A Few Different Windows

I've been a guest or confidante to a host of different families in the last few weeks. And given my Uncle Buck's recent trip to visit us, I can't help but view my own family through the lens of having recently examined the dynamics of others.  Perhaps it's comparative in some ways, but I mostly just come away shaking my head, a bit awestruck, that we humans manage to connect at all on this silly planet, even with those of our own blood.

I helped a dear friend with some catering at a party today.  I just provided some plating, dishwashing, filling of coffee cups, and was happy to pitch in to lessen the stress on her family. She discussed, briefly, the anxiety the day had created for her mother, some stresses with a sibling, the joy of a smiling, oblivious baby. She's an articulate woman, my friend, powerful in her ability to put words to ideas. And I was struck by how plainly she spoke of her mother's worries, her difficulties in communicating with or being understood by other members of her family. It made me thankful I could help and also gave me comfort that I am not the only well-spoken woman who stumbles her way through communicating with some of those she holds most dear.

Despite the ties of blood, we're not destined to be friends with our siblings. There is a shared history there, yes, and a common language with which we address life. We feel the weight of the same family secrets or weaknesses or tragedies. But there's no promise that upon adulthood we will sit down at a table and truly feel spoken and connected to, eyeball to eyeball, one fully formed life to another.

One of my dearest friends recently texted and asked for prayers for her family due to stresses with her own siblings, tensions and frustrations that have been building for awhile. This is a family I've known a very long time, so the tensions aren't new to me.  I tried to provide comfort the only way I knew how, by telling her that the best examples of familial harmony fall outside of our home.  No family avoids chaos or animosity every day. And in the seasons when your own family struggles, we can at least trust that the best image of what a father or mother or brother or sister should be remains steadfast. God hasn't stopped being God, even if your brother is being a punk. And even if the tension is miserable, the wounds deep, God still provides help in our trials with the support of friends, a patient ear, a laughing baby, a shared memory.

I've looked out of a few different windows the last few weeks.  I've looked out the glass door at my parents' home and watched my uncle and dad chatting by a fire, my sister curled up in a seat between them. I've looked out a kitchen window in Montana as my boyfriend played with his niece, far flung but well-loved. And today I looked out another kitchen window as my friend's mom held her grandson, grinning enthusiastically at his adoring crowd. Families seem like such delicate machines sometimes, so tricky to handle, so easy to misuse, so quick to weaken with distance or time, and yet they do seem to continue puttering on. The burdens build, the valleys deepen and darken, and still we press on, brothers and mothers and sisters and fathers and wives and nieces and nephews and uncles and grandmothers and grandfathers...

I'm grateful to be surrounded by people who ache when their family aches, who worry when their family worries. I'm grateful to have sat at a kitchen table this morning with my own family, praying for God's continued mercies on my Uncle's cancer fight, praying for continued blessings. And I'm grateful to have stood, a couple of hours later, praying with my friend and her mom, for anxiety-free revelry. The big and the not-quite-as-big, the long trial and the new anxiety, the ache and the burden, God gives us families that create and cushion every wound. And He gave us His example, in hopes that we might love each other better through it all.