My dad is the only one home tonight,
yet on the Google Hangout
between some of my 6 siblings
- spread from Wyoming to the Carolinas -
and him,
he reports a pang of homesickness.
Isn't that what all of us should feel for where he is?
And he should be feeling "homewell"?
Instantly, I feel it, too: not so much a longing for home,
(indeed, I'd travel far to feel it)
but rather a yearning for
inside jokes,
comfort built of an inability to maintain pretense,
argument-mates who'll still be around tomorrow,
conversationalists conversant with certain topics of interest and geekiness,
and other ineffable qualities
that all mean just a fraction of what family is
to me.
That is why I am family-sick,
which seems weird to say,
having a family of my own that is upstairs as we speak,
but sometimes don't you adults just wonder what it would be like
if all your early-years family were under the same roof again?
Perhaps it would get ugly at times - I'm sure it would -
but you still wonder,
or,
at least,
I do.
