Re-creating family out of found friends

I know this blog is about becoming self-sufficient and I know I said the next one would be about creating lanterns but this is what Spirit is telling me to write. I listen when Spirit starts to nag in my head. If I don’t, I’m always sorry. So here goes:

 

Most of us have seen memes about family being blood or chosen. Most people think of ‘blood family’ when they talk about their relations. Some find out that chosen family is really what’s the most important and who they talk about when discussing family. What drives people to add to their family structure this way? Why are so many people claiming chosen family over blood family?

Family once meant those you lived with. From the Renaissance until the end of World War II, that most commonly included grandparents, parents and children. Prior to that, even more extended family would be included; aunts, uncles, cousins or more distant. Families all pitched in and helped with household chores, both in and outside of the home. Gardens or home grown crops were relied on for much of the vegetables that fed the family. Clothing and leather goods were usually made by a relative on site. Much of what was needed to survive was provided for by the family itself. In fact, this type of self-sufficiency is what many of us are trying to get back to.

Many modern families are disconnected in some way. There are members that refuse to speak with each other. There are secrets that are kept from certain members. There is a distance that is represented by more than just miles. Pain, hurt, anger, abuse, fear, lack of commonality; all of these things can separate blood families. Sometimes just one person in a family won’t speak to another member of the family. Sometimes whole parts of a family separate themselves from others. It becomes less of an extended family and more of a group of nuclear families that share common ancestors.

In a world that has moved from a clan family structure to a ‘nuclear’ family structure, chosen family is rapidly becoming a common part of our society. For some people, chosen family is a person who develops a relationship so close with another person that the emotional attachment becomes one that is on the same level as a blood family member would be. It’s an individual connection and may not extend to rest of the blood family. For some that connection does reach the whole ‘nuclear’ family and everyone gains a family member. In very special and rare circumstances, a group of un-related people will find connections and form a clan type of chosen family.

My nuclear family has two chosen daughters, a set of chosen grandparents, two chosen sisters and their families and this weekend, we found a group that could easily become a part of our chosen family. We don’t add family easily or quickly. There has to be more than just a list of things we have in common or opinions that we share. There has to be an emotional attachment, respect, trust and honor. We have to find that we really couldn’t imagine our lives without these people in it anymore.

So where do we find these people? It’s not like you can go shopping for them. How about we try an analogy? It’s much more like making something out of found objects. No, I don’t think people are objects! But usually found objects have been used by someone else; they’ve been scarred in some way; they may need some minor fixing before you can create something new out of it. Does that sound like any of your friends? Does that sound like you? When we make something out of found materials, we take those materials, scars and all, and make something new and better out of it. Adding found friends to our family creates something new and better.

Friends are people we’ve met in our lives that we aren’t blood related to, but with whom we still share an emotional connection as well as common interests. When those found friends become chosen family, we’ve re-created our idea of family in the traditional sense. We may not live on the same land, or even in the same state or country, but we’re family all the same. Aho.

Blessings,

Joy