Connecting With Cousins

My cousin Ben, me, and his wife Vikki in Iowa.

 

 

 

I’ve had some fun in the past year or two getting together with first cousins that I haven’t seen in a long time.  As kids, even though we lived all over the country, our folks got us all together regularly for holidays and family reunions.  As we’ve grown, however, we’ve kind of gone our own way . . . attending college, getting married, raising families, etc.  So, it’s been fun for me to call cousins that I haven’t seen for years and stop to visit them as part of larger trips that I take.

            It kind of reminds me of seeing classmates at a class reunion (though much more fun). We know how squirrely we all were when we were little and we have similar memories of times spent together. And, it’s always interesting to share our different recollections of just what happened and why. But more than that, the family bond in today’s mobile society is important and it’s always good to reinforce that and enjoy our shared history.

            Another thing that’s interesting is that our age differences are so insignificant now. I just got to re-connect with my cousin Ben and meet his wife and kids up in Iowa on our way to Indiana.  I always thought of him as “Benji,” but now I realize that he is older than my husband! Ha.

Another layer of this re-connecting has to do with meeting each other’s spouses and having our kids meet.  What fun!  I told my daughter that I want her to meet as many of her second cousins as she can, and being that a lot of these kids are around her age, she’s had a ball.  Last year I visited a cousin in Baltimore who has three children, and my daughter fit right in as the fourth sibling (their mother, my cousin Ann, also remembered with me the silly skits we would perform for everyone at Thanksgiving). What fun to see the beautiful children my cousins have “produced” – to see how their looks and personality traits have been carried on.

My cousin Ann and I during a recent visit (we called her Annie!).

I hope that our re-connection keeps us in closer touch with each other as time goes on.  This has been a joy in life, and I plan to get in touch with more cousins in the future. Let’s see, I only have seventeen more to go  . . . 

For life is what you make it.  So make it good!