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Tuesday, February 1, 2011

Family Matters... and oh look! it's February!

"To put the world right in order, we must first put the nation in order; to put the nation in order, we must first put the family in order; to put the family in order, we must first cultivate our personal life; we must first set our hearts right." ~Confucius

It's February ... I'm amazed at how quickly and yet how slowly time passes. It seems as though when you're involved in something it takes time but then you pause and already it's a month into 2011. Wow.

I'm back home in Trinidad (& Tobago)... back out to work... in a way it's surreal - and I think I've spoken about this before. One moment you're travelling and living day-by-day, moment-to-moment and then you're at work: stationary, back to the grind. Surreal.

It's a comfort to me being back with my [immediate] family though. I realise that I lost my centre (and my patience :s) whilst staying with my family in California. Too many expectations and preconceived notions of family and how things should be... sadness over drama - It is only on reflection that I realise how I should have related to stuff... hopefully the day will come when realisations occur in the moment and not a week or two after.

Family is a major part of my life - both immediate and [somewhat] extended. I say somewhat because I tend to only focus on the aunts/uncles/first cousins/really-close-relatives... any other pumpkin-vine family I don't consider as much - perhaps because I don't know them. Saturday (after waking up at 10 am due to arriving in Piarco at midnight), I went to church. It occurs to me that that's twice in the same month... something that has not happened in awhile (granted the first visit was to a Mormon church and the second to a Presbyterian). One of my dad's older sisters celebrated her 60th birthday with a thanksgiving...sermon? celebration? event. I'm not as close to my dad's side of the family as my mom's but ultimately - it was good to see everyone. To interact and reminisce. 

If I was to go into greater detail about both experiences I'd have titled this post 'a tale of two carols' because the aunt I visited was my aunty Carol (on my mom's side - d youngest sister of 8) and the aunt celebrating her birthday was my aunty Carol (on my dad's side - I'm not sure where she fits but she's older than my dad).  Family focused for the month of January and I learnt this morning that this year (upcoming Chinese Year of the Metal Rabbit)  favours getting more involved with family. I guess I'm just going along with the flow of the universe, and also with my own thoughts - my to-do list covers family, travel and photo-taking - I've had lots of opportunity for this year so far.  

Be blessed,

Ren

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Hi,

Can you recommend a physiotherapist post op for lumpectomy (monday)?

Your mom must be very blessed, I can't imagine going through 13 years of this.