This has been a pretty tough week for me. Not the worst, but definitely not the best.  

When I have weeks like this, there is nobody else I would rather be surrounded by than my family.  

No question.  

That is a key point: No question!  

Well, they may ask how I have been, how things are going, am I okay, etc. But if I do not feel like disclosing, they know and they do not press the situation.  

They just love me.  

And by doing so, they heal me.  

We go over to my mom and dad’s house almost every Sunday for dinner.  

This is my reset. This is my time to wipe the slate clean for the week and look forward to a new one.  

We may not do anything special at all. Most of the time, there is just good food, sitting on the front porch with my sisters, watching our kids play in the yard and an unspoken promise to keep doing this for as long as we possibly can.  

We know that not every family has this luxury. That it is special and rare.  

Some families have lost certain family members that held the glue together. Some consist of children or grandchildren that have moved on to start their own families across the state or country. And sadly, some just do not get along.  

I could not imagine. I think if my family fell apart for whatever reason, then I would crumble myself.  

My life changes on an almost daily basis, whether it be personal or professional. But one thing that I know I can count on is my family. When everything else is changing around me or when I am changing myself, my family remains constant. The only constant.  

I came across a quote the other day that said, “A happy family is but an earlier Heaven.” I think this has some merit because that is when I am happiest – after eating a good meal, sitting on the front porch with my family, listening to my girls, nieces and nephews laughing as they play. How could life on Earth get any better? 

I hope that as my girls witness and experience the importance of family and our effort to get together on Sundays, they will be instilled with the same comfort as I am.  

That no matter what life throws at them, how hard it gets or how much everything else is changing around them, they can always come home.  

No questions asked.  

(Paige Nas is a wife, mother of three, digital journalist for the Webster Parish Journal and publisher for the Bienville and Claiborne Parish Journal.)