs them.

I cannot imagine what would drive a child from my life. And I look at my life and I wonder, I seek to understand what makes them feel that we … I … am so unacceptable that they cannot spend time with us without the option of telling us what sins they see in my life.

That said, that heartbreak and little girl uncertainty admitted, the truth of the matter is that outside of the aforementioned sadness, the last year has been so much easier for us as a family. The visits from my parents were not easy for us. The tension caused arguments between me and Mike (arguments which Griff would say are very rare, indeed). Mike didn’t enjoy dealing with me and the unhappy anticipation of what they would be saying to me… because it was never a question of ‘will they say something’ but ‘when and what will they say?’ Griff hated their visits because he and Eliza would be left alone with them during the day while Mike and I would be at work, and my dad was always critical of Griff, whether of his physical stature or of his choice of hobbies or whatnot.

I admit, our last Thanksgiving, shared with people who love us for who we are, not for who we should be, was delightful. Frankly, it was the best we’ve had in years. And my kids are well-loved even without my parents. Graciously, my parents have proven to be supportive and encouraging to my brother during this last year, and they have been becoming the kind of grandparents to his daughter that they haven’t been lately to my children, and I am grateful. Maybe they, too, have learned from this experience.

One of the things I’ve been passionate about through the years is that we choose our family as we get older and as we move and don’t live close to family (because Mike and I have never lived in town with family). And we have always been blessed to have various people who were close to us and who were loved like family (a friend at work said to me the other day that I was family… nearly brought me to tears). Family is what we make of it.

And what I am trying to teach my children is that love is important and timeless and precious. And for now, for me, that is enough.

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