Family Reunion, Anyone?
Why write about family reunions when the world is on fire? The daily news, a litany of grief and loss—wars, famine, fires, floods, political upheaval, mass deportations. Write perhaps as a reminder to cherish whatever is good, honorable and lovely in your everyday life, in your ordinary family. Or pause for a moment to remember your childhood reunions. Perhaps you grew up in the constant company of cousins, aunts, and uncles. Or maybe your family reunions, like mine, started with a road trip.
It began with a 16-hour drive on 1950s pre-interstate roads from South Carolina to Ohio. In a Chevrolet sedan with a family of nine and no air conditioning. It was not fun.
The payoff? A few weeks with grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins. Well worth the trip. Our grandparents’ farm became base camp and from there we scattered to three other farms and several small-town homes. I never tired of helping Grandpa feed the pigs or getting underfoot while my uncle milked the cows. It was delightful to float on a giant inner tube in the farm pond or chase fireflies in the seemingly endless summer twilight.
On Sunday afternoons all the relatives would gather at the grandparents’ farm, spread tables under shade trees in the yard, and dig into a feast of homegrown, home cooked food, topped off with fresh strawberries and hand-cranked ice cream.
All accompanied—as I recall—with nonstop talk and loads of laughter.
Fast forward 25 years. Seven siblings have established seven families in seven different states. We learned as children that home is wherever you find yourself, and so we settled where college, careers, and spouses took us.
For decades our reunions were haphazard. Sometimes we managed to coordinate visits to our parents in South Carolina. After Dad died and Mom moved back home, we would meet in Ohio with the added benefit of connecting with extended family including occasional cousin reunions on a grand scale.
Still, after Mom passed in 2008, we siblings had no epicenter. We kept loosely in touch but soon realized that preserving our fragile family connection would require prioritizing reunions.
Beginning in 2011, siblings and spouses—missing only our sister who died years earlier at age 45—convened every other June to catch up, talk, laugh, and bond while enjoying a scenic, natural setting. It was almost as much fun for me as those childhood reunions, albeit a lot more work! When we went our separate ways in 2019 after our fifth reunion, it was obvious that we were all aging, but I assumed with our family history of longevity (our elders lived well into their 90s) we could plan on many reunions to come.
The pandemic upended the world in 2020, but it was in 2021 that the unraveling of our family began. It seems the downside of longevity is losing spouses not blessed with our genes. The first spouse died in January 2021. By October 2023, five of six spouses had passed away. Reunions were replaced by funerals, time set aside to share memories, honor lives well lived, and mourn our mutual losses.
Death moved into our sibling group in early 2025 with the passing of one of my four “big brothers,” the one closest to me in age, who told endless stories, who kept us all laughing. The only true extravert in a family of introverts.
We debated even having a reunion this year, but with the illusion of guaranteed longevity shattered, we agreed we had best get together while we can. In June we met at a state park in the Midwest, a picturesque setting with great hiking trails and available lodging.
It seemed a small group: only five of us and one remaining sister-in-law. Minus our extraverted in-laws and story-telling brother, it was rather quiet at times. Happily, a handful of our children, grandchildren, and one great grandchild filled the silence with the chatter and laughter we were lacking.
Family genealogy books that traced our lineage on both sides to the 1700s plus an informal memoir written by our mother fueled conversation, not to mention revisiting youthful memories, the resurfacing of childhood rivalries, and the chance to pick on their little sister yet again. The brothers argued the merits of the best major league baseball and NFL teams, and the Ford vs. Chevy dispute never ends.
We parted with a tentative plan to head west for our next gathering. We are in our 70s and 80s now. Even with good health and longevity on our side, I can’t help but wonder who will be present or absent from our next reunion.
I came home, as I always do, with a renewed sense of belonging. These are my people! This is my family! I marvel that we can be so different and yet so much alike. I am grateful that we have learned to set aside differences to focus on shared history, celebrate the strengths of our heritage and forgive its flaws. That is what family reunions are all about.