Family

“Microcosms fascinate because they tell big stories on an accessible scale. They are worlds you can hold in your hand. ...Family is the world, your very own living microcosm of humanity, with its heroes and victims and martyrs and failures, beauties and gamblers, hawks and lovers, cowards and fakes, dreamers and steam-rollers, and the people who quietly get the job done. Every behavior in the world is there to watch at the dinner table. You study them. You learn. You see how they change and how they stay the same. But if you think you really know them, you're missing the point. The point isn't how well you know somebody. The point is this: In a family you don't come from nowhere. You enter the world already part of something. The myths and behaviors are all there to model yourself on or against. You are who you came from. There is no escape, but there is transmutation. Family is how you become who you will be. It's through family you learn there are no limits on ideas. Nothing is strange ... if you believe in what you do, who cares what anybody else thinks? ...You were born with the chance to love them. You might as well. They're yours.”
~Patricia Volk