Departures

Maliana ~

This post will be somewhat of a departure from the usual weekly posts since this week has been somewhat of a departure from our usual week.

On Thursday after work, I left for Elyria to attend the showing and funeral for Tina's mom Catherine. I had never slept away from home without you before, so this was a bit of a change for the both of us. There were a few "I want my mommy" 's, but overall you did really well with Daddy flying solo. Lao Lao helped us out oodles and picked you up on both Thursday and Friday, taking you to the Columbus Museum of Art and dinner at 94th Aero Squadron to take your mind off of things. While I surely missed you, I also really enjoyed my solitary drive north, through snow-battered roads and farm country, watching the landscape change as I hummed along. A long time before you were even a thought in our heads, I used to head out on the open road to get some peace of mind by driving great distances on my own, sometimes in the middle of the night and on a whim. It just seemed to calm me and help me sort out life. I don't know why that worked, but I've always loved to hit the road.

Upon arriving in Elyria I attended the showing and got to pay the first of a few goodbyes to dear Caterina, then I got to spend some time with Uncle Joe, Aunt Tina and her large Italian family. I can't express to you how warm, welcoming, gracious, loving, funny, and interesting of a family they are. Many of Tina's older relatives (including her parents) had come from Italy to America as young people, each of them building wonderful lives in the United States. They reminisced and shared colorful stories, spanning two different continents and many decades, as they bantered and teased each other back and forth over homemade wine, LOTS of pasta and everything parmesan. I adored listening to all of their tales and long after many of them had left for their hotels or gone to bed, I stayed up with Aunt Tina's sister and cousin and listened to yet more stories, glued to their every word.

The next morning, we awoke and headed to the funeral home for the ceremony, then to the cemetery, and finally on to the restaurant for a last meal before everyone headed back home. I was so thankful that I had come, to be there for Aunt Tina and Uncle Joe, but also for myself as well. In general, I've typically found death and funerals to be pretty tough. And this was no exception. But most of the time, it's the harder things in life that we learn the most from. That being said...please Mali, try not to shy away from the things that seem the hardest in life. I guarantee that it will pay off in the end, one way or another.

And what did I learn on this trip, from all of these people? I learned that family is family, no matter what. You don't always have to agree with each other in order to love each other. And as strong as their Italian heritage and la famiglia is, I also learned that family can and does expand much farther than just biology. For example, take James. James is a man just slightly older than Tina and I. And as long as Aunt Tina can remember, James has been a member of their family. Her parents (Sal and Caterina) have always included him, and that was that. Except...James is not *technically* a Gentile. In fact, Tina does not know exactly how James came to be a part of her family. She only knows that James has always been there, through thick and thin, with her family and for her parents (and vice versa). Learning this made me wonder about this man, who he was and what exactly was his situation. I can only speculate on how this particular relationship came to be between James and the Gentile family. But in reality...it does not matter how it happened. What does matter is that it speaks volumes as to the size of both Sal and Catherine's hearts. What also matters is that being born to a family is just one of the tiny ways in which a family is made.

People are drawn together in this world through so many different paths and for so many different reasons. I may never quite understand how or why it all happens. Many times the families that are chosen for us, or that we choose for ourselves, can even share much stronger bonds than those to which we are genetically related. I think about my own life, about my friends and the family that I married into...and I feel closer to and more understood by many of these people than I do to some of those who share my DNA. This wonder of why or how this can happen is a mystery, but one that I don't feel a need to solve at this point in time. The magic of how we find these families for ourselves isn't necessarily important for me to understand, I'm simply content (and feel so blessed) just knowing that it happens for us at all.

Finally, of the entire time I spent with this family, the one thing I could kick myself for is not having brought my camera with me to Elyria. (You're probably asking, "What?!? You never forget your camera, Mom!!") But as I packed on Wednesday night, I thought to myself that it would be such a somber and intimate occasion and a camera might have seemed intrusive from someone like me. Boy, was I mistaken. What I now realize is that a death and a funeral, while of course will be sad, can and should also be a joyous occasion. It should be a celebration of a life well-lived and of a person well-loved, as such was the case for Catherine. Don't get me wrong, there were many tears shed. How could there not be? However I underestimated the amount of laughter that would be shared as well.

