To grandmother’s house we go on this Thanksgiving Day. In some ways, my family is a throwback to a different time. I have two brothers and two sisters; each of my siblings has a spouse or partner. Add in three nephews, two nieces, my mother, my father and my husband, and we’re one big happy (albeit occasionally dysfunctional) family.

The “throwback” has nothing to do with being a happy-but-dysfunctional clan; we’re of Irish-Catholic heritage, so that comes with the territory. It’s more about where we live. Not one of us “kids” has moved more than 20 miles from our childhood home in Weymouth, Mass. In fact, my parents earn the prize for moving the most distance, and it’s still only about 45 miles to their home in Sandwich, Mass.

Consider that my husband and my sister, Nancy’s, husband both grew up in our hometown (although none of us met until we had returned home after graduating from college) and we all still live here. Factor in the hometowns of my sister- and two other brothers-in-law (Hanover, Mass., Plymouth, Mass. and Saugus, Mass.), and I can’t help but think we’re an anomaly in a world where you can have breakfast in Paris and lunch in New York City without blinking an eye, never mind traveling half-way ’round the world from New York to Beijing in a matter of 12 hours — the same amount of time it took me to drive home for Thanksgiving break from college in Charlottesville, Va., way back when.

I have a great job that allows me to travel the world, but home is always where my heart is. This year I give thanks for my siblings and in-laws, all of whom are also my friends, and I count my blessings that we live close enough to one another to make thanks-giving a daily celebration rather than a once-a-year or once-a-decade family gathering.

— Lisa Matte, editor in chief