family

Over the weekend I spent time with my dear friend and her family... and I realised all over again how very important a sense of family is to me. This may seem ironic given that people tell me I am about to become a family... but family is more than just a mother and child.... family is something richer and deeper than a bond between two - it is hard to put into words, but its something about being part of a network, a group...whether born or created... its your "clan" that feels like it will undeniably still be there for you tomorrow, and the next day... and for the foreseeable future. They may drive you mad, they may be imperfect in lots of ways... but they are yours.
I think that, coming from a very very small family of origin, I have spent a lot of my life looking for an extended family... and this weekend I felt both sad and hopeful at the same time. I am experiencing a change in the fabric of a very important relationship in my life - feeling it shift and become something different - something just as valuable, but different.... as I symbolically move into the spare room in the life of my former jigsaw "family"... And with that experience the inevitable sense of loss was none-the-less balanced by a positive feeling of hope. I feel the tangible sense, the taste and texture, of what it is that I want... I have loved what I have experienced of this....and rather than allowing grief to hold me back, or trying to hold on to the past... I instead take with me a sense of optimism. I know what I want... and I believe that I will find it. I don't know when, I don't know how... but I have a deep sense of trust that it will happen. I will have a sense of a family all of my own one day. I just have to be patient.
And in the meantime... my dear friends will be my surrogate family, my foster family... loving no less, being loved no less.... and I am thankful for what I have.