by Anncan

Created on: January 11, 2009

Given that there are 13 of us in my nuclear family, it's difficult to find a place big enough to gather and to find a time that all of us are available. We are spread over seven states and the extended, immediate family now numbers over 110 with married nieces and nephews and great nieces and nephews.

It isn't that we want to exclude cousins but that significantly complicates the gathering. We most often connect with them at funerals. Now that all of the first generation have passed, even getting together at funerals isn't happening very often. I've learned of two families of cousins who stay in touch by monthly email newsletters. They've welcomed me to receive their news and even to contribute from my family goins on. I'm very happy to comply.

I've also recently established email contact with a first cousin whose family we haven't seen in over 50 years. It's been so exciting and enriching to swap old family photos and to reaquaint with their extended families. In this respect, internet has been a boon to our revisiting ties and updating family news. It does fail to reach the second and third generations when/if they don't have the familiarity or interest in digging up the roots of the family tree.

I'm even among the oldest in our clan and my youngest brothers and sisters have only vague memories of the older cousins back when our parents were alive and we did have reunions. Happily, most of them are at least curious and when available to studying the family tree they are easily engaged.

We're even fortunate to have two in-laws who are animated about archiving our family stats. I'm the keeper of the 'story' and it's details vary from sibling and cousin. Generally, we're happy to compare our cobweb memories and details don't get in the way of good fun at examining connections from one family to the other. So, on one hand we have the geneaology sources and on the other the folklore. It's very entertaining and enriching.

Of course, we have skeletons in the closet as most families do. Where there have been divorces most of the exes don't try to invade our space. In two cases, an 'ex' has genial connections and they may show up but generally take a back seat, approaching only those of us with whom they've stayed in touch. There was one uncomfortable situation in 2003 where a nephew's ex showed up and flaunted herself in front of family. When it came to taking group pictures she had the sense to back off and remain out as his family gathered with my sis and her children.

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