Almost everyone is screwed up, broken, clingy, scared, and yet designed for joy - Anne Lamontt
As my Facebook friends know, I'm just finishing up Anne Lamontt's newest book, Almost Everyone - Notes on Hope. Anne is, again, brutally honest about her imperfect life. In addressing this crazy mess in which we're currently, living, she says I am stockpiling antibiotics for the apocalypse, even as I await the blossoming of the paper whites on the windowsill...
I can so relate.
One of the things Anne Lamontt and I have in common is big messy families. As Anne says, families are hard, hard, hard. It took me decades to realize that the vast majority of families are hard and messy. Anne reminds us that even 12 year old Jesus gave his parents a hard time.
If the earth is forgiveness school, family is your postdoctoral fellowship. Even in what might pass as a good family, every member is consigned a number of roles intended to keep the boat of the family afloat, which because of the ship's rats - genetics, bad behavior, and mental illness - is not as easy as it sounds.
But if we could choose from all the families in the world, most of us would choose our own. I know I would.
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