Startin' With Me

Well, it seems Jake Owens sung it best when he sings, 'I'd look back and not what like I see, I'd change a lot of things, startin' with me'.  I'd have to say this is the point where I am at.  Recently, I've been in an emotional place where I realize I need my family.  I have a lot of neat cousins and aunts and uncles, and I don't know them.  I've not kept in touch.  It's time!  I'm not exactly sure how, but I think it's time for me to try to get to know more than 2/60something cousins.  My own close family, they are really hard for me to like.  My parents, especially.  There are so many things in the way, that they can't see need to be fixed.  So the best I can do is accept it.  But when my auntie died on January 9th, I had no stories to tell about her.  I had seen her only once or twice briefly in the past 10 or even 15 years.  And it was really upsetting to me.  There are so many things I just don't know about her.  I know a few of my aunts, and I am sad to say they are the ones who you require 'approval' from.  I suppose judgementalism runs in the family.  But I think there are many in my family, like my auntie Shelley, whom are gentle and loving.  So when I was at the funeral, everyone cried, and I was as loving as I could be.  I spoke to all of my aunts and uncles, and hopefully all of my cousins and their spouses.  They are my family, and I don't have to discount them, just because I learned not to automatically trust family.  That is what I realized.  It has always been an emotional upheaval for me to visit family.  That is something I'd like to overcome.