Family

You arrive in this cushioned little community of people, no choice in the matter, and life has begun.

It runs from tight nit, fight the world from within, to disperate, don't talk anymore but, it's still family. They chose you (or maybe not 'chose'...), but you didn't choose them- but that's the way it is. No matter what you do, what you've done or what you're going to do, family provides. Stability, like holding on to railings when you're roller skating, has its value.

It can all be as mad as a box of angry badgers, yet you'd still cut off parts of your body you really need, just to help them out. Like a slightly dodgy album you bought almost by accident and forgot all about, you can pick up just where you left off years before, and no mention is made of it, and suddenly you appreciate it in a way you never did before.

There isn't a right or a wrong way to be with family. There's your way, and it's right. The love should be the same. Whether you go around for tea every night and make family the platform you live from, or you make the occasional 30 second phone call to prove you're not dead (yet) every 6 months, it should be the same.

From time to time, through  no carelessness of your own, you lose one or two. Maybe it's the human condition, maybe it's irony, like Alanis Morissette likes to talk about, but sometimes you only realise that unconditional, irrational, DNA based love, once that person has croaked. When you do realise it, it hurts like hell, because guilt is a powerful tool, more powerful than a Halfords Professional Socket Set at £89 with a tough, ABS plastic case. But you should never feel guilt, because the thing about family is, they know. They know you didn't choose them- it just happened. You were joined by one randy night between two (hopefully) consenting adults, and that's the way it is.

You can pretend you're falling in and out of love with family, to suit whatever mission you're on at that moment. Family can infuriate far more than it can please, some of the time. But nothing beats that feeling, knowing when you fall, and you're going to have the odd fall, there's a cushion on top of that concrete landing.

If you have family, stick with it. Eat the awful food, listen to the repetetive story about how uncle Frank once lost his underpants on the train to Bridlington, nod wisely at the right moments but, stick with it. As much as it seems they need you, you need them.

For those people who don't have family, it's shit and you're not missing anything. ;)


Maximum love and respect to Mum, Dad, Ben, Sarah, Granny (don't forget me in the Will- I mean it) and all the others I haven't spent enough time with.