Ever Expanding Family

She did believe, in some vague way, that whenever she got married, her husband would simply flow seamlessly into her own. She never thought about having to fit into his world, his family. It was as though she expected him to come from some great vacuum, eager - but not too eager - for family dinners, evenings out, backyard barbecues and all of the wrappings of an active family. She even has friends who insist that their spouses will, essentially, have to have no family of their own in order to properly assimilate into the demands of large family life.

It never occured to her that she would fall in love with someone who, while enjoying family, has no desire to acquire a new one.

But she has.

In some ways, she's been lost to her own family. Her parents wonder about her whereabouts. Her grandmother curiously calls and asks for updates. Her cousins, well, they vanished on their own long ago.

But she's creating her own family, building from the ground up, melding lives with someone completely different from herself.

So, she doesn't over commit him, although he generally does whatever she asks. She never tells her mother, "Yes, we'll be there." Recently, if it's something that matters enough, she'll commit herself, "I'll be there for sure, and I'll get back to you about him."

Her mother seems to appreciate this semi-commitment.

Mostly, she despises saying "Yes, sure thing, you can count on me," when she may very well have to place an apologetic phone call or write a suck-up e-mail later on down the road.

So, her new method seems to work.

Though it's new for her, and her observing family, to note that she can't just say yes, that she has to talk to someone else first, that she no longer seems in complete control over her time, of her life.

This is a deliberate move on her part. She has a tendency to move full-force through life, completely forgetting that anyone else might care about a decision she has to make, that there are people who would like to be consulted before she, say, rents an apartment, quits her job or books a hotel room. That is, there are people other than her mother who want to be involved in her thought process.

When she rented her apartment, she didn't tell him until she was moving in two days.

Now, months later, she consults him about an issue at work. Mostly, she's made up her mind about the course of action, but at least he thinks he's involved. And he, like her father always has, offers a unique perspective on the situation. At the very least, he will validate her choices.

He can fill some of the roles that her family long has, but he still will never fully integrate into her family.

He will never be her mother's son. He has his own mother, thank you very much, and, admittedly, he doesn't call her enough. He can't possibly take on another one.

Familiar Roles

It is undescribably true that our friends are the family we choose. Most of my closest friends, I have known for a minimum of five years. At this point, they know me far better than most of my blood family every will (with a couple of obvious exceptions). They ARE my family.

I have looked for most of my adolescent and adult life for the one person who will build a family with me, that one person with whom I will make a life. I have stood on the outskirts at many a party, watching as couples danced, as men flirted with women who weren't me. I've gone through patches of time when I was completely okay with than and others when the thought of an evening out as the lone unattached one broke my heart and encouraged me to stay home to watch Sex and the City or read a book. Generally, not wanting to be a crazy cat lady, I would go out and be the lone unattached one. I longed for the person I could call who would come to my rescue. For the person who would catch me when I fall and whom I could also save. I wanted a knight in slightly battle-worn armor, or at least someone brave enough and strong enough to come along on my crazy adventures.

And I've found him. And he's the family I will make. He's gradually melding into my blood family. The friend family takes more time, because we are built of memories and experiences that he doesn't share.

Before him, I was still here, still sitting with an aching heart as I watched my friends pair off, fall in and out of love. I have been here all along. I have had weekends spent going to Costco fourteen times with my parents (possibly a slight exaggeration), and no one called me then. No one fought for my attention when there was plenty to give.

I sometimes feel that my friends are waiting for me to fall back into the role of the unattached one. They were comfortable with that, comfortable hearing my wacky dating tales. I also believe that, at times, they think of him as another of my two-week long romances that crashes and burns before anyone even meets the guy.

It's not a year, it's not 10 years, it's not a shared adolescence or even one college formal attended as a couple. It's a simple sharing of life with none of the trappings of school.

It's "only" been six months, but, to me, and to him, that's a long time. And besides, a lifetime together, the building of a family together, has to start somewhere. Why not here?

Distance

I am my father's daughter. There are moments when a certain flick of my wrist or tilt of my hip will remind everyone that I am my mother's daughter as well. But I am my father's daughter.

My father will be angry for days and even weeks before he will let anyone know what is wrong. He will mope. He will furrow his brow. He will set his jaw. He will not speak.

