I'm really lucky.

I don't mean that in the material sense or even really in the general sense. I'm accident prone and have received the short end of the stick more times than one. But at the same time, none of that matters. None of that matters because I'm lucky where it counts. And right now? I'm feeling lucky because of my family.

I come from a big family. While I technically have two sisters, more often than not, it feels like I have four. While I'm already really lucky to be close with my literal sisters, my cousins are also a major part of who I am and the person I will be. As the oldest kid by almost three years, it was easy to feel like the odd one out. And while there were definitely moments in my childhood where that rang true, I also knew that my annoying, rotten, amazing sisters and cousins always had my back.

Now that we're all older and nearly grown up (and now that I finally have an iPhone), we all have a group chat together that we're active in literally 24/7. And I'm not exaggerating. Just today, I went to a movie and when I left the theater I found that I had sixty unread messages... all from this group chat. Do you wanna know what all those messages were? Embarrassing pictures of each other. For the next hour and a half, I sat in my living room cackling because of how hilarious all of these pictures and the following commentary were. Like the one below, where we tried to make a cute and cliche bath photo, but how I'd clearly and awkwardly aged out of the time when it was actually okay for me to join them (disclaimer, we were all wearing swimsuits when this picture was taken.)

But then, just as quickly as the laughter started, it stopped. It stopped because my sister, Emily, sent a video. While the video itself was hilarious, in the background we could all hear our grandfather (Pap Pap), laughing and making crude jokes. This past March, our Pap Pap passed away suddenly. His loss shook our family hard and quite honestly, we're all still grieving.

And yet, even though our laughter had been replaced by tears, being a part of this group chat made me feel a bit better. We started sending pictures of him and screenshots of texts from him back and forth. We started telling stories and talking about his little quirks that made Pap Pap, well Pap Pap. Then, next thing we knew, my cousin, Lexie, switched the conversation over to something that was absurdly off topic. And all of a sudden, we started laughing again. Just like that.

The truth of the matter is that I know this holiday season is going to be a hard one. Honestly, it brings tears to my eyes when I even think about it. But at the same time, I know it will be okay. Because I'm lucky. Because I've got my family standing at my back.

Thanks Em, Lex, Liv, and Lainey. I love you!