My Family

I am the warm hug you get when you come home from school. I am the hand you hold when you cross the street and the cheers you hear from the sidelines at your game. I am the sound of laughter around the dinner table and the quiet voice that reads you a bedtime story. You can’t see me, but you can feel me everywhere. I am a circle of people who love you no matter what. Who am I? I am your Family.

My story is one of the oldest in the world. I have been around for as long as there have been people. Way back in the Stone Age, hundreds of thousands of years ago, I was there. People lived in small groups, helping each other find food and stay safe from big, scary animals. Those groups of parents, children, aunts, uncles, and cousins were me. Later, in places like Ancient Rome around the 8th century BCE, I was a very big deal. A Roman family, called a 'familia,' included everyone living in one big house—grandparents, cousins, and all their helpers working together. Everyone had a job to do to keep the household running. As time went on and the world changed, I changed too. During the 18th and 19th centuries, many people moved to big cities to work in new factories, and I often became a bit smaller, with just parents and their children living together in one home. But no matter my size, my strength and love have always stayed the same.

Today, I come in all shapes and sizes, and every single one is wonderful. I can be one parent and a child, two moms, or two dads. I can be grandparents raising their grandkids or a family with children who are adopted. Sometimes I am made when two families join together, giving you new brothers or sisters to love. And sometimes, your very best friends can feel like me, too. People all over the world know how important I am. On September 20th, 1993, a group called the United Nations even created a special day, the International Day of Families, to celebrate me every year on May 15th. No matter what I look like, my job is always the same: to be a place of love, safety, and belonging. I am the first team you are ever on, and I am the love that connects us all.