Family Ties, and Whips, and Chains.............

Family is more than a happenstance of genetic slap and tickle. Two teens in the backseat of moms car on the aqueduct one summer night in the 60's and wham bam, you've got a bundle of baby joy. Instant family. Family is not about who put whose peter in whose who-ha and made an oopsey. Those are genetics. Blood ties....yes; family by the neo traditional sense...sure; but family is not about the petri dish.

When you think of family it should not inspire anxiety, tension, anger, depression, resentment, irritation, a cold detached feeling, or an otherwise need to either arm ones self with battle armour or plan ones own death to disappear and live life on the lamb. Images of a torture chamber are not appropriate either figuratively or literally.

If the idea of spending Easter Sunday with a family member makes you heave uncontrollably and curl up in the corner in the fetal position, then perhaps its time to rethink the concept and perception of family and how we interpret its meaning in the greater context of our lives.

In adulthood, when we find our partners, and marry or commit to them in other non traditional ways, we chose to make them family. Family is a choice therefore that we can make.  It's not blood, or chromosomes. It's heart, and mind, and body, and soul. Our family is who we chose it to be. It can be your siblings, or not. It can be your friends, your neighbors, or whomever you chose. And the beauty is they chose you back.

With this concept, our families can be as big or as small as we make them. They can grow and shrink and grow again. They are ever changing, ever evolving, to fill the needs of our lives as each year goes by. Family in this form is uplifting, reaffirming, inspirational, and full of love and hope. We are never alone unless we chose to be. 

My family is larger now than it has ever been, and I am blessed and loved and ever so grateful. To all of my sisters and brothers and cousins and moms and daughters and sons, to each of you friends above all else, blood ties or not, you are my family by Choice and I have impeccable taste.