Family Mythology

I learned first-hand about family mythology when a brother and my sister refused to accept the childhood memories I shared at the kitchen table the weekend before my mother died. It was offensive and disrespectful, as well as the accusation that my whole life is a lie that lives only in my imagination. It has been challenging to accept that other people’s perception can instantly become my reality just because they say so, but my siblings effectively dismissed my memories in the flick of a smug smirk, and that reality stays with me.

Tess Gerritsen writes the Rizzoli and Isles novels, the basis for the current TV show featuring Angie Harmon. Gerritsen’s latest work is entitled The Silent Girl, a story that finds its foundation in Gerritsen’s own Far East family history. I usually find little gems hidden in any storyline, and this reading is no exception. In talking about family descendents, Mrs. Fang, a lead character, explains to Detective Frost, “You could be descended from King Arthur or William the Conqueror. If that’s important to you, if it helps you get through your day-to-day life, then go on believing that. Because family mythology has far more meaning to us than the truth. It helps us cope with the sheer insignificance of our own lives” (chapter twenty-nine).

The profundity of a lifetime encapsulated in a few sentences struck me silent for a minute, and then I reread, contemplated, finished reading the chapter, then went back several times to revisit the last two sentences: “Because family mythology has far more meaning to us than the truth. It helps us cope with the sheer insignificance of our own lives.”

First, the assumption is that our family memories are mythology, and then that the mythology means more than the truth, which is certainly the case in my family. Both of my parents are dead, but I have four brothers and a sister. When people say that death brings out the worst in people, it is truer beyond anyone’s imagination, as I found out up close and personal after my mother's death. What is clear before the death is muddied by family mythology afterward, as each individual in the family holds firmly to his/her own myths about what life was and especially about how the family heirlooms should be shared.

But Gerritsen’s second sentence, “It helps us cope with the sheer insignificance of our own lives,” profoundly affects me as I struggle with that concept on an almost daily basis: my own “sheer insignificance” is a deeply-felt truth that has lived within me since my earliest memories. My entire life has been focused on being someone, doing something, making a difference and being significant, all the while feeling profoundly insignificant as, time after time after time, my presence, my effort, my determination to be significant simply doesn’t matter. When it’s really important to be someone, to do something, to make a difference and be significant, my own insecurities will not be denied.

Far too many times I have wondered why I even try, why I go the extra mile, why I do more than many people know, why I struggle to make a difference when far too often I regret my effort.

An example leaps into my mind, a day when a student was killed in an automobile accident on his way to school, his chair empty when I took attendance that morning. A few minutes into the class, the door opened and the principal stepped into the room to declare bluntly that [student’s name] was dead. There was absolute silence as the students began to process what they had heard: their classmate was dead and some of them, staring at his empty chair, didn’t have a clue who he was beyond his name. My mind kicked into “do something” mode, so I found poster board, markers, a box of photos – and let the day’s lesson be remembrance. When the project was finished, we displayed the tribute on the wall outside my classroom so other students could “picture” the student and share memories of their classmate.

Imagine my surprise when the local newspaper came out that week: the principal was in a front-page photo, standing behind students seated at a table “working on” a poster in memory of the student who had died in the accident. She had taken the poster off the wall, invited two students to join her in the back room after school, and staged the photo to focus on her involvement in the students' grieving process, a process made much more difficult by her tactless announcement that he was "dead."

Why did she do that, pretend that she had done something right that day, rather than handle a difficult situation badly? Simply because she could? Perhaps, after reading Gerristen’s words, her motive was far more complex: having this power truly helped her cope with the “sheer insignificance of [her] own life.” It was not right, it was not fair to take the focus off the student’s death and put it onto herself, but there is no do-over in the real world, no saying sorry for becoming the moment, rather than living it.

Gerritsen's quote takes me on a mental meander and realize that the older I become, the less significant my life is to me. I think about who I think I am, the places I’ve been, the things I’ve done, the people I've met, and all pales in comparison to those around me. I am not heroic; I have not overcome great tragedy; I have not struggled mightily against negative odds and triumphed. I simply awaken each morning, put my boots on the ground, and keep on keeping on, completely lacking significance in who I am and what I do.

Inside, I’d like to be significant, but I’m not: there will be a slight ripple with my departure, but a ripple that will quickly close as life moves on without me. Some will remember for a while, but far more will never know that I existed. I enjoy more than some, less than others; do more than some, but far less than others; touch some lives in a positive way, but mess up just as many times with my stumbling and fumbling to try to do the right thing at the right time for all the right reasons. It’s not that I am insignificant, but that I am not significant that strikes me most deeply.

My family mythology is not a huge help in allowing me to cope with my “sheer insignificance” because so much of what I think I know within myself -- if my siblings are correct -- is pure rubbish. However, again quoting Gerritsen, "If that’s important to you, if it helps you get through your day-to-day life, then go on believing that." It’s easier to believe the untruth of personal perception than it is to probe the truth of someone else’s reality, and that’s where my thoughts wander this fine Sunday morning.