We have evolved into humans who need connection. In a perfect world, everybody would have a biological family who has known them from birth, and then ascending layers of chosen extended family. Every single one of these people represents some level of accountability in ourselves, in who we are.
As we grow up and the populations of both camps decline (both through attrition and death) we lose a little bit of ourselves with each departure. We then recover and go on to love another day. It's like we never learn.
In just watching people and reluctantly playing among them over the last decade, I've built a pretty tight theory on how being connected to people helps make us better people.
We have to be connected.
It's just the way we've evolved, we can't help it.
It's one of the most over-used movie lines ever, but when Jack Nicholson said "You make me want to be a better man" he was pretty much speaking a Universal Truth. Anybody and everybody we love should make us want to be a better person. That's the way love works. It's cool that way.
Maybe that's how you know it's love.
It won't always bowl you all the way over, but you'll know it when you feel it. It's a many-faceted and seriously unreasonable thing that will leave you feeling a little bigger, braver...taller and stronger. Less alone - proportionate to the people on your island.
Conversely, it's absence leaves holes of varying size.
Yea, sorry the whole conversely part sucks out loud.
I swear!
I stand by this theory.
I can see it like it's a cartoon!
All of these unspoken expectations, pokes, phone calls, pieces of mail ... All of this keeps us tethered and woven into some identifiable piece of fabric. These are constant reminders that we are alive and there is somebody else out there who gets us and knows us and loves us anyways.
If you love somebody, let them know. (sometimes you will also have to let them go, but we'll save that for later) Shower the people you love with love. See your people in person and hug them, even if it proves to be an arduous journey to do so. There is no time like the present, people have a way of leaving unexpectedly.
And, as always: Call your mother.
If you don't have a mother, call your aunt.
copyright 2010 momomasters
