Surprise! You get me this week. Who will you get next week? Who knows? We’ll figure that out later.
Anyway. Due to circumstances, I’ve been thinking a lot about my family this week, so I’ve been pondering the fact that there’s a reason I love to write and read books about found family.
My family is actually pretty easy to explain–I found me some. My roommate is my dear friend. We met online, then met in person, then took up residence together first because she needed a place to stay, and then because we got on really well, and two incomes are (good lork, are they ever) better than one.
I’m old enough to be her mom, so sometimes just to make things easier, I say I am. Sometimes I call her my “internet daughter.” Sometimes, when I want to make bio kid yelp, I call her “my good daughter.”
My second kid, of course, I found by the side of the road after a rainbow fire tornado tore through and demolished–kidding! I actually birthed her. I have the scars to prove it.
On the other hand, my son is not biologically my son. He and my child have been best friends since they were 16-ish, and at a point he needed a place to stay, and he’s been here off and on since. Mostly on.
It does make it difficult sometimes to talk about my family–last week I was talking to a coworker who has known me for years, and I said something about “the children” and it threw him off, because when we were first getting to know each other, my son had not yet decided I was his bonus mom.
Also I should probably mention that when the children introduce me to friends, I first ask for pronouns and then ask if they need adopting. Everyone needs a mom who accepts them. So how many kids I have can change by the day.
I do have a hard time remembering who knows what. Maybe that’s what makes it hard to explain. I actually dislike telling people that my son is not my biological son–I love him and that should be enough. But I know it confuses people, so. I get it. I’ll explain.
My big dream is actually to expand the family a bit more. I want a bigger house, and a bit more income. I need at least two, preferably four more bedrooms, and definitely a bigger kitchen and a room we can designate the library, for a quiet public area and the living room can be for noisy people.
Then I snag a couple more dear friends who need homes full of people who adore them. And–well, actually, maybe I could take over a summer camp? Separate cabins, one big kitchen, a couple recreation areas…we could just have a whole commune. I like that plan a lot. The children also have some friends they’d like to adopt.
Unfortunately I won’t be inheriting a bigger house or a small fortune, or anything else. So the dream remains on hold, for now. The love must pass through the internet until I can afford to gather more of my dear friends safely under one roof.
Umm…want to buy a book?