Family is the great riddle, the light, the connection,  and the dark chaos of our lives. Families are insoluble sometimes, connective and reassuring and loving, destructive and traumatic and impossible. I had a good talk with my sister today, she also lives in a small farm in upstate New York. Like me, she once had a lot of animals, she now has a few dogs. We went to the well together as children, are profoundly connected, but often find it too painful and difficult to talk to each other.  There is no conflict, just too much difficult stuff sometimes.

We go in and out of periods like that, sometimes we talk all the time, sometimes not for months, even years. The holidays, of course, are a prism through which feelings about family pass. Christmas was very important to me and my sister, and I suppose it still is.  I think the most difficult think about holidays is like Christmas is that they always evoke a notion of what should be, but which, for most of us, is not and has never been. Christmas seems to bring a special sense of guilt and angst for people who come from broken families, it stirs powerful emotions.

My sister and I had the nicest talk, and I think we will be back in touch again regularly. She is doing some tutoring, loving her dogs very much, including a new puppy, which is always a source of renewal and rebirth for her. She is healthy, has strong friendships, is beginning to think about fixing that bad knee of hers, crushed in an auto accident long ago. She is taking good care of herself. She is one of only two people on the earth who understands – she is a witness –  an important part of my life, who comes from the same place as I do. The only person other than Maria who just knows without having to be told.

For much of my life, I felt a great and patronizing guilt about my sister. I should have protected her, taken care of her, saved her. This is an awful thing to put on another human being, and I had finally shed those feelings. My sister is doing well, is living the life she wants, and living it with love and strength. She doesn’t need me to feel bad for her, she needs me to feel good for her, and that is what I felt today.

My sister and I are on parallel, if different journeys.  We have ridden along on the big roller coaster which is life,  and here we are, still at it, still trying to figure it out. We have never stopped working to heal ourselves, and when we can to try and help others heal. We are children of fear, I think, shaped in the cauldron of feeling. I told my sister about this year, about the move, about owning two farms, about the changes in publishing, the work and money pressures, my work with therapists, counselors, spiritualists, shamans. I said I need to be in this place in order to finally confront myself and truly heal. She understood completely. I told her I had finally found love after so many years of searching, and she understood that as well, and was happy for me. I admire her, I think she is admirable and great, not piteous and dependent.  I think I never really accepted her life until I began to get well myself. Talking to her is a holiday gift.

There is much joy around the holidays, but so much pain and much of it centers around this business of family. The families we have are not usually the ones we see on TV. Few of us can live up to those expectations. I can’t. My family life has been shattered several times over, and I can hardly bear to look back at the loss and the debris. Only ahead to my new life with so much meaning. Families are like nothing else in our lives.  We can’t hide from them, divorce them, or run away, at least not in our heads. Ultimately we have to deal with them as best and lovingly as we can. And we have to forgive them, let it all go, if we are to be whole. I am grateful to be finally learning that lesson.