It's hard to make a clan this large converge. We pile the represented ages, states, cities, towns, schools, jobs, habits and times and the odds are decidedly out of our favor.

But converge we do--once every few years. We drop everything, drive the distance, cancel meetings, pack up homework and see for a brief moment this family to which we belong. It's not all of us, of course, things like death and divorce don't allow for all of us--but it's most of us and most of us is better than anything else.

They quote movies and wear low slung jeans, hat on all of their heads declaring loyalties--BMXing, Disney, Lucky Brand, Potsdam, and other nondescript sort of things . We all have cell phones save the two youngest and even though meetings get canceled, text-messages don't. We let our natural tendencies toward showing love with physical affection run rampant--back-rubs all around!

Our food is served and no really sticks to their own plate--someone else's portion always looks better. We share, because even though we no longer share space, we're still family and family shares. And so, when we are saying goodbye and I am whispering into blond hair "Be good. I love you. I'll miss you." it's really okay, because we're family and we'll share.

It's not the kind of sharing I envisioned for my clan--I'm more of the great large family reunion every week sort than the broken meets broken for dinner at Denny's once a year--but it's the kind of sharing I'm happy, so happy, to do.

So I cry on her shoulder and whisper "I'm so glad" and I think she knows it's not for tonight that I'm so glad--it's for sharing. She has her beloved boys this week and I won't worry about them a bit. She's, after all, the one who taught me to share in the first place.