Family stories.

I've been thinking so much about family lately. Maybe it's that Mike's family is going through some big changes, or that I was recently with my family in April, but I've been thinking about family stories and how they're always the most interesting to me when other people tell them. I love to hear the threads of lives, to see the way things intertwine and settle. The forgotten things are usually the things I want to remember most, and as I've gotten older, I've realized that I just need to ask my grandma to tell me the story about when she was a kid and wrapped an empty box for her dad's birthday because he always said he wanted "nothing" for his birthday, about my grandpa's dad drowning in the Chattahoochee and his brother coming home to help on the farm. My mom talking about her mom's last days, crying while she sat on the side of the bed asking for forgiveness, and my mom, suddenly sounding and looking so much like a daughter, shifting right in front of me, steeped in memory. There is so much that is happening beyond my little bubble, and I am stretching out my arms pulling it all in, wanting to stretch out that thread just a little longer to include me and what will one day be my legacy.