Family

This weekend I celebrated my first 4th of July,
Family, food and drinks were plentiful,
Yet I did not enjoy myself,

Maybe it is important to add that I wasn’t with my family,
So although I was willing to embrace the new people I was surrounded with,
They were not willing to embrace me, unless they needed help lifting something,

My whole life I have hated cliques and the people who comprise them,
Close-minded idiots whose lives revolve around isolation and familiarity,
Yet I never realized that a family is nothing more than a clique bonded by blood,
Therefore, it’s the hardest clique to break into,

How many of us pride ourselves on our supposedly unique family traditions,
The exclusive memories, inside jokes, all the things that make us feel united to the relatives around us,
Even if we only see those people a few times or a year or spend most of our time wishing that we had more time away from them,
Don’t we all know relatives who have treated us worse than any stranger or close friend?
Don’t we all have a relative that we would probably not get along with if it weren’t for a blood bond?
Why do we remain loyal to these people: outdated ideas of familial obligation.

I could have spent my 4th of July with friends that I would have had a better time with,
I turned them down,
Not because I enjoy this family’s company more, or because I know them better,
I turned it down for the simple fact that they were family, as if that is enough to erase all shortcomings,
It’s not, and the belief that the badge of family shields people from criticism or hate only perpetuates familial pride