The Ties That Bind

Recently, on a lovely summer day, my almost four-year-old granddaughter Sasha and I went for a leisurely walk around the lake close to our house. As usual, we enjoyed watching the geese and ducks paddling in the water. To our delight, a mother duck came swimming toward us, a whole string of ducklings in tow. We counted them. There were eleven. "She has eleven babies," I said to Sasha. Taking her soother out of her mouth, Sasha looked at me intensely with her big brown eyes, and I knew she had something important to say. "Oma," she said, "that is too many babies. She should only have two. Two babies is enough!" Such wisdom, from a child who still wants her soother! The world has certainly changed since I was that age.


A couple of weeks later, on a blistering hot summer day in mid-July, we found ourselves at the splash park not far from our house. It was filled to capacity and we had to stand in line in the hot sun, waiting our turn to enter. In front of us was a tall muscular man with three young boys. I found myself staring at him, unabashedly, not because he was so good looking (really!) but because I was fascinated by his amazing tattoo. Emblazoned across his broad back, just below his neck in large letters were the words The Ties That Bind. Adjacent to the words, and cascading down his left arm was a leafy vine. I couldn't help myself, I had to make a comment: "I normally don't find body art attractive, but your tattoo is lovely," I said. He turned around and I saw the name ISOBEL engraved on his chest. We chatted a bit and I asked him about his boys. He told me that he has eight children, four boys and four girls. (I knew what Sasha's opinion was about that!)  My mind was busily stereotyping as I formed a mental image of someone with probably three different women. Goes with the tatoos, right? Brazenly I asked him if his children all had the same mother. He proudly pointed to the name on his chest and said, "Yes, Isobel is their mother. We had ten altogether, but we lost two of them." "How old were they when they died?" I queried. He told me they were two months and four months. I was horrified and wanted to know how they died. Two of them in infancy? Were they crib deaths?  "No," he said, "they died in the womb." I was so impressed that what society usually calls a miscarriage and often dismisses as not real, were to him also his children. I had a poignant moment, standing there in the hot sun with a stranger, as I remembered  the child I birthed prematurely and never held in my arms.

This wasn't my only surprise on that day. Spreading a blanket right next to us was a young woman with twin boys, about two years old. She confirmed that they were twins. Then she dropped the bomb shell: "They also have twin brothers, seventeen and a half months older." She nodded in their direction. Sure enough, another set of golden brown curly haired boys! My daughter and I just looked at each other, our jaws hanging below our knees! Sasha and Ivan are seventeen months apart, and that is often more than enough work. The mother of the double set of twins told us that she has a  rare condition in which she will always drop multiple eggs, but she didn't know that until she had her second set of twins. "They could have been triplets or quadruplets," she said. She also shared with us that her first pregnancy never came to completion and that she and her husband are looking forward to meeting their first children in heaven and discovering if they are twins or triplets, or maybe even quadruplets!


"But how do you manage? Do you have help?" we asked her. She didnt look or act like she was falling apart! "Yes," she said. "We have hired a nanny who looks after them full time while I go to work. As soon as they go to school the nanny will be replaced by a housekeeper. She will be cleaning up a big mess!"


Our oldest grandson was four before he had any cousins and all of a sudden his baby sister and the other seven cousins came along in quick succession. When he was about seven years old he looked at me, shaking his head as yet another pregnancy was announced. "Oma, they just keep coming," he said.


I have to go downstairs now and clean up a big mess in the play room. Four grandchildren spent the day with us yesterday and they forgot Oma's rules!

Oh, the ties that bind ...

We share each other's woes,

Each other's burdens bear, 

And often for each other flows 

The sympathizing tear.

When we are called to part,

It gives us inward pain; 

But we shall still be joined in heart,

And hope to meet again.

(John Fawcett, Blest Be the Tie That Binds)