Pop 89: In Praise of Big Families
By Madonna Hamel
madonnahamel@hotmail.com
I come from a large family: six kids, two parents and the occasional dog. And, while it was exhausting for my mom, and expensive for my dad, we kids thrived. I was reminded of this when I heard the poet Billy Collins read his poem “Only Child.”
He writes: “Not until my parents entered their nineties did I long for a sister. A nurse I named Mary.” She would drop everything whenever he called. “Be there in a jiff” she would say. They’d meet for coffee and sit and reminisce. He would tell her his childhood secrets, admit his peculiar habits. After a while they might order another coffee, share a pastry. And then he would walk her home.
Only children, says Collins, are terrible liars, because they have no one to blame. I, however, was very good at skewing the truth. I had to to make it look like I was goaded into behaving badly. I was forever getting into trouble for yelling at my younger siblings. I was - am - very loud. My sisters, however, taunted quietly, a strategic way of dodging punishment. Also, whatever they did, I was told, it was up to me, as the older one, to take the higher ground. Just ignore them. As if.
Only children, Collins also says, are better receivers than givers of love. They never had anyone to bestow love upon. Nor, I’d add, did to did they have anyone to whom they could to express the kinds of regret, remorse, longing, wonderment, and frustration that come with growing up alongside each other. I also felt a lot of filial protectiveness. I never had children, but I had mother bear tendencies early and often. When anybody teased, hurt or threatened my sibs I swelled with anger and indignation on their behalf.
In fact, my first recollection of a full-on adrenaline rush fight-or-flight response happened when were preteens, living in Prince George. A group of boys came at me and my youngest sister and my brother with knives. At least they said they had knives. To this day my brother swears he saw the knives. Regardless, we believed the knives were on their persons. Anyway, they were the kind of boys who lurked at the bottom of Dead Man’s Cliff, a haunted empty and dried up riverbed we kids decided to explore one Sunday afternoon. We wanted to get a closer look at the rusty old car and, so the story went, the skeletons of the dead drivers who either committed suicide or lost control of their vehicle taking the sharp corner at the top of the hill.
The boys, there were four of them, were stocky, nervous, gum chewing bullies. The leader told us to leave their territory. I snorted at the very idea. “Territory, ha! Or else you’ll… What? Kill us?” I mocked. Then I hauled off and let them have it - with my words: “They’re just kids, for God’s sake! You think you look tough threatening a couple of little kids? Go pick on someone your own size. “The truth is, the leader was shorter than me and visibly taken aback by my rudeness, my refusal to concede to his machismo. He actually stepped back, as if assaulted by a gale. He then pointed to his pocket where the knife resided and then to the furthest path from the road and told us to leave, and take the long way. “We were just going,” I said. “Come on,” I said to my frightened beloved charges. I wanted to hold them, assuage their fears, rock them in my arms. Instead I herded them homeward, the three of us sniffling and shaking. When we got home I crumpled into a blubbering heap of delayed terror.
Warning: Do not make my siblings cry. Do not dare, don’t even try. I don’t care if you are my sister’s cherished sons. I don’t if you are my brother’s best friend from school. I don’t care if you are justified- that is, you think you are justified. I will glare at you with a stare that says: You couldn’t have found a better way to say that? Don’t you know that honesty without compassion is just cruelty? Who died and made you king?
These feelings - spoiling for a fight or wanting to take on the pain of my siblings - are painful. I feel my throat swell, I crave the words to make it all better. But I can’t imagine being little Billy Collins, playing on the floor alone. Or grown man Billy not having a big sister to call, any time, day or night. I have two, counts ‘em two, older sisters. And two younger sisters. And a soul mate of a brother. And the urge to call them increases with age.
Living alone, with my nearest sister three and half hours away, the next best thing to being there ‘in a jiffy’ is living in a village that is basically four big, fat extended families. Whenever there’s a wedding in town, I know I am invited, the whole town is. The same goes for high school graduations. And of course, when someone dies, we all show up, having delivered sandwiches, cookies and squares earlier that morning. And we stay on after the funeral, reminiscing. And those of us who are new to town, having only lived here ten years, listen attentively, the way Billy dreams his big sister Mary would.
This past summer I attended a ‘small’ (ie: a hundred people) ninetieth birthday gathering for Jacquie Carlier, matriarch of one of the founding families. There were babies and great grandparents and toddlers who periodically would raise their hands in the air, knowing innately that whoever was standing there would bend and lift them up without breaking from their conversation. Maybe one day those toddlers will want to break away. But I have no doubt, nor do they, there’s any number of relatives who’ll ‘be there in a jiffy.’