Aunts and Uncles

We grew up somewhat family-less and without a history.

My parents were the only people in either of their (large) families to immigrate to Canada from The Netherlands after World War II.

My dad arrived by ship, and landed at Pier 51 in Halifax.

My mom arrived by plane, with a stopover in Greenland to refuel. When she left to marry my dad (a man she hadn't seen in years and whom she would marry within days of her arrival) she really thought she might never see her family again, given how difficult and expensive travel was in those days.

I remember the occasional call from Holland: Oh my goodness that was an event, and the pause between what the person said, before you heard what they said, was so long it made conversation difficult. It was hard to stay connected. Letters took weeks and weeks to arrive.

Still, we had Dutch visitors almost once a year by the time I was born, and I remember them as highlights of my childhood. The house was full of people talking and laughing and drinking and smoking. (You could do that in those days--the smoking part--in front of children, and not feel too bad about it.) My parents have always offered exceptional hospitality and on those visits, they pulled out all the stops.

It was wonderful.

Communication was a bit of a challenge, especially with some of the older relatives like my Oma and Opa. I still don't really understand to this day why my parents didn't speak Dutch to us more often. I would have loved to be able to really talk to my Oma and Opa. Anyway, we did interact with my limited Dutch and their limited English, with some translation by those who were bilingual.

Some of my friends had large extended families and they didn't care much for their family events. They were a burden to be endured. I don't know, maybe their extended families didn't have the capacity for fun and enjoyment that mine did, but I remember just not understanding why you wouldn't be thrilled to be able to spend a lot of time with your family, or have an Auntie that lived close enough to visit whenever you felt like it.

There are still many parts to my family's history that I don't know and would like to. The last time we went to Holland (much too long ago) I said that I wanted to visit the graveyard in Aalten where my father's family and ancestors were buried. I'm not sure who I asked, but they looked at me like I was crazy.

But I have spent so much time in pioneer graveyards in Canada reading the stones of the McLeary's and the Smiths and the Gautiers and the McPhillips that I wanted to spend some time among the stones of people that had my name. I wanted to know their stories, because they are my own.

Where do I come from? To whom do I belong? Do I have my great grandmother's smile? Did any of them write? Which of my great-greats loved to laugh? Where did we get our love of the argument? Who played music? Who loved to cook?

My father told me a few months ago that he remembers his mother going out to her garden each morning and deciding what they would have for supper based on what was ready. I can imagine my Oma, long hair tightly wound, her large hands pulling a weed here and there, surveying her plot of land. I wish I would have seen her.

I think my love of history and my great delight in my nieces and nephews and the relationships that they have with each other and with my children and with me, are borne somewhat because of the ache I have in not knowing my aunts and uncles and cousins the way I wish I could have.

My parents are in Holland right now, visiting for a few weeks. One of my aunts sent this picture of them with my mother's siblings and their spouses. They've just been out for dinner to a great restaurant--they've been eating and drinking all night. I'm sure there has been a lot of laughter.

I'm sure the relationships are not all perfect and smooth, but they are all smiling. They have all stayed married and none of them is estranged from any other family members so that they can't get together now and then for a night like this. They are all living long and relatively healthy. They all like to travel and they all seem to enjoy the moment as it is given to them.

That is my heritage, that is my history. These are my people.

I wish I knew them better.