to be a part of a family

It is loud, rambunctious and busy. my days and space are crowded out by the needs of others. alone time is hard to find and even harder to keep. There are appointments and dinners, scheduled conversations with grandparents, and long dynamic conversations. There is always some one who is having an off day. 
Tears are a regular. we are all processing something - for most of us it is grief of some sort. we are burying, or trying not to bury, significant experiences, important people, and the identities we have accumulated over the past few months or years. but we are doing it together. 
The "we" began anew in the crowded Frankfurt airport. After 4 hours of frantically searching (or not so frantically waiting to be found on my part) my family reunited with tears and hugs, accusations and laughter one month ago to the day. we had our whirlwind adventure in Europe. 2 1/2 weeks of to see bits of Germany, France, Switzerland, all of Lichtenstein, some of Austria and a little bit of Czech republic: Marburg, Worms, Strasbourg,  Rhienfalls, Schleitheim, Zurich, Trumlebach falls, Insbrook, Salsburg, hiking in the Alps, Vienna, Melk Abby, caving in the Moravian Forest, Prague, Kunta Hora, Czesky Krumlov.  
Time in Europe was beautiful, amazing, frustrating, overwhelming, exhausting, invigorating, etc. Reconnecting with people we thought we knew, ones who had changed or where in the midst of changing. Becoming adult children, struggling to redefine our identities. "Forming, Storming and Norming" - said my mother. An experience filled with "too many old rocks" - said my father. 
And now we are back here in Winnipeg together. The place we lived out the last 9 years of my childhood together. The place we should call home. But home, as we all know, is never stable. 
For my parents and sister, culture shock comes and goes, paralyzing my loved ones with indecision and a sense of being overwhelmed. I try to buffer them as best I can - stand with one foot in both their worlds. I organize their lives and walk them through simple things we once took for granted. Slowly they adjust. 
And then we cry together. I have my own griefs: a year left in my EMU world, singleness again, the knowledge that  I have no clue what comes next. Hannah is looking forward at university and back at Chad. She has not truly begun to bridge her two worlds. Mom and Dad have to some how move back. But maybe they should call it forward, forward into this world that has no idea about the last 3 years of their lives. And Joshua is not here at the moment, but he is figuring out what comes next. 
But for the first time in a long while we are doing it together, we are sitting together on the same continent processing. And we know that we will continue to be only a phone call (not a disconnected skype call) away for the foreseeable future (how ever long foreseeable is). And even though it's exhausting and busy and living with these people makes me more grumpy than with 7 others at college (for among family we are not on our best behavior, we don't always worry about how we present ourselves, and often we let our less desirable qualities run free because their is no fear of abandonment), it is my family -  And I'm happy to be home. 

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