Cousins

Cousins. They are your first best friends.

From the time I was a little girl, with only one sibling, it became apparent to me that cousins are so much more than cousins, but more an extended version of siblings.

Growing up on the north shore of NB, I spent so many summer vacations at my grandparent’s farm in Miramichi, NB.  My mom worked full-time to provide for my little brother and I some 200 km from them all – where we, as a small family of 3, were pretty much on our own when you considered the distance from my mom’s family, so visits to her home were limited.

But when the school year ended and summer vacations came, we knew what was in our immediate future plans and the anticipation killed us!

Miramichi Bound

And then Mom would announce our departure. Hopping the Via train or the bus, we were Gram and Grandad bound.  I can’t even explain the excitement in knowing what was to come in the weeks ahead.

Oh, how I loved my grandparents, both. Spending time with them on their farm was a life so removed from mine on a regular daily basis.  Not just due to the distance, but in their simplicity of living.

We would arrive at Gram and Grandad’s with them both anxiously awaiting our arrival. 

Gram would have fresh beds made, eggs and bacon on hand for leisurely breakfasts, and treats for the evenings.  We couldn’t wait to call our cousins once we arrived, and would be watching for them through Grammy and Grandad’s kitchen window as they made their way out over the hill to us.

And then the moment – when we could barely wait to hug!  Those faces that we hadn’t seen in months.  The faces that were all too familiar – as they weren’t just those of the friends that they were to us, but of the closest and deepest of connections – a blood connection.

Enough Cousins To Form Our Own Ball Team

I remember at times counting 12 or 13 of us, all cousins, playing Simon Says.  We didn’t have devices.  There were no electronics.  When Gram said “Out!  Go play!”, we got out and played.  And together, we played hard.  With that many to play with, you couldn’t help but create your own fun.

We would spend the entire vacation making plans for sleepovers with one another at one aunt’s and uncle’s or another’s. Every day, evening and night was planned for and played out until we were played out and out of vacation time.

We would plan on games of Ghost Down Cellar, and Marbles. As menial and lame as they may sound now, they SO filled our days and contributed to some of the most amazing memories of my childhood.

Becky

I’m brought back to it all and their deeper meaning this past week, as I lose one of those cousins. Actually, probably the one I was closest to then and who was more a best friend and sibling in my childhood within the realm of extended family given that we were so close in age.

We are two years apart in age.  And eventho she had 5 siblings of her own, and I had only one, at a distance of 200 km apart and without the means to visit more often than once a year, how we so cherished our time together when summers came.

That’s Small Beans

We’d spend it at Gram and Grandad’s farm making the very most of what we had available to us. 

Sure, we had moments when we fought, most notably the one involving a flying basket of green beans from my grandparents garden that Grammy had asked us to clean for her, but they were few and far between. And we nonetheless, made up the next day, forgave and forgot – just as you do within the commitment and loyalty of family or siblings.

And that was the key. 

We were best friends but also family – all at the same time. And that made our relationships unique.

I think back on those times now, but in an even different context than I have since before Becky leaving us this past week, because I realize, that they weren’t and aren’t just friendships.

Nor are they solely about being related.

They were the early relationships that contributed to shaping us. They made us who we are in the very earliest of building blocks. And they are those that sustain us and remind us of where it is that we come from as we move forward in our lives.  Of where we belong.

Cousins By Chance, Friends By Choice

They are blood relatives and whom we share so much with. But also, they are our earliest of friendships.

Unlike a normal friendship outside of family, they know our family dynamics, as they too, lived it.

They fundamentally share the same family values. Because our parents shared the same as siblings and were raised in the same household with that same set of values.

They know us.  They love us initially because they have to, just as siblings do. 

They accept us, warts and all, because that’s what families do.  

And when they are your best friends…and by choice?

They are your absolute truest of friends.

Aside from immediate siblings, there is no other friendship that we will know, that allows us to be so loved and accepted, in all of our flaws, for an entire lifetime.

So eventho I am with only one sibling, technically? Really, I’m not.

Not as long as I have cousins.

Go here to read more about childhood summers on the Miramichi as a kid in our older blog from My Painted Porch!

Next up…camping anyone? Or glamping?? Which is yours?