A Circle of Strength

Home is the place where, when you go there, they have to take you i

Robert Frost

This week I forwarded a sweet article from the Washington Post to a number of women I love—mostly immediate family members (https://apple.news/Amxc6lmktR–Nlvw2wVYY9Q). It was about a wedding dress which each of eight brides in a single family had worn on their wedding day over the last 72 years. I was startled when every woman on my text string read the article and sent me a comment related to the story within just a couple of hours. Two said they had preserved their own wedding dresses, hoping someday their daughters or granddaughters might chose to wear them. Five (including me) had stories about themselves or their children having been blessed at birth in a dress handed down from a family member or that had been made from scraps of material from their own or a relative’s wedding dress. All of them loved the idea of a such a tradition which bound the generations of women in a family together. I tried to imagine my husband and sons bonding over shared wedding or baby blessing memories. It was so foreign to anything I could conjure up that my brain froze and had to be lubricated with Coke before it agreed to start again.

Not long after Son #3 was born, I joined a local Reading Circle. One year we read a fascinating study by Carol Gilligan (In a Different Voice) in which she suggested that while men tend to define themselves by the use of “I” statements, women are more likely to define who they are by describing their relationships. That idea made sense to me. The men in my family are problem solvers. If I have a difficulty that needs resolution, they are willing–even anxious–to forge ahead and “do” something. More nuanced emotional difficulties are not so easily managed. That’s where the women who matter to me shine.

When I lived in Kearns, for several summers in a row, a group of three or four neighbors and I walked two miles every morning five days a week. It was nice side effect to get some exercise, but the most valuable result of that weekly pattern was the opportunity to share one another’s daily ups and downs and gain some perspective about how other families dealt with similar struggles. On days when I was buried under too many kids and too little money, it was a relief to find women/sisters who listened to my story without judgement or repercussion.

Twenty years later, Son #2 passed away unexpectedly. My sons stepped in to notify family, handle the difficult funeral decisions, and work out how to help his partner and their children. I will never forget sitting on the couch the morning after his death, with Son #3’s arms around my shoulder as we wept together. But it was a woman, my younger sister, who came and stayed with me a week,–fending off the intrusions of everyday life—whose quiet presence without demand or expectation gave me the peace I needed to face a lifetime without him.

The past year or so that need to share has become even more critical. Seven women I hold dear have been diagnosed with one form of cancer or another. Seven. Son #3 is now an oncologist—a very good one. Even he admits it is a statistical rarity for me to have so much of the insidious disease in my immediate circle of friends. When I want to understand the medical ramifications of what is happening to these women I love, I call him, and he is generous with his time, explaining to me in detail what I need to know. But when I want help to ease the burden of those stalwart women, I do what women have done for generations—I listen to their stories.

Two of these cancer patients are former neighbors and were diagnosed with breast cancer within a week or two of each other. They have been each other’s lifeline, sharing information, symptoms, side effects, and tips for managing the daily complications such a disease has on individual families. One patient is the mother of a daughter-in-law’s best friend. Two are members of my local church community—one well-known by the members of our congregation, and the other inactive for many years. A sixth woman serves with me on a charitable foundation. The seventh is a teacher I taught beside for more than 20 years. Some of them know each other; some haven’t met. But as they have learned one another’s stories, they have become a network of women standing together–supporting each where they can–during the long and difficult days.

I’m sure some there were those who scoffed at a group of women in a single family foolish enough to share a wedding dress. But women know a secret of life that is sometimes less obvious to men. There is strength in shared experience. And hope.