Disparate

It’s difficult, I think, to talk about people who you don’t have permission to talk about. You shouldn’t, of course you shouldn’t, but when their lives and their decisions impact on your own life, it’s difficult to not to. Maybe pseudonyms are the way forward, and maybe they are not. Maybe just not saying anything at all is the best way, but sometimes I feel like I could explode with all the emotions that are running around my brain at any given time.

J has no relationship with his brother B.

It is something that has deteriorated over time and as it stands now, there is nothing there. There is politeness if we meet as a family, if we are at their parents, we had a genuinely lovely night when their dad had a 70th birthday dinner last year. We are maintaining, willingly and happily, a relationship between our girls and their uncle and auntie but really it stops there.

It upsets me for the most part, I hate that when we are given such a tiny amount of close relatives, we can’t all get along. I hate it that as a parent to soon to be three children, there is a possibility that my girls would someday feel like this about each other. I hate that I have a brother who is no longer here and J feels like this about his brother.

But I do understand it.

This is when it gets tricky. The reasons that they have the relationship that they have cannot be published here, whether it was ever read by any of the parties or not. I think I see that there is desire to rebuild the relationship, mostly from B, but then nothing comes of it. J claims not to care that this has happened and his feelings are strong about most things. That’s the thing with him, he is kind and generous to a fault, he cares deeply about people and about people’s actions, he believes in the good in people and is very disappointed and upset when people let him down. And this, to him, I think, is a let down. Not even to him necessarily, but in general. This is frustratingly vague, I do know that, I’m frustrated just writing it, but it does have to be this way for now.

We have such a short time here, not to be morbid, but it’s true and some of us have even less time than others. We can’t guarantee that we will live to be eighty, no matter how hard we try with a healthy diet and exercise so we should maintain every relationship that we can. I am as guilty of this as anyone, I’m nowhere near perfect in this as with everything else, but I do try and I must try harder. We all must.

But it slightly breaks my heart to see these huge cracks emerge, emerge and deepen and remain. It saddens me that we don’t visit with him and his family any longer, that when we do see them, it is awkward and forced. And I worry most that this is the status quo, that our children, theirs and ours, won’t remember that we holidayed together, spent lots of time together, were close.

Families!