Family Matters

The dynamic duo
Originally uploaded by smoove_J.

Saturday night's fortune cookie, after a Ken's Dim Sum combo, read: "Want adventure and excitement? Take a vacation."
Eight hours later, I was on a flight to Los Angeles.
The past few weeks, I've been contemplating taking a vacation, but I'd been too lazy and/or cheap to do anything about it. Life at work was stressful, life outside of work was stressful, life was just ... uncomfortable. Then, Hollywoood came to the rescue.
It seems really pathetic that it took a movie to break me out of my funk — my cousin called it "the saddest thing I'd ever told her" — but it's true. I watched Adam Sandler's (ADAM SANDLER!!) Click last week. Not the best of movies, but the premise — family is No. 1 — kind of resonated with me. That night, I booked my ticket to LA for my great uncle's 90th birthday. We did the same thing two years ago for my grandma's bday, except in Vegas, and the entire family was there.
It was the same thing this weekend. The entire family was here, from east coast to west, from north to south, young and old. There won't be many more events like this, since the older generation is getting older, and older. My grandma wasn't even 90 when she died last month, and both my uncle Connie and grandma Molly are well into their 90s. And they're the lynchpins, the family matriarch and patriarch, that keep everyone coiming together.
After the party, some of the family went back to my uncle connie's house, where I spent many a passover growing up. I had so many memories run through my mind just hanging out in the backyard, shooting some hoops with my cousins, young and old (That's you, Rob). I'm glad I came.
Tonight, it's dinner with my aunt, uncle, and a couple other cousins. Tommorrow morning, I jet back home.
Quick, expensive, but a trip well worth it.