Happy Thanksgiving!

🚨 Newsflash: 2010 was 15 years ago. 🚨

I’m not sure how this can be since it was just yesterday that I was boppin’ wildly on the dance floor at Genentech's National Sales Meeting to Lady Gaga’s "Bad Romance" with Sheryl and James.

I mean, one minute you’re holding babies, and the next you’re looking up at two brilliant, hilarious, fully-formed humans who now call you Auntie.

Time, it is truthfully said, is a thief.

My nieces, now 12 and 14, have somehow turned into young women overnight.

Many of you have known me for years, and you haven’t seen them at this age yet. They’re all legs and opinions and inside jokes now… and honestly, 🫶🏽.

Mostly because I’m the cool Auntie and I take great pride in this. And I love them. But I digress.

This moment was a proud one for the Flowers family.

Zoe, Niece #1, gave a talk in front of her entire school about finding identity in being mixed race and how it will be a lifelong journey to uncover all the different aspects of herself that make her, her.

She’s in 8th grade.

We were all there, captured in one frame: Mark, Debs, my sister-in-love (Debism!) Susie, her parents, the girls, and me.

Three generations. One big, blended circle.

And as I looked at this photo, it hit me:

While you don’t get to choose the family you’re born into, you do get to choose how you show up for each other — in the tiny moments, the holiday chaos, the long drives, the loud tables, the growing-up seasons.

Family, the given and the chosen, is the first place we learn love, patience, resilience, humor, generosity, boundaries, forgiveness (so much forgiveness), and all the other skills that make us who we are in our work and our lives.

This year, I’m grateful for the people who shaped me, the girls who remind me how fast life moves, and the roots that keep me steady no matter how far I wander.

Here’s to family, my family, my original community. 🤍

Happy Thanksgiving, My Friends. 🦃 🥧 🍂

xx n:)