Somewhere at my parents’ house is a photo album of everyday family photos from my childhood. Dinners at the family table, basketball games in the driveway and summer days spent outside running through the sprinklers or swimming in our pool. My family was together all the time.
Not “together” in the deep, soul-nourishing way we talk about at weddings. I mean together in the everyday way. Same table. Same routines. Same holidays. Same people showing up because the system of life, school, church, Sunday lunch, proximity, pulled us into the same room. Even my grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins all lived within 15 minutes of each other.
Then adulthood came along and gently unscrewed the lid.
College. Jobs. Moving trucks. New last names. Babies. Work schedules that don’t care about Thanksgiving. Aging parents. Some hard seasons. Some awkward conversations nobody knows how to finish. And suddenly, the family you were “close” to can start to feel … far.
Not always estranged. Not always angry. Just distant.