Sometimes I feel like it's the only things that unites us.
This weekend was one of those time.
We haven't all been together since 2014 so having a 2 year old who was anxious to play with a bunch of boy cousins right around his age, a husband who hasn't seen all his brother together in over a year and me who loved the idea of being with my mom and sisters all together to laugh and talk about our boys was very exciting!
Being 35 weeks pregnant and trying to figure out how to afford this next baby, possibly having to move in a month, taking off work, almost stopped us from going but we recognized the rarity of this opportunity and saw the benefits of the family time together outweighing the disadvantages so we prepared well and anticipated a fun filled weekend of picture taking, beach-going and family loving.
To spare you the rather gory details, the weekend to a hard turn for the worst when the brothers got into a rather public and thoughtless argument at one of Madis games. It wasn't a surprise to any of us but it was painful, embarrassing and discouraging all the same. It was almost expected and as I looked around and saw every family members reaction to the embarrassing display of disrespect, judgements, ego and anger, I knew we all felt the same. We even confirmed verbally in a few instances that we all could agree. This can't happen anymore. We're tired of getting together, just to feel like we could go a few years without seeing each other again. We're tired of feeling misunderstood, misrepresented and disrespected. And we're all tired of spending time, money and effort into vacations that leave us feeling sick inside and less bonded together than before. After speaking briefly with all the siblings separately after the argument, we decided to show up to Madis game the next day a 1/2 hour earlier and discuss how we can better respect each other and set aside our differences to have more enjoyable vacations and hopeful take a big step in the right direction of loving each other better.
Merrells aren't talkers. There's a long history of unspoken buried feelings a lot of sarcasm, indifference, stubbornness, bold statements, and uncensored opinions that make having a serious conversation very difficult. Having everyone agree to a meaningful, level-headed, open-minded conversation was a big deal and required a lot of faith and trust in one another. Chad and I prayer all night and the morning of that something progressive, healing and loving would come from our talk. We talked about how important it was for us to start the conversation with the common understanding that this wasn't a blaming game, or a place for accusation, or even a time to point out hurt feelings or flaws (that could be done on an individual basis or better yet, not at all once we'd all taken a moment to apologize and forgive one another), but rather a place for us to gather and apologize, possibly establish some basic respect boundaries for the future (without dwelling on past wrongs) and most importantly, rediscovering the one commonality we all have...we love one another, family is important to us, it had to be, why in the world would we keep putting ourselves through these ridiculous family catastrophes if we weren't invested in each other. We don't want to change anyone and hope they wouldn't ask us to either but we can communicate more respectfully to have more enjoyable times together.
The closer we got to the conversation, the more worried I became. I kept replaying phrases in my head and trying to play through senarios of how different personalities would respond. I recognized the fragile nature of this conversation before we even started but I underestimated just how many pieces it would shatter and break into if handled incorrectly.
We were all together and had to start talking eventually but, all of us being so different had a much different interpretation of how this conversation should go. Again, I won't divulge the details of our conversation, especially since it seriously lacked depth and any true essence, but it was shockingly destructive, lacked the spirit entirely and had no direction for the first word spoken to the last. Feelings were hurt even further, words went unheard and misrepresented and apologies fell on deaf ears that seemed to be clogged by more accusations and hurtful judgements. Voices slowly raised, language became more offensive and defensive walls were further paved with pride and predispositions. I sat in shock and almost complete silence and the few words I desperately tried to get out were buried under side conversations and sighs of frustration and anger. I felt like a failure. I felt responsible. Responsible for suggesting such a silly solution as a family council to redirect some of the hurt feelings into apologies and common desired for betterment. When we all grew silent with frustration and futility, I apologized for the direction of the conversation and reiterated my intentions. I saw a few surprising sets of eyes with hope in them as I gave an example of what I had hoped would come from this, we all knew it was handled poorly...again. But this time, it seemed irrepairable. I tearfully took advantage of everyones angry silence and said what I had hoped to have said at the beginning of the conversation about offering apologies, taking responsibilities for ourselves and moving forward with new perspective. The more I spoke, the less realistic it sounded to me. We were not there yet. Hearts were hard as stone, there was still a heavy blanket of indifference towards each others opinions and hurt feelings and too much focus on our own agenda. I felt like I was suggesting we build a skyscrapper of gold in a 3rd world country. The whole reason we all really wanted this conversation was because I think we've all been close to calling it quits, not being as intentional about spending time together. And we accidentally added another reason to do just that.
As we drove away, knowing we had plenty of talk time on the way home, we sat in silence, reflecting on all the "if only we would have"'s and "should have said this" and "shouldn't have said that"'s. We wished we wouldn't have gathered together and talked/tried at all, we wished we hadn't even come to California at all. Chad started talking about how it's not worth the stress, the tears, the guilt, the hopelessness. and I stopped him and reminded him that there's more at stake then just his feelings towards his family. We had Liam and Matix and today we failed them. They have cousin that will see less and less of them, aunts and uncles that will have little to no relationships with thier dad and a confusion, unfair perception of how families function and should treat each other. We owe it to our kids to keep trying and changing the flaws inside ourselves, to fight for our family. We prayed for understanding and comfort and the spirit filled our little car. As we concluded talking, our hearts were still heavy and it was even physically evident how discouraged we were, we just couldnt find the silver lining anywhere. Liam must have sensed the emotional exhaustion of the car because as he always does, he came to save the day. He randomly told us both that he loved us and sang "I am a Child of God" as if on repeat for about 20 minutes in his sweet and honestly, reverent voice...which naturally made me cry harder and brought smiles back to Chads face. We both felt like failures that day but Liam reminded us that we were designed specifically to be the kind and dear parents of a very special boy and that we have a responsibility to him to do exactly what we did that day. To try, to fail, and to try again. To build up a family that can be together forever and foster actions of intention and love. We felt his support in his simple example of effortless and personal love. That boy is undeniably an angel in my life.
The weekend only became more difficult with unexpected car problems to add to our list of blindsides but we decided we were not beat yet. We were still swinging, still fighting for something. The battle was lost but not the war. We'll continue to work hard on ourselves and continually try to put aside our differences and hurt feelings to understand others. Communicating is hard for even the happiest married couples, the most functional mothers and sons and the most loving and alike brothers, so yeah, we've got our work cut out for us! Like my brother-in-law said this weekend....we are not a normal family, we're special, we have to think of special ways to approach our "special" differences. We've become aware of many new things this weekend. We realized that no one is required to love, its apart of our agency, and family bonds have to be created, sometimes they aren't built in. We learned that righteous desires and prayers can't change the lessons we each personally need to learn and sometimes the answers to those prayers is the temporary delay of those righteous desires. Praying for the spirit to be present and then putting yourself in a position that offends the spirit isn't going to give you the results you're looking for. Obviously, we learned a lot. A lot of hard lessons.
We love our family. That's undeniable, it wouldn't hurt so bad if we didn't. We'll never stop trying to express that love but we will also learn from what doesn't work. Love sure is a language and the dialects are copious just within our family. Our ability to learn those languages has nothing to do with anyone else and their desire to do so or receive that love. Just as the Savior loves us all, regardless of whether we welcome him into our lives or not, we too can express our love and support with no strings attached. I know that expressing Christlike love isnt just benifitial to the recipients. It strengthens our relationship with the Savior and allows him to love through us. Its healing to both the giver and the reciever and it's needed by every living being.
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