There are lots of "DA Family", "LJ Family" type things I see online. And I mean no disrespect to the people who do it just for shits and giggles and fun and know its just a derptastic way of uniting a group of people for good times.

But it got me thinking about what Family really means to people. In particular, what it means to me.

I have always had the thought and upbringing that you chose your real family. I don't consider a lot of my -blood- relations family. Mostly due to the fact that they're all backstabbing, self-entitled idiots. The family that I do have, are people who have earned that place in my life.

Family is the group of the few people that can really work their way into your life. The people who earn a degree of your trust thats out of reach to most anyone else. The people who bother getting to know every aspect of who you are, and who can disagree with you and still love you no matter how different you are.

A person who is family never questions who you are, what your intentions are, or where you stand with them, no matter what the circumstances are. If they have to question, they obviously don't get it.

And ultimately, the feeling is mutual. If you can apply all of this to yourself in regards to another person, you can count them among your family. And they don't need to go spouting about how you ARE family all the time to them. It's just known. It's a comfortable fact of life.

The online families are entertaining as long as they're kept to a once in a while joke, and not shoved forcibly into every conversation and moment. It kind of ruins the -meaning- of family, and what those members are when it is.


So keep the funsies to funsies, and don't abuse the crap out of it.