We All Eventually Become Adults

Kate and I just had dinner with my cousin Adam and his wife Bella. I'm the oldest cousin on my Dad's side, with Adam pulling in second, two and a half years my junior. All of the cousins on that side have always been close. The fact that my Dad, his two brothers, and my grand parents all ended up living within 30 or 40 miles of each other had a lot to do with that. Growing up we had frequent family gatherings, and all the cousins got to grow up together. Some of my fondest memories involve that whole group of people.

So it's really cool when those relationships make the jump from childhood to adulthood. Not that I'm a stranger to adulthood. I'm now closer to 40 than 30, which is a scary prospect. Even my youngest cousin is 18 or 19 or something like that (sorry Erik...I'm not good at keeping track of that sort of thing.) But I'm finding myself spending time with cousins on a more one-on-one basis lately, and as couples, which is really cool. That's what I'm trying to say. I'm getting to know my cousins more as people individually, and less as that nebulous group, "My Cousins."

Part of the reason I'm getting such a late start really getting to know Adam is distance. He and his wife have been gone from the East Coast for quite some time now, so we almost never get to see one another. And, at least in the past, when we did, it was at some large family gathering, where conversations tended to occur on a group level rather than individually. Which is why tonight was so great. Kate and I really got to know Adam and Bella individually, without the group dynamic interfering.

We've also been recently getting to know my cousin James and his wife Amy more. James is, I believe, the second youngest of the cousins, unless I'm forgetting someone. He was still just a tot when I was hitting early adulthood. I didn't really know him that well, beyond the fact that he apparently thought I and my fellow older cousins were freaking hilarious. We'd have James to the point of tears (of joy) sometimes. I got to know him more as he got older, of course, but only recently have we been able to really start a real friendship.

I think it's all great stuff. My cousins are some of my favorite people on the planet and I hope to never lose touch with them.

Catching Up with Friends, Indirectly

My cousin James and his wife Amy (it's probably more appropriate to say Amy and my cousin James... James: "I'm helping!") have been maintaining a blog ever since their son Caleb was born about seven months ago. The time between their posts ranges from days to weeks (or minutes, in the case of their last giant blogsplotion of babies, bridges, bread and beaches), but they keep up with it consistently, and I'm always glad when I see a new post from them pop up in my Blogger Dashboard. I love the micro-publishing world for just this reason. It makes it so easy to keep up with people, at least indirectly, when you don't talk to them in person often enough. Here's their blog address if any of you are interested:

http://theajduo.blogspot.com

I mean this truly. I know more about life at the AJ Duo Fortress of Familyhood than I do about the lives of many other people that I see in person on a consistent basis. Blogging allows you to grant media-rich peaks into your daily life to many other people at once. My sister and brother-in-law's site for my nephew Jackson is another good example, which I've mentioned in previous blog posts. I don't see the three of them nearly often enough. There's the phone, of course. But the Jackson blog gives a much deeper picture of his life and those of his foot servants than a quick phone conversation can share.

I think personal blogs are a great addition to the paraphernalia of modern life. Along with Twitter, they represent the best in indirect personal communications, and I'd love to see more people I know start their own blogs. I can tell you that, after this year long experiment is over, Kate and I will start maintaining a smaller-scale blog to share our lives with our friends and family.

Baby Love

Nothing says positive like baby pictures. Yesterday Jason and I went to a cookout at his Dad's house. We got to see Baby Jackson and Baby Caleb, Jason's cousin James' baby. They were so cute especially when they were meeting for the first time. I can't wait to see them grow up to be friends. A few of the pictures I took came out really good. And now I can say that I really love taking pictures of babies, it's hard not to love. Babies grow so fast you really need to capture them through all their stages in life.

It was great seeing Sue, Gary, Amy, James, Lou, Karin, John, Stephanie, and Grandpa too. It's been a while since all of us have gotten together. The food spread was amazing- thanks Lou, Karin, and any others who contributed. Hopefully this summer will be filled with more fun cookouts and plenty of cute babies.