Shoutout! (Feat. Friends)

The term “family” always had an interesting meaning to me. I never had the closest relationship with my family. Growing up it was just me, my brother, and my parents in little ‘ol New Jersey. Most of my cousins and aunts/uncles lived in various parts of the five boroughs. We wouldn’t see them very often because of this and as a result, it became a very cliquey environment. I mean, they had all grown up together and we only came over for the occasional holiday or family get-together. I distinctly remember one thanksgiving during high school. We were at my aunt’s house. My brother and I were chilling in my cousin’s room and more and more cousins came streaming in. They were all chatting and of course, my brother and I were just happy to feel somewhat included. My aunt eventually comes in to tell us the food is ready downstairs but of course, my brother and I aren’t going to go if our cousins aren’t going. Anyway, something had happened with my uncle’s car and so all the cousins were talking about it, and they were sitting in a circle whispering about it when they suddenly pause, look over to me and my brother and say “uhh the food is ready downstairs” as if to say get lost losers. So, this basically sums up the dynamic I have at any family get-together with relatives. 1)Walk in and say a few hellos 2) Make sure to have a plate and keep my mouth full 3) hope someone(anyone!) notices me and my brother and takes us into their group 4) Hope my parents, dad most likely, don’t stay too long. Don’t get me wrong I love my family, but I definitely won’t go to them for advice on anything besides which jacket is best suitable for the coming weather. I learned that lesson in sixth grade. Since then it’s been Reddit threads and Google searches for me. But seriously, for me when I think of people who I confide in most it must be the close friends that I have made over the past few years. The phrase “blood is thicker” gets thrown around a lot to mean that if they’re blood then they’ll undoubtedly be all you got. Even to this day my mom still says “Your family is going to be here til the end” like some unholy union. My experience has been to the contrary. Oddly enough some of these close friends I haven’t even met yet. Learning Korean over the past few years has led to meeting a whole variety of other language learners as well as those native to the language as well. This also leads to gaining friendships as well (isn’t technology beautiful?) Interestingly enough one of my closest friends, Emily, I met on Tinder, so I guess that’s good for something. I consider her one of my closest friends and she lives in Canada. There’s also Ab in Italy, Abbie in London, Jen in Spain, and a few good friends in Korea They are all a huge part of my life. They are equal parts my therapist, language teachers, and unwitting audience/recipient of all the cultural jokes and accents I attempt to lob their way. This also includes my amazing coworkers and my story slam community as well. The conventional wisdom is that the family you’re given is the one you’re stuck with for better or worse. I was resigned to this fact for a long time and this extended to friendships as well but my experience has been to the contrary. Blood may be thicker than water but just take a little Kool-Aid pack and some sugar and that water become that much thicker and a lot more delicious as well.