Traveled the breadth of a continent

actually, it's more like a couple counties in the state of Michigan, but this Saturday marks the date of the MacDonald Family reunion. I believe we're expecting 11 people. That's including the latest addition, Avery. Thankfully, that's NOT him pictured above. =)

Fat Kid is excited about the reunion. it should be fun. my family is incredibly small, at least in it's current form. there are uncles we don't talk to as a matter of principle, others that we do talk to, but never see, and certainly no cousins the same age as my sister and I. so, it has become sort of a running joke that i keep dating women that come from large, loud, boisterous loving families. jumping into christmas at their houses is like being taken from a farm in Deerfield Wisconsin, and dropped into Times Square on New Year's Eve. yeah, it's exciting, and a bit overwhelming, but it's really just out of my element.

The MacDonald Family reunion will be more like any given Sunday afternoon at some people's houses. A meal, some talking, some catching up on the porch of my parents' house. No picnic area at a local metro park, no tents, no big vats of baked beans and cases upon cases of beer. it'll just be a handful of people, sitting around talking.

i can't help but feel like i've been put at some sort of disadvantage, though, because of the small size of my family. i feel like i'm missing some critical part of my personality that i envy in other people. the ability to have family that knows you better than anyone in the world. the ability to have children around you as an adult all the time, and to foster relationships with them. to learn how to be a cousin, and a uncle, and a nephew... and frankly a son and a brother. at all of these things i feel i am a failure. not in the sense that i am evil, or uncaring... i'm just vacant, i think. my family is distant from each other. more geographically now than ever before... but also emotionally. i love my parents more than anything. they were fantastic parents. i never wanted for anything. i had a mom at home when i returned from school. i had a father who coached my soccer teams, and parents who watched me play baseball and soccer. they were both there the day i scored my only goal in playing 9 years of soccer. and my sister and i are better friends now than we've ever been. but i know we can, and i want to be, closer to all of them. especially now since my sister has had a son. i want to be the uncle to him that i see some of my friends being to their nephews. i want to be the uncle he calls when his parents don't get him. i want to be the uncle that he's excited to see every holiday because i lift him up and do airplane spins with him.

so, my family is interesting. i really put most of the blame for our emotional situation on my shoulders. i'm the one who pulls away, i think. i think i don't give them the benefit of the doubt enough of the time. i think i keep myself busy enough to never really think about it... until moments like this one where i'm a little slow at work, and have the time to stop and think about it. but i think they pull away, too. it's almost like i think we both feel that there's *so* much being left unsaid, and so much that went unsaid over the years, that it's impossible to just jump into the middle of the story. so, when i break up with a girlfriend, or admit my doubt about my life to them, i'm disappointed with the results. i get frustrated because they don't immediately know what the hell i'm talking about. so, i guess i should try to start doling out the morsels more often, so there isn't a whole truckload of information to digest at once.