Odessa

There are those people you are born related to and those you chose to be with. I for one am not terribly close to those I was born related to. I gave up long ago on trying to have a relationship. I think the following from USA today sums it up nicely (link: http://blogs.usatoday.com/oped/2007/11/lifes-real-boun.html#more)

'Our chosen family'

Everyone has gathered best friends — an old school chum here, a trusted colleague from work there, or some wonderful person met by pure happenstance. These friends are people we can confide in, speak our hearts to — and to whom we listen intently for solace, inspiration and advice. They are our chosen family — the brothers and sisters of our souls — who clarify and define who we are, what we are doing. And these friendships never change: To speak after a decade's separation is the same as speaking just yesterday, time and distance rendered meaningless in our life journey together.

When we sit down to our feast of Thanksgiving this year, we should give thanks for that other family, that chosen family — our human harvest of enduring friendships. And they're easy to name, too. They're the ones who made a difference. "No love, no friendship," wrote Nobel Prize winner Francois Mauriac, "can cross the path of our destiny without leaving some mark on it forever."

So who says you can't pick your family?