A Tangle of Cousins

It’s a tangle of people, a pile of cousins. It’s beautiful and sad, because we live far away from one another. Distance heightens our happiness at being close to one another, and brings a sadness that a goodbye is coming.

Nieces are: help in the kitchen, talks about books, Harry Potter trivia, warm squishy hugs, a little hand pulling mine, being called “Auntie Becca” (not my real name), making big batches of mango shake, imaginary land rules (Dragon only breathes fire and ice, not water), quirk for days, and a lot of laughing. I love watching the cousins together, the older ones being great older cousins to the younger ones. It’s a mishy mashy pile of love.

Time with my brother and sister-in-law is: quickwitted jokes, quips and laughs and their very generous hearts. Lara looking out for me, my brother equal parts wisdom and stupidity (little brother forever). Chinua and Matty wrestling, a more even match than they have ever been. Game nights of wink murder and charades, Seven Wonders and Monopoly. Street food and water play for Song Kran.

We cram every possible moment in, because we only have two weeks. We lose sleep, the kids get grumpy, we keep them up too late and eat under the fairy lights strung in my tree. We invite our friends over to show each other off. (These are our amazing friends- this is our amazing family.) We swim nearly every day, because the heat is incredible.

Sometimes the joking or sarcasm becomes too much and then we return to softness. We check in with each other and reassure each other.

I love them so much I feel like my heart will burst with it. Love touched with sadness.

Thanks for coming, beautiful family. 

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