Friends, family...whatever! They're mine!

The graduation watching crew!

Ah, family…you love them, you get really annoyed at them and you’d fight to the death for them. I have a super wonderful family. I have wonderful step-family members, wonderful ex (in-law) family members, and wonderful in-law family members. I’ve got it made in the shade when it comes to family members.

When my ex and I split I was worried that his family that I had been a part of for 21 years would all disappear. But all of them (except for a sister in law, her husband and their 2 offspring) kept me. I’m so thankful for that because they’re all great people and they’ve put up with me for many years. Heck, they watched me grow up so to speak! To this day, I still value them greatly and look forward to the times we can see one another. They didn’t discard me like the 4 people I mentioned previously did. They’ve accepted Manchild which speaks volumes to me. My family didn’t discard my ex, because he’s a great guy. And he’s been a part of my family for 21 years, too. So if you can’t tell, we’re all one big mixed up, intertwined fam-damily.

Recently with the graduation of kidlet # 1, some of us were all mixed up together. Exes and in-laws, cousins and spouses, boyfriends and special friends…just a big ol’ bowl of relation spaghetti - and we had a ball. I had the pleasure of spending lots of time with my ex, his sister, my kiddos, and my new hubby. It didn’t matter what the particular relation was because we were all there to honor the fact that kidlet had survived 12 years of schooling.

I feel really fortunate to have the type of relationships I do with friends, family, ex-family, in-laws, outlaws, cousins, brothers, and kids. I want to go to the grave knowing as many people as humanly possible. I feel that the more people you know, the better off you are. And I feel even more strongly that you can’t have too many friends. I know the official title of some of my peeps are family but I consider them friends as well.

Congratulations kidlet, you had a whole army of family, friends and others cheering for you. More than you can count on one hand!