My brother Brendan is heading up to Townsville tomorrow. I have 4 brothers and a sister. We are all very different and don’t see that much of each other. Brendan is the brother I see the least of and he has lived away from the family most of his life. He has been home at my parents for a couple of months. He was living in NT. He is also quiet and hasn’t got a lot to say. We have little in common and very different lifestyles. Yet being my brother means I can pop into mum and dad’s and borrow his sleeping bag from him to go to school camp like I did a few weeks ago. He can ask me to type up a resume for him, which I haven’t done yet, but will today. It is the same with all my siblings. I see my sister Kate the most and enjoy her bright personality and have quite a close relationship with her.
I know if I needed any of my brothers or sister’s help, I would have it if I asked and they would in turn have mine. We shared a childhood. On Christmas day, most of us usually get together and laugh together about the memories. We phone each other sometimes on our birthdays, but not always. We see each other at extended family occasions. Our lives are not really entwined externally but in my heart they are.
There is a wide range in our ages from me (40) to Kate (24) so it makes our family life interesting. The six of us all have different lifestyles and jobs. It makes diverse conversation when we are all together. We find links through people we know and share stories about now and the past and enjoy being together. We can quickly resume our childhood roles and it is fun to do that occasionally.
I admire my parents their ability to let us all go and keep a good relationship with all of us without interfering in our lives or trying to control us. It is probably what keeps us all returning home willingly and happily. I hope I can be like them with my own children.
The Upside of Anger
I really enjoyed this movie. I strongly identified with the main character. Not that my husband died and I thought he’d left me for another woman, but I have been equally outraged about wrong assumptions and she was just playing it out to an extreme scenario. She was angry and wrong and hurt and wrong and fabulously self indulgent and witty and wrong. I have been all those things before and it really made me think to watch someone else do it in such a spectacular way.
My wonderful fairy godmother Auntie Angela said to me once that the great thing in life is that she is so often wrong. Most of the hurts and pains and negative things we imagine are wrong. It would be great if I could keep that in mind in future. When you are hurt or imagining some betrayal or slight, it is very difficult to suppose you could be wrong. I intend to do that though. That is my intention.