we are family. but, what's your name?

I was never close with the cousins from my dad's side of the family. Well, almost. The one and only time I recall us being close was at my granddad's funeral. How ironic. His leaving brought us together, though not for long. That 3 days of sorrow, brought us together in a way that was just beyond words. We were truly like cousins. Unfortunately, after the wake was over, it was all lost too. The bond we had went into the crematorium with my granddad. Perhaps, at the very least, that was what my granddad wanted to us to be.

Since then, it has always been a once a year "gathering" for us all, with not more than 10 sentences exchanged. We probably can't identify the names to the faces we see. Even if we pass each other on the streets, we're just a "oh so familiar" face to each other, at the very most, a hint of smile as acknowledgement. Nothing more, nothing less. I've always believed that we don't speak much to each other cos of our age gaps. Then it hit me, I had a relationship with someone 11 years my senior, even older than some of them are. What basis do I have to claim that we can't communicate? All of us never had put in that extra effort to build the bond, or to even sit down and have a proper talk. There always had been that barrier between us.

Does it matter whether I have a cousin who's a lawyer, one who's a pilot, one who's a teacher, a distant one who's a singer and all? Does all these truly matter when it comes to family? I'm not proud of it. When it boils down to it, we're just passing strangers on the streets who happen to be related.

I've met them on the streets, a couple of times. We don't say hi, we don't smile. We don't even have each other's number. All I know is, that's my cousin I just saw. His/her name? "I think it's so-and-so. But I can't be sure." 21 years of my life. I can safely say for sure, we've not met more than a 100 times. How tragic.

So, is it better to have been close before and drifted apart, or is it better to have never been close before? A question to think about, a question I can't answer. The family tree we've filled up like 5 years ago, still remains on the same piece of paper it was written on. I wonder, if 10 years down the road, where will this piece of paper be.

What went wrong, where went wrong, I don't know. I stopped finding answers. It has all just become something we're all used to. Now, that's why the television is so very important during the Chinese New Year visits. It's our source of escape and excuse to be quiet. We all stay rooted in our seats and when the time comes to leave, we all breathe a huge sigh of relief.