Whose family or kin...

What is Family or Kin, there is that saying blood makes you a relative but loyalty makes you family.
Even my mother would tell me 'just because someone's related, doesn't mean you have to like them' too true indeed there's a lot of people I love but do I like them?
Then of course being from a mix of Irish Italian family this in itself was different to my friends upbringing. My mother's Italian side was almost flamboyant in their displays of affection, hugs, kisses big hellos, busy family gatherings for all sorts of celebrations or just because it was a Sunday. My father's family a little more reserved,  and usually around funerals.
Growing up in seventies Dublin was good and bad, father's worked long continuous hours and mother's did the rearing, but not in our family. Many families emigrated to Australia or other countries. Luckily our Dad was a progressive modern man and luckily he was in full time employment, he'd get us up for breakfast and out to school to allow our Mammy (as we say) to have a lie on. He'd hug and hold our hand and was happy to bounce a baby on his knee or push a pram unlike the other men of his generation. Daddy lost his own mother quite young and communication with him and his own father was of quiet understanding, they didn't talk much.
His Aunts stepped in but only partly, he adored these two Aunts, Aunty Day (May/Margaret) and Aunty Aggie. These two sisters lived in a dark house together filled with memorabilia from WW1, old photos and furniture made by Hick's Cabinet Makers. Johnny Hicks was husband to Aggie. Aggie was Johnny's second wife she was a French Polisher and by all accounts excellent at her job, and worked in most of the fine houses of the 1900s, the thing is he told her soon after the marriage that he married her for the sole reason of rearing his children and that on his death he'd be buried with his deceased first wife. Aggie raised the children and she said she truly loved them, on his death and within  weeks of his burial, her sister, Auntie Day called to take her to live with her on Collin's Avenue, the Hick's family never visited my Great Aunt Aggie. Her job was done, the children raised and she, surplus to requirement. She would sit in a beautiful carved minimalist Art Deco style curved chair in wrinkled stockings about her ankles as myself and my twin brother John would crawl beneath the old dark cupboards on a Safari to reach her, our goal was to tiggle her ankles, and hear her laugh, she had a wonderful laugh. She would teach us old Dublin songs that she had taught our father, she was loving and good. Yet abandoned in a loveless convenient marriage and then ignored by those she reared. How many people go through this? Her family, her kin, her friend was her sister. The two sisters attended Mass every Sunday, same time, same church, same pew, with the same people she raised and reared within touching distance, did they offer her the hand of peace? Who knows..
Aunty Day was different again there's photos of her as a glamorous hipster, very stylish, but more Victorian in her ways, manners was  very important  to her day to day. We learned not to interrupt, to stand when someone came in the room, to politely wait to be offered a biscuit, always say please and of course thank you. It's something that to this day I hold onto, good manners and I appreciate those that try too.

Daddy loved his two elderly Aunts and it wasn't by a sense of gratitude it was one of utterly unconditional love. His Aunts showed him love when at a time in Irish Society children were often seen but not heard. It was a time when foundlings were raised by those that found them and nothing ever said. A time when irritant boys were sent to institutions that no one talked about, that Irish babies were shipped to Canada and the USA for a small fee.
When Dad was a young boy of ten he was a cadet in the St John's Brigade, his father my Grandfather was a returned British Naval Petty Officer and was a member of the St John's for years. Dad was often in the First Aid Post on O'Connell Street, he talked not often, but about what he witnessed, young women the victim of attacks or abandoned on the streets while pregnant he could never understand how 'family' could discard a young child or family member that way. One thing this insight gave him was humanity and compassion, he always wanted or tried to see the good in others even if it meant being taken advantage of himself. My mother always said people took his kindness for granted..but then isn't that the most wonderful attribute to have..kindness. To this day, to me, anyone that can show their fellow kindness is priceless in a world full of disposable and fleeting commodities. Some folk are so poor all they have is money. My two Great Aunts where a strong force in his life, the loss of his mother wasn't spoken about, it was a get on with it attitude. He was a loving Dad, a kind caring Uncle, he was a generous and compassionate man. He abhorred cruelty especially to children and I often witnessed him championing children. Yes he shouted yes he'd 'give out' to us but he also encouraged us especially us girls. 'Remember women can do anything..and usually better than us men, but you'll have to work three times harder to prove it and most likely get paid less, but you can do anything'..he adored women in a respectful and admiring way, he enjoyed their company and they enjoyed his. His one love was our mother his glamorous, striking and often stubborn wife Patty.
They were very different, but it worked or at least they worked at it to make it work.
Their friends would become extended family to us twins, our Aunty Kitty and Uncle Tommy may not have been blood relatives but  they are my Aunt & Uncle in every sense of the words. My Hindi friend uses Aunty or Uncle as a term of endearment to someone older or elderly, and I love this tradition. these two Great Aunts of mine where my Dad's strongest family or members of his kin. The love was genuine and real.
Growing up in the late 30s to 50s in Dublin was very different as was the 70s to now. Simple gestures like collecting seawater in lemonade bottles for our elderly Aunts and taking them to their house so they can bade their feet still brings a smile. I remember how they delighted that although they couldn't go to the beach, Daddy brought some of the beach to them. Then we'd be sent to the chipper for Fresh Cod and Chips. My memory of our Aunts soaking their feet in basins filled with water from Dollymount Strand, seaweed floating about their ankles, eating fish and chips while in the background with the sound down Big Daddy was wrestling Giant Haystack it's a priceless image, the memory maybe sepia but it's wonderful.
He couldn't do a lot for their ailing health but he could make them smile. Aunty Aggie died first and it was heartbreaking, there was little or no singing in the dark house then.
 When Aunty Day died and it broke Daddy's heart, she was so ill she didn't recognize him when he sat everyday by her side.  'Where's Francie?..why hasn't he come, Francis tell him to come see me.' Francis was our Dad's Dad, Aunty Day's beloved brother. He was there. She was his kin his family. Some people find genuine love with a friend, I know I have friends  and cousins I call them my family, they are my kin, I am lucky my own family are important to me. Other people may not have the blood link but do we need it? The meaning of family has changed and is different to so many. I'll never be a 'natural' mother but I know I've been and will be a mother to those that I can be, they will always be part of my family, my kin. I have been surrogate Aunty adopted sister..and I have been and am truly loved. I am lucky to have a family to know my kin to realise that it isn't blood it's kindness it's consideration that creates a bond...and I am so grateful.