I miss cousins. Maybe the need to be surrounded by biologically related friends is an artifact of antediluvian times, a yearning for a band of near-brothers we can count on not to drop spears and run away when the rhino charges.

Or maybe its just recollections of noisy Sunday pot-roast dinners, swiftly followed by noisier wars of tag out in the yard.

For 30 or 40 years, whenever learning someone is from Alaska, I usually manage to ask whether they eat at my cousin John Hobacks big Sea Galley restaurant in Anchorage. Conceptually, I know Alaskas a vast expanse. But with so few people, surely everyone must eventually dine at the states best seafood joint?

Astonishingly now old enough to be dynamic young retirees splitting their time between Alaska and Arizona, John and his wife Verele came through town this week in a Winnebago, working their way up U.S. Highway 101. Johns parents Frank and Lucille in West Seattle were virtually a backup set of parents to me. But when John and I last met in person, he was going through the hotel/hospitality management program at Washington State University and I was about 12. Still, Id have been able to identify him from across a crowded room by the amused twinkling squint of his eyes.

We talked of many things of our grandfathers love of fishing, of John working a mechanical bilge pump in his dads small boat out of Valdez before the big quake, of lovely Lucilles relatively benign magazine-hoarding fixation, fueled by Publishers Clearing House. These touchstones of shared heritage automatically bind us closer than might seem possible, considering how little actual time weve spent in one anothers company.

But we mostly talked of children. Of 13 first cousins on the Winters side of my family, John and Verele are by far most accomplished in terms of replicating the traditional happy web of interconnected kids and grandkids. All their children are well established in life. In the never-ending joyful lament of parents across all time and space, we celebrated their success while regretting they dont all live close enough to touch. This subject is front and center for me, as in just another heartbeat or two, my own beloved 16-year-old daughter Elizabeth will be off for college and independent life.

When John and Verele moved back up to Alaska in 1982, and even more so when our grandpa left his Michigan family behind to come to Washington state in 1902, it was a separation from parents, cousins, friends and nearly all that came before. John recalled how phone calls down to Seattle ran 50 cents a minute in the 80s. But Verele reassured me that our age of instant texting and photo transmission greatly enhances the ability to keep sharing day-by-day discoveries, experiences and passing thoughts that all nurture a strong sense of family.

Retouching and freshening family bonds will be at the forefront of American life this weekend with our somewhat early 2013 Easter. (The earliest it can be is March 22, which next rolls around in the year 2285.) My mom used to put pieces of homemade chocolate fudge and caramels inside plastic eggs. Oh my goodness, did that ever excite a flat-out frenzy of searching! Later, wed head for church, 4-year-old me standing upright beside my dad on the front bench seat of his big green Jeep station wagon. I dont think it even had seatbelts, far less child-safety seats. Maybe I was vouchsafed from harm by singing hymns in my little tenor voice, annoying my big brother.

In these latter days, I think of myself as a jack Episcopalian, borrowing a term from our neighbors in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. A jack member of the Mormon Church or another denomination is, basically, a member of the club who doesnt attend meetings. So dont look for me in church Sunday, but Ill be thinking kindly thoughts about all of you who are there.

We lost a member of our family this week. I came home from work and found our elderly Welsh corgi, Bina, had up and died while lying in her favorite place for raccoon observation. Her life paralleled my daughters childhood, as we picked her out of a Portland litter when Elizabeth was in kindergarten. We recalled this week how Bina missed and mourned her brothers and sisters in the weeks after we brought her to Ilwaco. Today, I know she is scampering in the company of all her enormous clan of brave little cousins in the cow pastures of heaven.

M.S.W.

 Matt Winters is editor of the Chinook Observer and Coast River Business Journal.