Our TRIBE...calling all Aunties & Uncles!

So here is our tribe....

This is a photo from our Wedding Celebration which was last June '07, around the Summer Solstice. We got married in San Francisco's City Hall on the Winter Solstice 12.22.06 with our mom's as our witnesses. We had our celebration party six months later. No we did not have our party on the tracks, we had a little adventure walking down to the railroad tracks while our tables were being set up for dinner. We liked this industrial backdrop for our cast of characters. The weather was superb, everyone was in good but genuine social form!!! A perfect day and so much fun! I for one thought that having the official ceremony and the party separately was perfect for us. The guy in the orange turban is the security guard next door.We were all forming into position waiting for the photographer when he ran up along the r.r. tracks carrying the bright yellow ladder. The colors of the orange turban and yellow ladder were unexpected and made everyone burst into laughter. Of course we invited him in for the photo. See the shadow of our dear friend Jaymie on the ladder in the photo?

So this adoption, to include baby o, into our tribe has got me thinking. Families are spread out all over the country, and some people in our lives, we wish were family anyhow. Just how many people does it take to raise a baby. I say a WHOLE TRIBE.

My good friend Angelina had her son, Jacobi, a year and a half ago. She had a hard labor which put her back in the hospital a few days after she brought baby Jacobi home. I had just returned from Brazil and Eric & I went over to stay with her NEWBORN so that papa Oliver could get some rest. Family flowed in and out of the apartment and back and forth to the hospital. Music was being played, the baby passed & cooed over. Food filled the kitchen table. We were all on shifts. Eric & I even spent a few nights with baby Jaco sandwiched in between us to care for him through the night. While this story unfolded under unfortunate circumstances for Angelina, both in being away from her new one, and also having to recover, we felt so privileged that we could help and be part of their lives. It was a precious moment that usually only new parents have. I felt my strong protective hormones kicking in seeing this little six pound being breathing between us and hoping for Angelina to get better. Which today by the way, Angelina is fine, a great mama and makes a beautiful clothing line, Ocelot, and Jaco spends his time running all around her studio and is growing like a weed.

Another story about family by extension; My dad grew up in Oahu, Hawaii. I will always remember visiting over there when I was six years old and calling every person I was introduced to as Auntie & Uncle. Now how can this be when my dad is an only child?

Our talented friends Craig & Cathy, parents to Zane, live part time in Hawaii and everyone is Auntie & Uncle to Zane, even the mailman is Uncle. Zane, now five this week, seems to be raised knowing that a whole community is raising him. No they are not hippies, but open to the influence of their creative & intelligent friends. I think this is great and I'm signing up people to be Aunties & Uncles either genetic or not, to be part of our community and baby o's life. No obligation required, only a desire to share yourselves.

Grandma Carla is already signed up for some Saturdays so I can be at my gallery. We are all making room for this exciting transition. We want to be inclusive with this new part of our family.

We also feel fortunate that we are starting to meet many families in the Bay Area who have adopted children and may I say...they have been just great to us! Your lucky when you adopt, your definition of family is asked to be reconsidered and you must leave the blood lines behind.

In Hawaii they have a word for extended families which is also part of Hawaiian culture. 'ohana' means family in an extended sense of the term including blood-related, adoptive or intentional. And 'hanai' means adopted family...here is a great story about hanai.