We have seen a restaurant staff pull two or three tables together to accommodate several people in a family. IOW, a family that gets along and lives in the same area of each other. Then, there are those family members that live states away from each other and very seldom see each other or even call each other. Sounds exactly the way my wife's family is. My 1/2 brother and I really don't get along because we have such a difference in lifestyles. For one thing, he absolutely hates computers and I love them and he loves tough/hard work and I darn sure don't. He is a few years older than me. Basically, we have never got along. We have very little, to almost nothing, in common with my wife's family. So, which category do you fit in at............"get along" or "don't get along"?
My family gets along just fine, but I have lived a thousand miles or more away since I was seventeen, so we see one another every ten years or so. We talk more often than that, of course, but I'm not much of a telephone talker and, since my brothers aren't on the Internet much, we don't keep in touch that way, either. It's not a matter of not getting along and I am, in fact, exploring the possibilities of moving from here to be closer to home.
My family all get along fine, but we are spread apart also. Up until recently, the only one I was close to here was my daughter, but now she has the job in the Netherlands, so she is not here very often. On the other hand, my oldest son, who has lived in North Idaho for many years, recently moved out here for a better job opportunity, so now I get to see him more often. My other son is in Washington State, and now that Robin is not here to travel out there together, I do not get to see him very often at all. However, we all keep in close contact online. We all have apple devices, so we have one iMessage chat that is for all four of us (my 3 kids and myself), and we just add to the conversation as we have something to say or share. None of us is much for talking on the phone, but we do also do that occasionally. I enjoy being able to visit online; but often wish that we could all be close enough to see each other more often.