Cousins chat line 2014.6.23

A few days ago I got wind of the fact that some of my cousins who we used to be very close to had formed a group chat on whatsap. I wanted in and thought it might be a nice way of connecting, and rekindling old friendships.

We had all it seems come together to support one of our own who was sick and in need of cheering. We began awkwardly, chatting, and joking around and generally just trying to feel our way around.

It was, I must say only the fact that we were committed to be there for our sick cousin that kept us going.  Certainly it was that way for me.

In so many ways it began to feel like a high school reunion. 

Cousins who were so important back in the day had moved on. 

We had gotten married and had kids. And we had moved on too. 

Our childhood was filled with wild extremes of fun and freedom. We didn't think we had any freedom at the time, but we lived in a different world. And we had more unsupervised time than kids have today.

Really good times and truly horrible times. And we experienced all of this, together as children and now as grown ups we can laugh at each other and in doing that laugh at our selves.

We all have our own lives and daily challenges. 

We have doctors and lawyers and butchers and bakers and even candle stick makers.

Hoteliers, house wives and business men, and some really successful business men. 

Yet we can all sit as equals. The reason is there is a common thread that runs in our veins binds us and draws us closer. But more than the blood, the common temperament that our fiery fathers  had, binds us in a bond of common experiences. 

We are bound not just by blood and DNA but by what's in that blood and DNA.

We jokingly refer to the "worm" that is the legacy we all had to endure and in some cases even inherit. 

The worm that knows no reason. It resides in the heart of all of us and has deeply damaged all of us. 

And this too is the legacy that binds us all together. Like survivors of a war, we are all damaged in some way. 

The strange thing is that our unique composition has created a bizarre consequence. 

Most of us have found strength from our ordeal. I know I am,  who I am not despite the worm  but because of it. 

I recently said to somebody that being able to read my dad's mood was a necessary life skill that everyone in the house had to develop. Knowing when we had offended or gone too far,   and when things were about to go pear shaped was something we took for granted. 

In the corporate world I find myself able to "read the room" . And gauge the mood far more accurately than others can. 

I find that I am able to work with difficult people and to the amazement of my peers am able to predict emotional responses.  

Maybe I have learned to read body language or am receptive to other's emotions at a primitive level. It's not something that I can describe or care to examine too closely, 

But its definitely there and which ever cousin I bounced this theory off has found in there own lives something that resonates. 

So instead of sitting around and feeling sorry for ourselves we can celebrate having been exposed,  because it inoculated us against so much that could hurt us later. 

Don't get me wrong. I am not recommending we all send our grandkids to Auschwitz to toughen them,  but we have to accept that like the tempering of steel we have been changed by fire and ice. 

M Parak 

June 2014