Friday Funday: Extending Our Family

In putting together today's edition, it occurred to us how interconnected our little staff is. Paul's wife finished Amy's wedding dress. Amy and Shawn went to school together over twenty years ago. Paul and Shawn have worked together for over a decade, beginning at the Nebraska Press Association.

We've known each other, been friends with each other, worked together, travelled together, and enjoyed each other's work for a long, long time.

We're a family, of a sort - and frankly, we sometimes communicate with each other more often than we do members of our own families.

Our friends, Sarah and Ian, are beginning their lives together - officially - today, adding to their own extended family, which includes us.

It amazes us sometimes, when we think of the incredible people who make up our extended families. From lawyers and lobbyists, to seamstresses, business people and car buffs. There are a great many theatre people in our extended family, and several large clusters of folks who work in radio, print, and web too.

There are more cartoonists then you can shake a Hunt Crow Quill pen at. From the man behind Hagar the Horrible, to Batman's body double/Mad Magazine cartoonist; from the man behind the Undercover Cockroach and the Martians, to the first cartoonist in space (ok, it was his work that went up in the shuttle, but still...)

While all of these people are incredibly talented, we'd love them even if their skill sets consisted of merely being good friends.

It's often said that we don't get to choose the families we're placed into. Whether through biology or adoption, that's at least partly true for almost everyone.

For the most part, the families that we each choose as we become adults - our spouses and friends - are individuals who often have characteristics we admire and strive for in our own lives. Whether those characteristics include beauty, intelligence, loyalty, integrity, or a combination of all those qualities and more, the people we choose to bring into our larger families are no less important to us than the people we grew up with.

With that in mind, as our friends join together their already somewhat mixed families, we proudly welcome their newest members into our own extended family.

Congratulations, you two.

May you have many, many, many long years of happiness together.