Family Matters

I write about things here because I believe they matter. At least they matter to me. I know that some of the subjects I address matter more to me than they matter to other people; and I know that there are other subjects that matter to other people far more than the subjects I address. Such is the world of personal opinion.

But, there are subjects that matter to everyone. There are subjects that remind us once again that we are all more alike than we are different. One of those universals concerns is pain in our families. The source of the pain doesn’t particularly matter; the type of pain doesn’t particularly matter. What matters is that people we love deeply are hurting deeply.

When family members are really hurting it can easily become the dominant reality for the loved ones around them. Rather quickly, political and religious issues don’t matter as much; even poverty, disease and war are relegated to a lesser place in our thoughts and feelings. For a period of time there’s only one thing that matters – that our family members get through their pain and return to a measure of peace and well being.

When I think about it, seeing and connecting to the pain that is being inflicted on other families in places around the world is what makes other things, like poverty, disease and war, matter to us. We see a mother holding a starving child; we see a son carrying a severely wounded mother; we see sisters and brothers mourning the loss of brothers and sisters – and we feel it; we know it; we connect to it. We’ve been there at some time in one degree or another. Familial love binds us on a common level. When we experience genuine compassion for others who are in pain over members of their families, then they begin to feel like members of our family.

Today, there are members of my family who are hurting. At this moment, that’s all that matters to me. They’re not hurting because of poverty, disease or war, or because of political or religious injustice or oppression. They’re hurting for other reasons. All that matters to me is that their pain is real; the relativity of that pain in the grand scheme of things is something that others can assess.

My loved ones are resilient; they’ll heal, and they’ll move forward. But not today; and probably not tomorrow; and maybe not the day after. In due time, other things will begin to matter again to them, primarily because they're part of a family. Their attention will turn to children, to spouses, to siblings, to parents, to others they love and care about, and the same familial love that brings them pain today will be the vehicle that returns them to their daily lives.

I send them my love – today, tomorrow and the day after.