Week of August 6, 2003
"I want a boat ride."I'm a derelict member of my family. Or perhaps it's that I am a fringe member of my family, the only child of my father's second marriage. When my father and my Mom's Mom died in September, 1985, my immediate family was cut in half. There was just me, and my Mom.
I met Scott early that year, and the tragedy of illness sucked him into our circle completely. In the test of hard times, Scott was a rock. I loved him for many things, but I loved him especially for being there, at that time. With all that grief and adjustment, I was able to provide support for my Mom and listen to her reliving that awful month, while Scott did his best to be there for me. In between, he helped us keep the household going, with the illusion of normality. After losing my Dad and grandmother, my family was made up of three.
I grew up with my half-siblings at the edge of my life; sometimes they were close both physically and emotionally, too often they seemed far away. They were the best part of holidays and a source of pain too since the relationships were so tentative and fragile. They were my family yet also not my family, and it was so hard. I loved them the way small children do, but what could I be to them? An annoyance, a usurper, background noise. My father dealt with them awkwardly, though I know he loved them deeply. Guilt was always a part of things, because they were six children he could not support and could not be present for. He filled in around the edges, but all too badly I think. Yet I know he loved them with all his heart. More than he could ever express to them, for my father was a very shy man. He could be blustery, when he was drinking, or during what I think must have been manic episodes. He was larger than life at times and yet at others he could be very withdrawn. He expressed emotion very poorly, unless he was venting at my Mom. The warm and fuzzy bits never seemed to make it out the way I know he would have liked. He hid his inner life and his feelings tightly inside himself, so you had to look for clues around the edges, and how could one do that without living with him. I had my mother, who helped me find and decipher the clues, so I of all the kids had the best chance to see him as a father.
My Mom is the antithesis of my Dad's first wife, though both were named Carol. His first wife was a quiet Midwesterner, filled with filters and presentation and doing things the way they should be done. My mother grew up on the Upper East Side of New York, a product of private education, expressive and arty and intense. She saw all the boundaries of her world, and feeling confined by them, sought to live around the world's expectations. She had a lot of intellectual freedom, but she was too intense for her preppy world, and she found herself drawn to my father's wild thinking and intellectual bent. I think also, from her alcoholic upbringing, she developed an intense urge to save people. My father was wounded, and ripe for saving. The quieter and more repressed my mother felt in her surroundings, the more excessive she became. She has no filters, and thoughts run wild through her, black and white and black again. Or vivid red. They war with each other and yet each is real while they pass by. She blurts out what she thinks and feels, and yet another time her feelings and thoughts can be completely opposite. She is an intense woman. She is not about filters, and presentation, and doing things the way they should be done. She follows her obsessions, until she tires of them, and then she takes another path to see where it will lead her.
Our two families mixed like oil and water, and though there were many times I worshipped my siblings, I was also uneasy with them for I felt I was foreign. And to them, I was spoiled and bratty and receiving all the time and attention that should have been theirs. A tough situation all around, and not an easy one to reconcile.
Once the kids were past 18 and full of their own lives, their Mom moved on and the reasons for our get togethers dwindled. The family gatherings grew smaller and less frequent and once my father died, visits were rare things; dutiful visits based on my mother staying in contact. I never knew my place in it all, and hid more often than not because I didn't know what to do with my intense feelings for these near-strangers, to whom I felt so close and also so estranged. And awkwardness breeds awkwardness, and avoidance. My faulty completely: I hid.
Years went by.
In 2000, there was a Lee family reunion. They have had others over the years, and I always felt that my nose was pressed against the glass, wanting to be a part of them but feeling separate and alone. I couldn't be a part of them, but I wished that I could. That year there was a great effort by some of the sisters-in-law and my sisters to have me come. I was extremely touched but too chicken to consider going. I bailed out.
But in 2001, Owen was born. And when the reunion began to be planned for 2003, I had to reconsider my avoidance. I could hide for me, but could I really hide Owen from the only Lees he will ever have a chance to know? The only physical connection he will have to my father, his long-dead Grampy? The clincher was that my brother had a 2nd daughter just 5 months after Owen was born. This is the cousin closest to him in age, and I think it unlikely that he will have any others. At the reunion, we would have the chance to stay with my brother and his family in one house on an island. It would be a rare opportunity for us all.
Filled with fear, I accepted the invitation to go to this Lee Family gathering. I'm a Lee, and though I'm not the same as the rest of my siblings, I share their blue eyes and their fair skin. The same weird brain that can do so many things, but that is hard to channel for success.
I sucked it up and faced the truth - I hadn't seen three of my half brothers in 12 years. I have 17 and 20 year old nieces I've never met. A 12 year old nephew I'd met once when he was an infant. Any contact I've had with my other relatives was due mainly to their efforts and those of my mother. Clearly, as a relative, I leave much to be desired.
This week begins on the road toward Augusta, heading to the 2003 Lee Gathering at Lake Cobosseecontee.
Tune in next week for more…
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