Earlier today I thumbed through my cousin's pictures of the wonderful family gathering that they had during the holidays. In our family there are at least nineteen grandchildren ranging from their thirties with their own kids to just entering high school. Ten of them were home without obligations to take a remake of one of our old family pictures. And as I sat and looked through them, another wave of sadness washed over. While being in France for the holidays I was missing out on Santa coming to my uncle's house, Disneyland with the family, cramming as many cousins into our families’ several houses as possible, staying up all night talking, taking hundreds of pictures all within a day, pretending to work at my auntie’s store while we all caught up and joked about each other’s lives, and most of all just being with family. It’s not everyday that you have so many family members together in the same five-mile radius.
And whenever we were able to get together like that there would be mayhem. Meals would be a production, no one would sleep till hours after we’ve already climbed into bed, showering and getting ready would take hours and you would be with at least two others in the bathroom while brushing your teeth, everywhere we went would require a caravan of sorts to get us places, plans would be made, calls to cancel other plans would also be made, people would be sat on, cousins would be tickled, and somehow everyone of us would end up at the bottom of a dog pile at least twice within the week.
And so it occurred to me that although I have hundreds of pictures of my family, that perhaps my room isn’t filled with pictures of them for several reasons. As I look through these pictures I keep getting sadder and sadder from being so far away from home. Perhaps it’s just easier to make it through my stay in France without the constant reminders of home.
No comments:
Post a Comment