The Village

It takes a village to raise a child, according to an old African proverb, and Hillary Clinton capitalized on it with her book of the same name. I haven’t read the book, but I certainly subscribe to the theory.

When my son was alive, a lot of people helped him: volunteer soccer and wrestling coaches, Sunday School teachers, godparents, teachers, neighbors who had very little stake in his behavior as long as he didn’t bother them, and a host of others. It turned out that in addition to us, his parents, an entire metaphoric village raised him. These people did things we were not available to do or didn't have the expertise to accomplish.

There is no way we can pay back all the people who helped him – and us. What we can do, however, is to be kind to others and to help out those we can. All of us need “safety nets” of all kinds: emotional, financial, and even physical. We all need someone to catch us when we fall. I wouldn’t have broken my ankle on the ice a month ago if someone had. But since breaking it, the number of people who call, who volunteer to bring in food, to come and chat, who bring and send funny get well cards, who walk dogs, who drive me around. That number of people in my village is amazing. And humbling.

At a recent family gathering – and we are involved with chosen family because our blood families live so far away – I found a lot of people willing to be part of my village. One piloted my wheel chair up a ramp and to a table, many made a deliberate effort to stop by the table where I was sitting and give me and my wife hugs and chat at length, and a few stopped by to tease me good naturedly about being klutzy (I slipped, in truth, and in a fluid graceful arc landed flat on my back looking at the sky. Nothing klutzy there, thank you very much!). I enjoyed seeing and talking to all of them. I am at least twice as old as most of them, but I feel as if I am their contemporary. I have to step back and realize I am their parents' (or grandparents') age.

And so it distresses me when people reject the village. At the family gathering, some extended members of our chosen family made it a point to avoid me and my wife. This is the second event that these people have made a point to snub us. I suspect they think we are trying to “alienate the affections” of the ones who chose us. In their narrow view, it seems, there is only a certain quantity of love that exists, and if we get some of it, they get less. This is an attitude I don’t understand. The more I love, the more capable I am of loving and receiving love.

On the other hand, their cliquish attitude kept these family members in a tight little circle and few of the people who greeted us also greeted them. Maybe they are afraid, maybe they are jealous. Maybe they are angry because I am a loud person, too frequently profane, too outspoken. For whatever reason, they got less of the available affection that infused the room because they couldn’t accept it.

At first I was angry and felt rejected. But I realized I had a much better time (despite or perhaps because of being stuck in the wheel chair), I connected with more people, and I can merely feel sorry for people who are not open to love. I cannot survive without others, and I don’t feel joy just by being alone although I need time by myself.

My village is large. Their village is very small. What a pity.