I’m really lucky. We weathered Covid in my family without major illness so far. We are all as protected as we can be now. I got to hug my parents after a long time of occasional driveway chats. I thought the hugging was everything. This weekend I realized that the hugging was just the start.

This week my Dad went to visit my brother out of state and my Mom came this to hang out with my family. This isn’t the first time we have all seen each other. There have been first dinners, games played with grandkids, and catching up on what is going on in our lives. But this weekend was different for all of us.

My Mom said and I agree, that when we all started to see each other again, live and in the flesh, it was awkward. Strange. She said she forgot how to be here. She’s right. We forgot how to host my family, too. We are all very close, but we forgot how to be together. Just be. Not a scheduled holiday move through motions gathering. Just hanging out.

So this weekend, Mom and I shopped for random stuff, folded laundry, scanned some pictures. She watched a movie with my son and my husband made a delicious dinner. My brother and Dad fixed a garage door and sipped a new whiskey. They took my nephew for a morning of fishing where my Dad got to swap fishing stories with his grandson. We all found each other again, in all the small ways.

On MPR there have been many stories about going back to the office, or church or school. How people will or won’t navigate it. How strange it all feels. This week a woman told me about how strange it felt to go into a store the first time without a mask. How even though she was vaccinated she still felt vulnerable.

What I think we are all learning, is that we there is a lot more to do before we feel normal. Like coming out the other side of any major event, the time it takes to feel ok again, is a lot longer than we realize. I sympathize for the many people who lost family and won’t be able to find their old normal. I’m grateful I have the time to get to know my normal, and my people, all over again.