You know in life most people if not all would say that family comes first. No matter where you are in life, maybe you just entered the workforce or ventured on your own with a new business, people will definitely remind you or tell  you that family comes first. Your mom, your dad, your sister, brother, whatever. They should come first because they are your blood after all and they probably love you to bits. You can always count on them for anything!

But then it got me thinking, like hey, I don’t think some people in life can actually count on their family at all. Some kids have to deal with their parents’ ugly divorce. Some don’t even know their parents. What if the father is an alcoholic, abusive asshole who beats his children? Or like this mom who chose drugs over her own kids. Some families have zero structure such that they just hate each other.

Not all people in life are that lucky. They literally have no family to rely on. That is definitely sad on a level which I cannot even begin to imagine to understand.

I am lucky. I have a great mom and brother. I am also pretty close to my cousins and now all of us love the new, younger generation i.e. my nieces and nephews. I am after all, their super cool uncle Alden.

So to everyone out there, let me tell you this:

You don’t need a blood connection to be family

This means: Your friends are family too. 

You probably already know what I am talking about. When you are really close to your friends, you guys form a bond. All the memories shared together and the laughter and the shit you guys you go through, you and your friends become really close.

Now most people would just call this bond with typical terms like, BFF (Best friends forever), good friends, close friends, mates etc. So why not step it up a notch and call them family?

This is not to say it’s simply a new convenient term for you to use on your friends, but what I am saying is, you don’t need be born with the same last name to be family; you don’t need to stay under the same roof to be family; you don’t need to look alike to be family; you don’t need to have the same skin color to be family. It goes on.

You don’t need a lot of shit to be family, because all you need is love.

My real family

I was actually enlightened of this concept of friends being family by my fellow Bboy friends. Yeah, we are Hip Hop! But it doesn’t mean we always go, “Yo yo this is ma boy (whoever), my brother from another mother dawg!”. We don’t need to say that played out line. The love for our passion, bboying and memories together is enough. That’s love.

What else don’t you need to be family? Let me know in the comments.

Peace.

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