Stan and Ford, from Gravity Falls
So what do I have in common with these two guys?
Just like them, I’m a grunkle. That is, I’m a great-uncle.
Through my marriage to Missy, I’m the uncle of my nephews, A1 and A2. And A1, the older of the two nephews, has two awesome sons of his own, K. and S.
I’m very fond of all four boys. In one way or another, I’ve done the avuncular thing with three out of four. (And S. is pretty new on the planet, being a newborn, so I’ll get there soon enough.) I’ve given advice, brought them to college in my car, and gone swimming with them, to name three different activities with three different nephews.
This makes me happy in a way that really struck home to me today as I was driving into work, and talking to my girlfriend about it. I also raised my stepson, Turtle for many years, back when his mom and I were married, and we still are in one another’s lives.
When I think about those things, they help me connect to an important and complex truth about myself.
My relationship with my dad was problematic to say the least. He wasn’t around a lot when I was a young kid. I idolized him and saw him as a mythic figure because of the way he floated in and out of my life. He traveled a lot for his job, and as it turned out for some not so great reasons. When I was in high school, and college, it was revealed rather spectacularly to me that he was in fact a terrible man who had done, and continued to do terrible things, to my family, and many others. That really knocked me for a loop for a damn long time.
As an adult, I tend to shy away from many norms and conventions. When I hear “This is how everyone does x…” I tend to go the other way. That’s especially true about social norms around family obligations.
But, over the years, I’ve gone from my knee-jerk, “I’m not gonna do what everyone else does” position, to a more moderate one, where I opt-in to what works for me, and make things my own.
Which gets back to that truth thing I was talking about earlier. The truth is, I love my family, bio, marriage, kink, poly, all of it. And I interact with them in the ways that work for me. I’m really a very good uncle. (And such a modest one, at that!)
I’m happy to share what I know, donate my elbow grease and effort to help my nephews, I’m patient, loving, and kind with them. And they’re all great. I’ve watched A1 and A2 grow up to be spectacularly great men. A1 is a good husband, and a great dad. A2 is smart, motivated, and adventurous. He moved to a foreign country to be with the man he loves, and married him. I’m so happy about that, and about them. I love my great-nephews, and I’m glad to have them in my life.
If I could phone-call the me of 20 years ago, and tell him that two decades down the line, he’d become a step-parent, and a grunkle and be happy about both of those things, that me just wouldn’t have believed it. I was so angry and bitter at my dad for being terrible and the betrayal of his falling off the very unrealistic pedestal I had put him upon.
As an adult I see that I get to opt-in to my family relationships, in the manner which works for me. That’s beautiful, and I’m grateful for it.