Spectator by Seema Goswami: The families we choose

As you grow older and find your own tribe, you realise that blood really isn’t thicker than water. It’s the friends you make who become your family

How do you define a family? Is it just people linked by DNA and marriage? Is it restricted to mom/dad, kids, and maybe two sets of grandparents? Does it encompass the extended clan, no matter how far removed? Can it ever include those who are not related to you by blood, but by laughter and tears instead?

Friends can become chosen family, as with the characters in Four More Shots, Please! (2019).

The enduring friendships in Tag (2018), stand in for familial bonds.