Boxed In By the Distance
Between Us
I set my
two packages on the counter, and the postal clerk in the holiday red vest
smiled.
�What
wonderful places to visit,� she said.
The boxes
were bound for my father�s house in northern British Columbia and my sister�s
apartment in Beijing, China. And
they would be wonderful places to visit, if I ever did.
But
that�s the point of this column.
I�m
troubled by the geography of families, and by the love that fills and empties us
throughout our lives.
My mother
is dead, and one sister lives within driving distance of here. But Dad and my sister are far, far away.
The distance between us is not by accident, not driven by chance or
happenstance. It�s a part of who we
are. I know families who have lived within miles of each other from birth to
death. Families who pass customs
and heirlooms and homes from one generation to the next. I can�t envy�and don�t
spite � them because I don�t understand that legacy. I have a different origin, one that
feels like a scar at this time each
year.
I don�t think I�m
alone.
I spent
Thanksgiving Day at my sister�s � the closer one, geographically speaking. We talked of nothing important, left
much unsaid, as usual. Three hours
felt like six, and I was happy to head home by early evening. I didn�t ask: Why
have we drifted apart? I didn�t ask:
How has the nature of our love changed? I didn�t ask: Do you feel like I do,
like you have no origin? I didn�t ask, but I can answer that last one. It�s a panicky feeling, like living in a
house with no foundation. Starting
from zero. Knowing if you don�t
create a solid, stable family of your own � a new family � you will die having
none at all.
I haven�t
heard my father�s voice in more than a year. The last phone call was in November
1995. We have a birthday-card relationship. He writes to me and tells me the
dimensions of the house he has remodeled.
I write back and say I am well. He hasn�t met my children. I don�t know if he still has a beard, if
he wears his glasses all the time now or just to read, if he still eats
M&M�s by the bagful.
My family
has scattered, waiting for some big event to bring us back together.
An aunt died
this year, and I didn�t hear about it for two months. She was my father�s brother�s wife. Her death didn�t bring us together, even
for a funeral. The birth of
grandchildren hasn�t brought us together.
So I have no idea what will.
As a
child, I didn�t think it would be this way. Things weren�t great, but no one
promises greatness. So I carried
on, thinking that we�d stay in touch, that we�d find the time to find our way
back home. I
thought we�d do something, say something, change something. I thought one of us would
think this was important enough to fight for. But we wait, all of us, as if
the answer is outside ourselves. As
if the force is external rather than internal.
There are families that will come together for the holidays, families that build traditions, families that savor the past.
That is
not my family.
And so I try, with my wife and children, to build a new family. It feels odd sometimes, with traditions so new they feel a bit empty. The promise is there, but it�s based on the future, not the past. And it lacks continuity, the comfort of knowing that what came before folds into what lies ahead. That we are who we are because of who we were. And that we matter to one another, not just at Christmas but all through the year.
-Brian Willoughby,"Slice
of Life" column, The Columbian newspaper, December 8,
1996