Family

Harry' s family photos - boxes and boxes of them - have taken over a dresser top in our bedroom. His mother was a self-appointed archivist; she assembled and sorted and identified hundreds of old photos and ensured they were passed on. This collection is really remarkable and, unlike albums with captions and cutesy scrapbooking detail; genuinely historical. There are photos, also newspaper clippings, diplomas and other memorabilia. Clearly the work of several people; Harry's mother the most recent. She must have collected these from many of her own and husband's relatives, annotated and identified and passed them on to her sons.

Of course, lots of information has been lost. Harry and I haven't even looked at all of them yet, but already I've seen dozens of unidentified babies (this sent me to my own collection of photos, mainly of my own children, to write names! and dates! Because even if I can tell my baby daughters apart at a glance, their children aren't going to be able to.) What's also remarkable is the extent to which Harry's mother kept the history alive for him and his brother. I loved listening to them talking: "Oh that must be Uncle Sal, because that's in the North Jersey house before the addition. . . " "This looks just like Mom; is this grandmom?"

All this is so unlike my own experience of family I can't even begin to say why. For one thing, I know almost nothing about my biological father - he disappeared before I was two, and my mother seems never to have looked for, let alone kept in touch with, him. She married my stepfather when I was about 3 1/2. She then moved to the US with him and my baby half sister (I was born in Europe) which had the effect of severing ties to my maternal grandparents and their line. . .I do have some photos and a little information. The most striking is a wedding photo where my mother, a six-month-old baby, squirms in her mother's arms - my Omeli, in white satin, the matron of honor for her twin sister. My Opa stands behind her, looking uncomfortable and out of place. ( he was not grata in Omeli's family) All around them and the radiant bride and groom, whose name I don't know, are uncles and great-whatevers. It's a gorgeous photo, too - long before I hung it on the wall next to family photo of Harry's it seemed to echo, I exhibited as art on walls in my several homes. . .

I grew up, and married the father of my children, whose family proudly claims to be descended from a signer of the constitution, and all the time we were married, I took pictures and collected them and made albums. There are some photos in there of my own dysfunctional shards of family (Mom, my sister and brother) but mostly I worked to create a history of my kids (family). I didn't get much support from their father in this. When each daughter was in late grade or middle school, she was assigned to make a family tree, and what surprised me about this was, although my disconnected spouse had no idea; his mother and sister did. They provided reams of information, photos and all; both of the daughter's projects were wonderful and both got A's.

Today I saw an old friend of mine had posted some gorgeous family photos on Facebook. She and her husband live in a network of family connections even more impressive than Harry's, apparently. As they don't have children of their own (my friend and her husband) it seems her motive might be more artistic than what? historical? Familial? But then who am I to say?

I don't yearn to have a lineage like Harry's or my friend's. I cut my teeth on quite another vision of family; for better or worse it shaped who I am and how I feel about "family." My daughters are almost the only FAMILY I own openly - much as I love my brother and his family, my Mom, my sister. But it must be said: I did not feel, as a child or young person, belonging to anything I could call family. I married because I wanted to have a child, and then a second child; all without ever wanting to be a family. (This almost certainly doomed my marriage.)

Now Harry and I live together. We talk about parenting (which we did with other people) our children, and we have our animals. . . 2 cats, a dog, 3 birds. . . we live together brilliantly, as befits the survivors of old and troubled marriages in which we learned much. (Sometimes, in a dream, I think "but when we have a baby. . . " and then I wake and know that for Harry and me, this IS our family.