Day 163 Question 163:

What are you envious of?

Yesterday was an emotionally exhausting day.  It wasn’t a bad day…just a wide array of emotions felt throughout the day.  I have been thinking about family a lot lately.  My family is pretty small.  I have my mom and dad that live about 10 minutes away from me and then there is my sister, brother in law and 2 nephews that live 1,000 miles away.  This is pretty much what I consider my family to be.  There are obviously more members but some I have never met or have not seen since I was a young child.  I am envious of those people that have big, tight-knit families.  Don’t get it twisted..I am envious…NOT jealous.  I do not take for granted having the family that I do because they are the most important people in my life.  I just sometimes wonder what it would be like to have a big family Thanksgiving or Christmas surrounded by aunts and uncles and cousins and nieces and nephews.

If any of you tuned into my entry yesterday, you know it was an emotional one for me.  It was the peak of my emotional day yesterday.  I called my mom last night and talked to her for quite a while and I said a lot of things that I needed to say….the things that I usually put on paper as opposed to actually verbalizing them.  I told her how happy I am in life at this time (probably the happiest I have ever been) but I still do reflect back on the person I used to be and can’t believe some of my actions.  I used to hold in so much hostility and so much anger….and a lot of it got directed at my parents.  I told her how it hurt my heart thinking about the way that I treated them and I no longer wanted them to feel that they needed to walk on eggshells for me anymore.  I have found so much clarity and I do not let my past control me but I did feel bad for how I acted and for putting my parents in such a miserable situation.  I had so much bottled up self-hatred and emotional issues that I hadn’t been working out and I was just directing all of my pain at them.  My mom told me that over the past 3-4 months I have been a completely different kid (yes she still calls me a kid at 33 years old ;0).  She said I have become so much more calm and she has really enjoyed being around me.  I told her I was sorry for the past and she told me not to be sorry because it is the past.  I don’t know where this rush of emotions came from yesterday.  Some people think that the meditation I do is just goofy and is just some hippie mind-set but since I have started practicing I feel so much more at ease in my life.  I feel that I have dove so much deeper into my consciousness and I am no longer allowing my ego to control me.  Whether people “buy it” or not…I have never felt more at peace than I do now.  My emotional state yesterday was needed because I was finally addressing my thoughts and my feelings in a constructive way.

Anyhooooooooooooooo…as usual I went a little off base there.  So, in yesterday’s entry I mentioned that my nephew is 18 years old and has been in a Juvenile Detention Center since he was 14.  I have wanted to get in contact with him by writing him a letter to tell him that he is loved and hopefully form some sort of relationship with him.  I called the New York State Department of Social Services and asked if there was anyway of locating him or getting his contact information and the lady told me no because I am not his legal guardian.  She was a very kind lady and she asked if I could contact my sister to get his information and I had to tell her that I was unsure where she is.  The lady told me that she wished she could tell me because it sounded like he could use a support system but because of federal laws she was unable to give out that information.  I am determined to get to him though.  A friend of mine suggested seeing if someone with the Department of Juvenile Justice could forward a letter on to him so I am going to try that approach.  If worse comes to worse I will email my sister (I know she has a Facebook page) and hope that she will give me his contact information.  I have a strong feeling she will tell me to fuck off but it is worth a shot.

Family means everything to me.  There are people in my life that are not related to me that I would still consider my family because I love them so dearly.  I must repeat that although I am envious of those people with big families and great relationships, I am still beyond lucky for the people I do have in my life.  This life is flying by and I don’t want to miss out on opportunities.  Yes, I want my family members to extend their hands out to me from time to time but right now I am willing to do the work to try to bring people together if at all possible.  My mother and her sister have a very simple relationship.  They write letters to each other maybe once or twice a year and just talk about the usual (what family is doing, weather, etc.)  They do not have an emotional bond that I believe sisters should have.  Family (in my opinion) is something that should be easy and natural but I have found that it actually comes with a lot of complications and road blocks.  Since departing from my self-loathing and self-absorbed ways I have had a clearer picture of family and how much I value the people in it.  I have seen how different everyone is and have learned why some relationships have been strained or have become non-existent.  A part of me wants to forge through the wall and bring everyone together.  I want to write letters and express the importance of family….even through all of the differences.  My dad and I are rarely on the same page but I still love him unconditionally and that will never ever change.  My sister (biological sister) drives me crazy sometimes because she never calls me and sometimes I get really sad about this but I am not going to stop giving her the benefit of the doubt.  I know she loves me unconditionally….she can’t know that it hurts my feelings if I don’t tell her.  This process has allowed me to see my strengths and to also see my weaknesses.  I can’t assume people know what I am thinking or what I want.  There is work to be done if I want to see some kind of results.