Do you know your second cousins?

morah

Thu, Aug 14 2014, 8:20 pm

I was just wondering about this, as I am very close with some of my cousins and it is quite likely that when they have kids, my kids will know them well. At least I hope so. I know who my second cousins are but do not know them well. I have none on my dad's side- his parents are the sole survivors of their respective families, so he has no first cousins (though b'h he has 5 siblings). I have a few on my mom's side, but I don't know them well enough to keep it all straight, and some are a lot older than me and the others are a lot younger. So I'm just wondering- how well do you know your second cousins? Do you have a lot of them? Do you remember who they are at simchas? Do you invite them to your simchas?

mommyhood

Thu, Aug 14 2014, 8:33 pm

I am not really close to them because there's so many and we don't live in the same city. I don't even know all of their names.
It will likely be the same for my kids, k'ah they have many first cousins and just making arrangements to get together with them is a challenge. My kids are not invited to my/dh's first cousin's simchos. No one would be able to afford that many extra people so they really have minimal opportunity to meet.

agreer

Thu, Aug 14 2014, 9:30 pm

I'm not close with my 2nd cousins at all. I have a few, but our parents (the 1st cousins) weren't particularly close, so they're basically just a teeny tiny notch above acquaintances.

If I had to limit who I invited to a simcha, I would not invite them. But that's just me, personally.

amother

Fri, Aug 15 2014, 12:31 am

Dina_B613 wrote:

My mother has over 40 cousins just on her mom's side alone - no way do I know all of them. I wish I did though. The ones who I have met have mostly been at funerals, unfortunately. I guess we need more simchas!

I don't go to funerals. Every once in a while I'll go to simchas if I know the people marrying off or the person getting married. We don't even get invitations to all of them, its just impossible. I basically know 3 my age from camp/school, their siblings, the 2 that lived in my building and some of their siblings and the cousins who are my mother's age and some of their kids. K"H my grandfather was 1/13 and each of them have 9 kids +. The ones in Israel I don't know at all but get introduced to them if we meet at simchas.

ohsleepy1

Fri, Aug 15 2014, 1:13 am

I have a lot of second cousins. I know some of them well, others not so well. At a second cousins wedding my sister and I spent time with other second cousins we never really knew and both of us ended up marrying them. Now we have the same last name (again!) and our husbands are first cousins Smile

Ruchel

Fri, Aug 15 2014, 4:41 am

Provided dh and I don't have first cousins (I think he doesn't have second either), we cherish ALL our cousins and treat them the same whether they are second or sixth, if we are close. That's the Shoah... I don't get/imagine families with dozens of first cousins, nephew. shrug
BH our kids will have plenty of nephews and our grandkids will have plenty of first cousins Smile

chaniej

Fri, Aug 15 2014, 7:10 am

I'm very close to some (been to their parents' homes when I was single, etc) but totally not close with others/ don't even know their names. It depends a lot on how close my parents were respectively with their cousins. My mother's 2 closest cousins I know all their kids and we're always in touch.

Raisin

Fri, Aug 15 2014, 7:24 am

I don't really have any first cousins, and we only have a few second cousins. Growing up they always came to our simchos but we belong to different groups and lived in different neighbourhoods and I wouldn't really recognise the kids if I met them. One set of third cousins are chabad and lived nearby so we are more friendly. (but they had only boys my age)

Once my sister was at a wedding and sitting next to another couple. Upon introducing themselves they realized that the man and my sister were second cousins.

Bh I have lots of siblings and my kids have a million cousins on both sides.

freidasima

Fri, Aug 15 2014, 8:14 am

I'm like Ruchel. We don't have much family and we cherish our fourth and fifth cousins because that's all we have. And they cherish us as well so it's mutual. Only in this generation do we have bigger familes that were born after the war. The few that lived through the war and had children and I am their children' or grandchildren's age - we are as close as we can be living countries apart and we are always there for each other, thank heavens for the internet!

yo'ma

Fri, Aug 15 2014, 9:04 am

I have second cousins on my mothers mothers side. We lived on the east coast and them on the west. There are two sets, three each. The oldest of one family, is a little younger than me, so I was friends with them when we were there. The other set, is closer to my younger sisters age, so they're close with them. Sadly, only my grandmother and her sister survived the war.

My mothers father had two sibling that survived the war. I don't know if one of them got married, but he stayed in Europe and wasn't religious. We had absolutely nothing to do with him. The only thing I knew about him was that he looked like my grandfather because I saw a picture of him. He also had a sister who was very chasidish and lived in Israel, Bnei Brak. My mother knew her first cousins, but didn't have much to do with them. They all have lots of children, which are my second cousins, but I have absolutely no idea who they are.

On my fathers side, I only knew one. I don't even know if there are others.

sequoia

Fri, Aug 15 2014, 10:22 am

I have one second cousin in Israel and I've met her a couple of times. Another second cousin is in Russia and I've basically never met her (age four doesn't count).

I am quite close with my cousins and their kids. Even though they grew up in Ukraine and I in the US, we spent a lot of time together.

yOungM0mmy

Fri, Aug 15 2014, 10:23 am

I myself have over 150 first cousins, and DH has about 100. We are spread around the world, and although all the first cousins kind of keep in touch, they also range in age from 30+ to newborn, which makes it hard to have much of a relationship. Some of my cousins are younger than my kids, and when one of my cousins was referring to me to his mother, he called me "that lady".
My grandmother's parents lost their families in the war, save a few cousins, and they were very close, whereas us kids hardly even know who they are. And to my grandmother, is was very difficult to see that we don't know her siblings very well, never mind their kids or grandchildren. At different times, we have had monthly faxes, blogs, email groups and whatsapp groups, and facebook helps too, but with, at a conservative estimate, 500+ second cousins, it's impossible. Every once in a while we'll meet someone with the original surname and know we're cousins, but that doesn't help the female side who got married...
My great-grandfather's brother recently passed away, and we got in touch again. They were a family of approximately 10, and all of a sudden discovered they have about 300 second cousins and third cousins! It was amazing, heartwarming and exactly what my great-grandfather would have wanted - he and his brother were separated because of communist Russia for over 35 years, but their reunion was something special, but long term it is a very difficult thing to keep up, although the bond and affection is there.

chocolate chips

Fri, Aug 15 2014, 10:56 am

Most of my second cousins I barely knew because we didn't live near any of them. Now I live closer to some so I know them better and I am in contact with others via whatsapp so I got to know them all much better.

I can imagine the same with my kids. The ones I am close to (as in my cousins that I am close to and see often) my kids will know their kids but the ones I am not and rarely see, the same will be true for my kids.

Chayalle

Fri, Aug 15 2014, 11:10 am

On that note, my grandmother was always very, very close to her brother A"H (he past away very recently) even though they lived on different continents. The two of them survived the Holocaust, having lost parents, grandparents, siblings, aunts, uncles, etc....

My great uncle's family lives mostly in Brooklyn, and they invite us (my siblings and I) to all their Simchas. I really love and appreciate that, since we don't have many relatives (on my side of the family) in the US.

When it came to the kids, though, it kind of petered out....since my kids aren't invited to the Simchas. This past summer DD met one granddaughter of my great-uncle A"H in camp, and it was a really nice experience, they said hi to each other all the time and considered each other family.

The feeling is there, even when you never met before.....