I am my father's daughter.

People think they know him. They call him by a nickname, when in reality, he hates when anyone shortens his name. They think he's "such a nice guy," in much the same way everyone thinks I'm "such a nice girl." I had too many "stay sweet" comments to count in my high school yearbooks, yet anyone who really knows me would probably not use "sweet" to describe me if they only had one word to use.

I am my father's daughter.

My father loves my mother with all of the passion in his heart. He loved her stupidly and wrongly. He was rude and sarcastic and thought that would work. He dated other women, not making her jealous, just biding his time until she saw fit to love him in return. He hid his affection behind a shield of anger.

I am my father's daughter.

I am in love now, for the first real time in my life. All the other times I may have loved, but I do not think that I was in love. I love with all the passion in my heart, but I will not say it. I will bide my time, making passive aggressive comments until he should see fit to say he loves me in return.

I am my father's daughter.

My father will remember key facts about certain people and nothing about others, even if he's been told 100 times.

I will stare right through some people, never remembering why I am supposed to know them, while there are some faces that I can recognize and identify from a mile away, and not because I want to, not because I like the people that go with the faces, just because.

I am my father's daughter.

My father will make seemingly snap decisions that, in fact, he's been mulling over for hours, days, months, whatever fits.

I thought about moving out of my parents' house for at least two and a half of the three years I lived at home, most seriously in the 10 months before I finally moved. Yet, my decision to actually do it came over the course of about four days. Those close to me were not pleased by the seeming alacrity of this decision.

I am my father's daughter.

Both father and daughter show our emotions in our behaviors yet keep our thoughts private. It's obvious that *something* has affected us, but we won't tell you what, not unless you fight for it. If you want into our world, you have to earn it and earn it and earn it again. And there's no guarantee that once you've been let in once, you'll be let in again anytime soon.

There is sometimes an angle in my hip, a sigh in my chest or a tilt in my head that will remind people that I am my mother's daughter, too.

But then I will retreat into my private, secret world, and it becomes all too obvious that I am my father's daughter.

Life According to Plan

"Originally, she thought, "I wanted to meet someone in college, date him for several months and then bring him home to meet everyone." She thought this on her way back to her apartment after a dinner with her parents and her boyfriend of a mere six weeks.

"I wanted to know him inside and out before I let him loose with my family. Who knows what he'll say? Who knows how he'll behave."

She certainly didn't know, couldn't predict yet how he might react to a given situation. And, she worries, people sometimes want to hold her responsible for his behavior, as if she could make him say "thank you" more often, when, really, she knows he just wasn't brought up that way.

She does know this, though, he's very different than she thought he was. Different in a better way. She worried he'd be too much like that last one, too nice for his own good, so nice that she felt that one of two things would happen, 1) she would somehow explode from her desire to be not-so-nice around him, or 2) he would eventually revert back to the purely bad behavior she knew about in his past.

But this one. Oh, he came across as nice and innocent, but, then, she also comes across that way.

They are two misunderstood people living in a world that has been cruel. He's given in to more cynicism than she has. She still believes that everything will turn out okay.

She believes that when she's most in denial.

She turns to look at him and smiles at the sight of his face. She's come to accept and appreciate that this is the face she'll be seeing throughout her life. She also looks at that face and thinks, "Who are you? Where did you come from?"

He senses her stare, reaches across the car and takes her hand.

She continues to smile at him, then turns to stare out the car window, thinking, "I don't know you at all."

How Many Times

In the last week, I have started to count, though not really keep track of, the number of moments when I realize that I would like to say the words, "I love you." I'm not talking about times when I would like to say it for the first time. No, I am counting the times I would like to say it if we were already saying it to each other.

For example:
*When he made pretzels, without being asked, to take to my parents' house for dinner
*When he felt comfortable enough with my friends to spend an entire evening with them
*When he asks if I want him to drive
*When I go to sleep at night
*When he leaves in the morning

I'll have to be careful, because I've started saying it to him, in my head, or just mouthing the words after his eyes are closed, or after he closes the door. Perhaps one time the words will just slip out of my mouth, unannounced. Perhaps I won't mind.