Family is a pain, huh?
Those kids want a snack…and you’ve barely cleaned up lunch. You’ve paid for the kids’ sports, the mortgage, groceries, and the bank account is begging for mercy–and then someone needs fancy duds for an upcoming banquet that MUST be attended and there is NOTHING to wear.
You’re dog tired, worked hard all day, and the nagging demanding ball and chain wife love-of-your-life wife wants to engage with you about the activities of the day. You’ve spent the day driving the kids around, grabbing food on the fly, fitting more errands in that can really be wedged into an already full day, and that no good, wants it all on a silver platter, treat me like a king kind of husband hero-of-a-husband rolls his eyes when you ask him to put the kids to bed.
Yup, family is a pain. Drudgery, mind-numbing routine, pushed-to-the-edge-of-exhaustion-tasks. A Pain.
But a kind of pain that grounds you, centers, you, and gives you a reason to wake up in the morning. It makes you delight in the laundry you have, because if you weren’t up to your eyeballs in laundry, it would mean that you hadn’t all had fun in the leaves this weekend. The arguments that your adolescent has with you (that you really, REALLY don’t understand) are a signs that she’s growing up, that her abstract thought has grown in complexity, and she is becoming her own person. And the spouse that asks you to call if you’re gonna be late, when you just wanna be free to go out after work for drinks with the guys, cares-cuz you matter to her.
Family can be so restraining. But what feels like being trapped, can be grounding, and life saving:
Yeah, yeah, I know this commercial is intended to be about seatbelts. But doesn’t your family life sometimes feel like the beauty and restraint that are inextricably combined in this video?
There are some of you who find having a spouse and children confining…right now, they don’t seem so loving and uplifting. There isn’t “slo-mo beauty with beautiful music tinkling in the background” moments right now–your family is drink-milk-straight-from-the-jug-against-the-rules kind of family. A I-don’t-know-how-we’ll-pay-the-bills-this-month kind of family. Families that are rude, dismissive, non-validating, rushed, and generally distracted from celebrating the wonderfulness of your contribution to their life.
There are times when releasing your family’s hold on you seems tempting. There’s no doubt that most couples find themselves in trying times during the life cycle of their marriage. Maybe the drinks after work you crave aren’t with the guys, but with a special one who has caught your eye…and you’re tempted. She’s engaging, interesting, funny, and doesn’t demand that you mow the lawn, or change your share of poopy diapers. Or going to the gym isn’t about the workout so much as the guy who’s been winking at you…he smiles and is open…you know what he’s thinking, what he’s offering…and it seems so easy compared to that burping, bump-on-a-log guy sitting on the couch, who only speaks up when he wants you to bring him something.
Family is a gift. They are a pain, but they are an uncomfortable, smelly, life-giving, complaining, whiny, hilarious, wicked, annoying, fascinating, griping, stifling, anxiety-provoking, engaging, frustrating, awesome gift. Family gives you a place to call home, a place that keeps you safe, a holding that reminds you of who you are, and what your goals are. Families are wildly imperfect, annoyingly frustrating, and adoringly secure.
Appreciate your painfully delightful family today. Let them ground you, hold you securely, love you by tying you down in a way that will save your life.
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