FRAMILY

I want to write about something that is very near and dear to me today: Framily.

Many of you might be asking why an English major insists on lumping two words together, but it's the best description I can come up with. Framily= Friends + Family, and it is a concept I have grown to cherish even more in my adult years since leaving Michigan, though it was important to me in childhood as well. For the purposes of this blog not being the length of War and Peace, I am going to limit my musing on framily to just the one in Kansas.

First of all, I have to say that I'm the lucky Michigan transplant-my mom is from out here and I have family two hours in any direction. That being said, I still elected to live in a "commune" with 5 other Michigan teachers in an old historical home we promptly named the Michigan House. The house then made the "New teacher" tour the following year! W00T! In this house was another Kappa Delta from Valpraiso, a couple of GVSU grads, one of the GVSU's sisters and her wife, all of whom had know the KD since childhood. We settled into a routine and built relationships with each other. One Sunday, a few of the Michigan external friends ended up at the house for breakfast...wheat pancakes, left over cheese enchiladas, scrambled eggs, and beer. This tradition came to be known as "Family Breakfast." Framily are the people who come to your house on Sundays, sit around with you, discuss classrooms and lives, over left over enchiladas-and keep the tradition alive to this day (though we're on hiatus). Framily are the people who call you when their alternator is finally dead, and you drive them all over Garden for almost two hours, helping them get the part and then have it installed at a back door operation for cheap. Framily are the people who come with you to your grandmother's four hours away and enjoy the whole trip. Framily are the people you have spur of the moment cook out withs, the roommates you combine resources with to make a full meal instead of one part of a meal. Framily are the people who make you a fruit pizza for your birthday and make sure you drink an entire bottle of wine AND get home. Framily are the people who sit next to you in church, for whom you babysit on a Friday night for free, the people who watch your dogs for you for nothing more than a thank you. Framily are the people who help you change out the bulbs on your car and charge you nothing more than a thank you, the people whose own families offer to do your house inspection for you for nothing more than a thank you. In short, "Framily" are the family you choose, the people who make your day to day life worth living.

I love mine!