What is family?

I talk a lot about Family, but what is family really?  

Truthfully they are the people you seek out in a crowd.  The ones that put a smile on your face and moments later bring you to tears because it's so good to see them.  They single handily energize and drain you of your last ounce of juice.  Are you born from these people or did you carry them for nine months?  Not necessarily.  

Through life's journeys we are somewhat like a big rolling rock that picks up innocent pebbles along the way.  Some stick with us and others fall off.  Those that stick, we keep them close and adopt them.  We throw them into that ever growing somewhat vague bucket we call 'Family'.  Sometimes those new adopters become closer than our family members and they feel like they were just there all along.  Some distant relative we are just now getting acquainted with.  

Are we always wonderful to our family?  No.  But they love us despite of ourselves.  They choose to remember us as we once were, as we could be again.  Family is the first in line to tell you how you are screwing up and how you could fix it.  If you feel someones hand on your shoulder giving you a shake. Don't worry...it's someone that loves you.  

With all that love comes the feeling that with these people you can just be yourself.  Stop for a minute and think about what that means. For some it may mean singing a song with all the wrong words at the top of you lungs.  For others sitting around sans makeup which may mean all those "beauty marks" are out on display.  Who knows what is mean.  But whatever it is, what is so great is that you are trusting in the fact that the people that you have classified as family, whom you have deemed worthy enough to drop your guard down with, will love you whether you know the words to the song.  They will love you with make up or without.  They just love you. 

I have thought a lot about family this week.  Tomorrow my Grandmother and my dear friends Mother will both have memorial services in their honor.  They both so strongly believed in Family and the meaning of it.  So for both wonderful ladies I dedicate this weeks blog writing to them.  May they rest in peace.