Division of Family

Yesterday, after a brutal (for me) workout at the YMCA (1 hour on a treadmill at four miles per hour on a 15% slope), I stopped by the field my niece was warming up in for a soccer match to say "Good bye and Good luck" to her since she heads off on Friday to her first year of college.

It seems like only yesterday I gave her a stuffed Tigger that was nearly as big as she was for Christmas.  I recall her laughing and running around with him with wild abandon and watching her dress him up, insisting Tigger was a "she."

I have another photo of her somewhere where she is about the same age, after she opened a gift of a razor scooter - one she badly wanted.  I caught her eyes popping wide as the wrapping paper fell away from the box.  I treasure the photo but I treasure that simple moment of joy even more.

In the years since, I've watched her grow and mature into a fine young woman - she played cello in a chamber music ensemble, the orchestra at school, and performed at a number of dance recitals with her proud uncle watching.

On the way home, in a selfish moment, I thought to myself, I didn't have any uncles or aunts see me off to college and thought it out. Family divisions - caused by the usual "list of characters" was responsible for this.

My dad being an only child, I had only two aunt and uncle sets - my mom's much older brother and sister and from them I was separated by geography and generational age.  Their children, my cousins, were all 10-15 years older than I, and as I was growing up - that made them "unapproachable adults" and not people to play childhood games with.  The Aunt lived 380 miles away in Boston, and the Uncle lived 2800 miles away in Los Angeles.

So the aunts and uncles in my life where all actually my dad's aunt's and uncles and my "greats."  Age again - caused a divide but there was another divide - petty family squabbles - that ran deep and turned to poison.

Without boring you with the details - my great-grandfather "parted ways" with his two brothers - over a squabble at the family business - he left and started his own - and thus was forever "mad" at Thomas Charles and Russell.  You may remember Thomas Charles was Franklin, Elmer and Marshall's father.  Russell was the WWI machine gunner that was wounded in the Argonne Forest.  This separation meant - that even though the three sons lived into the 1990's - and lived nearby - I never met them.

Another family business squabble - this time between my Grandfather and his mother - after my great-grandfather died - caused ill-feelings between my Grandfather and his mother's family (all of whom, I met only once at a family reunion, are very nice people.)  So those distant family members were "lost to me" while growing up.

My Grandfather had three sisters - between them, they had 4 children.  Aunt Ann was childless, my (great) Aunt Marian had two sons and a daughter and my Aunt Mary had a son named Pat (who had Down's Syndrome).  Pat was a sweet, but big and gruff  (6' 2" 280 pounds) guy that seemed to behave in an unpredictable manner that was off-putting to me as a young boy. I have since learned better. Marian's children might have been in the social circle except...

...she worked with (and unfortunately, for) my Grandfather, Harry, as the bookkeeper in the family business - and one day, the day to day tensions of working together - spilled over and unkind words were spoken - and my Aunt Marion walked out to never return.

I recently found a letter, written by my Grandmother on April 26, 1967 to my "honorary Aunt Bea" that made me cringe -

I may not particularly like my sister-in-law and niece's mother - but I have tried to make sure that this (mutual) feeling has not prevented me from being involved in my niece's life.  I have gained much to treasure from doing so - and can hope, somewhere down the line, my niece might feel the same.  This bitter family lesson on how to watch what one says in the "heat of the moment" and to be a little more forgiving was hard earned and too late to cure the divides.