Family

This was not a camp reunion. Or a high school reunion.

It was a family reunion of the best kind.

Oh, I know, family reunions are often contentious, pugnacious, and generally unpleasant. Why? Because, in many, but certainly not all cases, the common denominator is blood. DNA. Period. You trudge out for the annual picnic or holiday or whatever, with nothing to say to people who are, for all intents and purposes, strangers.

What happened at our reunion was a complete anomaly, a cosmic event - over one hundred people gathered, from all corners of the country. People who could barely contain themselves and the smiles practically frozen on their faces. They weren't forced, coerced, or in any way pushed to get to their family reunion as quickly as possible.

Why?

Because the people who attended this reunion are a different species. Because we are Omegans. Sounds like visitors from another planet. And in a way, that's kind of true. Our planet was formed very recently in cosmic terms. Born in 1965 in the orbit of the stars of Omega, the first family, Bern, Sam, Linda and Wally. They are the proto-Omegans, the genetic blueprints from which our own love and passion for Omega was born. We are, and always were, their family. And they gave birth to the people we've become. Our membership isn't perceivable in outer trappings - cars, houses, SUVs, McMansions, whatever. We can't be measured by any quantifiable standards. What we have is really inexplicable. You had to be part of the family of Omegans who shared the same space, breathed the same air, ate the same food, and laughed and wept together.

And we had an uncommon, common-denominator, a denominator that united us in love and friendship. And the Steinman-Schartz team was our numerator. But they did not divide us. They defied the laws of mathematics and science. The larger we grew, the more we became unified. And no matter how many of us inhabited those few acres on that quiet road by a sleepy town in the mountains, we each felt like WE mattered. WE belonged. WE cared. Each of us felt as if they had a personal relationship with those few who united us. And those few, in turn, felt the same.

That's why our reunion was so full of joy and tears and hugs and kisses and friendships born anew.

After the reunion, in a conversation with Bern, the subject turned to awe at how this reunion exceeded our expectations. "Why?" I wondered aloud. That's when she turned and told me the secret. She said it's because she always thought of everyone as her children. And that somehow we wouldn't have become the people we are today if we hadn't been born of this unique type of love. That's why we are a family.

And this family will never be divided.

Wishing love, peace and good health to all my brothers and sisters. I already miss you.

Artie