Yesterday, I went to a neighborhood party where I gratefully picked out familiar faces from a sea of new, mostly young, ones. Kids were everywhere, on the swings, the slide and right beside the birthday girl, as she blew out the candles on her cake.

What struck me most is how alike these young people looked. They were all so, well, little.

How quickly we forget. How quickly the days of naps and tantrums give way to graduations and goodbyes. How quickly the tangible family, the family right here in the same house bickering and hugging and being mightily present to each other, gives way to what one might call a family of the air, one connected by texts and phone calls; a family spread around the country and — in our case right now — the globe. (With Tom in Serbia on a business trip, we are on three continents.)

But here’s the amazing part — it only makes us closer.  Three continents, one family. It’s a funny equation, but it adds up.