under a microscope

Ten years ago, if anyone had told me I'd have the opportunity to put my family under a figurative microscope, I would've thought they'd flipped out.  Yet such was my blessed fate.  

For four years, I used my own family as a "lab" experiment with my Delaware Valley High School health class, getting to put them - individually & as a group - under a figurative microscope.  What an amazing experience.

We tracked my relatives as far back as I reasonably could - to my grandparents.  We took two days to look at my geneaology, starting with Benjamin & Rena Davis Reynolds (Mom's parents) and Gar & Lillian Bessemer Lockhart (Dad's).  

The family tree dropped down to include, on the Reynolds side, Dorothy (Dot), Alpha (Al), William (Willie), Robert (Bob), Katharine (Kay - aka Mom) & Elizabeth (Betty);  on Dad's side, there was just one name - his, Raymond Lewis (uncommonly known to all as Pete).  Then, it continued down off of Mom & Dad's names to include Peter, Michael, Joann (Mim), Ian & moi, Elsa.  It dropped further, branching off Peter's name to include Whitney & Reynolds; off Mike's, it included Scott & Karen.

While noting that I only had my parents' unconfirmed stories as my guides, the class considered the basic attributes of my grandparents & how their histories might have affected Mom & Dad as adults, in their marriage, as parents.  

We dropped down to Mom & Dad, looking at them as partners & parents, how their various children seemed to respond to them, the different ways we kids apparently viewed them as parents & people, the impact they had on our live, even how we viewed our own parenting roles.  

Last but not least, we took a gander at the sibs.  How did we relate to each other?  What did we seem to expect to get & give within a family relationship?  Did our apparent expectations change between childhood, youth, adolescence, adulthood?  We considered the different ways me & my sibs experienced family, comparing & contrasting the oldest's experience with the youngest's - how might our birth order, the culture of our very different days, how we experienced events within & without the family, impact our expectations of & from family.

It was a remarkable experience!  To place my family - myself! - under a mircroscope, to look at me/us through the filter of a class unit, our dynamics & interplay reduced to a lesson plan.  To this day, I think WOW!