In the past, I have been uncomfortable with the idea of death (and trust me, I don't know anyone who embraces the idea completely), but after spending this short twenty-four hour period with the Gentile family, I realize that death is a natural part of life and if you do it right, the love and memories you leave behind are what truly matter. It's why we are all here and the only things that are impenetrable to the great beyond. There is a saying that I actually heard on the radio as I drove home, "The tricky part about life is that no one gets out alive." Basically, we're all headed there eventually...but making the time that each of us is allotted here on Earth really count for something makes it all worth it, even the "hard stuff". No one said we have to do everything perfectly. God knows that if that were our goal, every single one of us would fail miserably on the first day. Our only real job is to show up every day and do our best to try to love one another. Period. It may not always work out like we hope it will, but we have to try. Quite a few of the stories shared by Aunt Tina's family had both ups and downs, joys and sorrows, highs and lows, disagreements and resolutions, mistakes and successes...but that's life. And life is beautiful, warts and all.

Here is a status from Facebook that I put up once I returned home...for your Aunt Tina.
~ just spent the last twenty four hours with one of the world's most amazing, funny, and interesting families...remembering and honoring their beloved Catherine aka Caterina aka Mary...I adored every minute of the stories told, the sound of both Italian and English being intermingled in conversation, the homemade wine they graciously shared, the many laughs and even the tears...thank you Gentile family, for letting me be a part of honoring a woman who I wish I would have known better in life, but who no doubt lives on in her daughters' strength, courage, kindness, selflessness, and love.
Rest in peace...Sal and Mama C.

And with all of that being said, I shall move on to share the rest of your week. But first I need to post a catch up picture from our New Year's Day dinner with the Wilkinson family. We ate our traditional pork and sauerkraut to bring us good luck in the new year, and since I was a bit camera'ed out after all of the holidays, I only managed to get this one picture of us, minus Memaw and Papaw.

Here are some more pictures from the week and weekend...

first night back from Elyria...as uncomfortable as this
looks for me, I wouldn't trade it for the world!

getting another yellow "stripe" on your belt...
not ready (or even interested all that much really) to
test for your next belt yet, but racking up these little tape strips

 

using your new window markers



teaching Buzz how to use your window markers
(after dressing him in your footie jammies)

 

playing with your Hot Wheels from Santa

 

watching Dinosaur Train with all of your
Hot Wheels at the "drive in"

 

the girls are tuckered out on a lazy Sunday

On Saturday night you had a sleepover at Wai Gong's house. You were a bit clingy, likely due to the fact that I had already been away one night this week and you were still feeling the effects of that. But you did great and just like we predicted, said "I don't want to leave" when we came to pick you up the next morning. You played air hockey, hide and seek, made pizzas, set up forts in the living room, and watched movies. As usual, you had fun.

your new favorite...coconut popsicles

 

brain freeze!

 

 

scaring away monsters with Uncle Blaize

 

even Reuben got in the fort you all built in the living room

 

 

Wai Gong's proof that they do make you
brush your teeth at their house

 

you said, "wake up! it's not night time anymore!"

 

 

Christmas tree pancakes

2012 has been filled with all kinds of ups and downs, adventures and emotions...and as hard as some moments have been, I am thankful for them all. Because...that's life...and life is beautiful.

Love,
Mama

P.S.
As we were playing with puzzles on Sunday night, after snuggling and having you follow me around like a little shadow, climbing on me any chance you could get, and chilling out from this most unusually existential week...you asked me, "Mom, will you be my friend forever?" (me = gasp...swoon).  Then, as Daddy readied you for bed, you were a wild woman, jumping around and giggling like a hyena...oh, how I LOVE that sound, even if it means bedtime will take twice as long.

Life really does have a way of balancing out the sour with the sweet, doesn't it...?