New family pattern is actually oldest

The honeymoon is over. Forever, a cynic might say.

A few weeks ago, Holly Griscom came back from her wedding trip and moved next door to her mother- and father-in-law, and two houses away from her sister- and brother-in-law.

"It's definitely different. We're surrounded," says Holly, 26, who lives with her new husband, Jason Griscom, 27, in a house that nuzzles the 150-year-old Colonial of her in-laws, Juanita and Jay Griscom, in rural Woolwich Township, Gloucester County.

Jason's sister and brother-in-law, Christie and Russell Marino, live on the other side of the newlyweds. They, in turn, live just across the woods from Judi and Russell Marino, Russell's parents.

Behold the 21st-century family compound: a community where everybody knows your name because your name, or your maiden name, is their name, too.

At the Griscom-Marino compound, everyone either walks from one house to the next or climbs into a golf cart to make the rounds. Contact is frequent and informal.

"Most of the time, I love it," says Christie Griscom Marino, 29, mother of Dominic, 11, and Dante, 7. "But we're so informal around here that sometimes, when I just want to hang out by myself or plop down on the sofa and take a nap, somebody from the family comes to the door, and that's the end of that."

Jason Griscom, recently home from a visit with his mother and a stop at his sister's to pick up zucchini from her in-laws' family farm, had the pre-wedding advantage of knowing how the intergenerational dynamics play out.

"Because my sister and her family have been living next door to us, I witnessed it - I kind of saw how it all worked. And it's never been an issue," Jason says. "But, of course, it's all new to Holly, so I hope we have just as good an experience."

The bride knows "there may be issues about keeping our sense of privacy. But for now, it's a pretty nice way to live."

And it's a way more of us could well be headed.

Maria Kefalas, an assistant professor of sociology at St. Joseph's University, has long studied family patterns and life transitions. "And what we're seeing out there is that this mobile culture may actually return to patterns of the past, when family became the scaffolding of support."

There is a "trendlet" now, Kefalas says, that may reverse a cultural shift that occurred in the 1950s, when couples began moving away from their families to the suburbs.

"More and more working families with children may rely on the older generation for help. They're all realizing that they need one another, sometimes if just for emotional support," she says.

Sometimes, as Tevye argues in Fiddler on the Roof, there's tradition to consider.

When Irene and Peter Vosbikian tell people that they live within a half-mile of their four adult children in Moorestown, eyebrows go up.

Peter Vosbikian says he always hastens to explain that their family compound evolved on its own, with his children gradually choosing to buy homes in the neighborhood where they grew up because they loved the place - and one another.

"I think our closeness really goes back to our Armenian roots," says Peter, whose father left his homeland for the Philadelphia area in 1913, during the buildup to the Armenian Holocaust.

The youngest of seven children, he remembers how his father and uncle struggled in their adopted country, starting a foundry business through sheer grit.

"Struggle made us close, and family made us strong," Peter says, a vision he transmitted to his kids.

Irene Vosbikian grew up in South Philadelphia, the only child of a widowed Italian mother. But aunts, uncles and cousins took them under their collective wing. "Family was everything," she says.

Daughter Terry Vosbikian Testa, 38, and her husband, Michael, started the current family cluster when they moved into a stately 1930s Georgian Colonial in 2001.

Terry's oldest brother, Paul, 42, now lives around the corner in a contemporary home that faces the Tudor of his brother David, 40. Mary Vosbikian Schlindwein, 35, lives in a contemporary home seconds away from her three siblings.

"We know that to make this work, we have to give our adult kids their privacy and their space," says Peter Vosbikian. "We know when to disappear."

"You sometimes see more than you want to," says Irene, "but in the end, it's a miraculous thing that's happened."

Before the 1950s cultural shift, it was common for many generations of a family to live close together, or even in the same house.

"Today, in cities like San Diego, we're seeing that again, as families pool resources because of economic need," says Kefalas, the sociologist.

Other families simply don't want to leave the old hometown. What's familiar can be hard to give up.

"Geographic roots have a powerful pull, even in these times, when mobility is supposed to be the norm," Kefalas says.

Exhibit A: the Regn clan.

Cyndie Regn, 57, mother of three adults, is an independent divorced woman who lives directly across the street from her parents in Mount Holly. Down the block are her uncle and aunt. Her daughter Lauren lives six houses away with her husband and two children, and her son Matthew is living at home after a divorce.

"We can all see each other's houses," says Regn, "but that doesn't mean we always see each other."

Cyndie's father, John Regn, 79, started the ball rolling in 1948, when he and his bride, Kathleen, chose to build a house on land next door to his parents and around the corner from hers.

"It just felt right," he says.

Russ Regn, 69, John's "baby brother," also lives within sight of the house where he was born. He built his house on the same street as his brother's; he and wife Rosemarie moved into it in 1964, and haven't budged since.

"I wouldn't think of living anywhere else," says Russ, whose son and grandson live across the street.

With several generations living so close, a "small" family party can involve 35 people.

"I'm not sure we would have remained as connected as we are if we lived far away from each other," says Cyndie. "This probably wouldn't work for everyone, but it works for us."

Of course, other factors keep families close, too.

For example, Kefalas says, "It's taking longer and longer to grow up. Thirty is the new 20. . . . In the extended transition to adulthood, we may see more returning to the nest, or at least to the neighborhood."

And as grandchildren come along, the desire to be together can grow stronger.

When Anastasia Sanderson and her husband, Scott, married in 2004, they were drawn to the charms of a tiny trinity in Society Hill, which was perfect until five months ago and the birth of Stella Helene.

"We were bumping into walls and into each other," says Sanderson, 31. "It seemed a good time to put our house on the market."

The trinity sold quickly, and suddenly couple and baby were desperately seeking a new home. Anastasia's mother, Helene Matkowski of Voorhees, had an inspiration.

"I knew they really needed a place to live, and my own apartment complex had some vacancies. So I got up my courage and mentioned it," says Matkowski, 59, who slowly allowed herself the fantasy of having her first grandchild just a grassy court away.

But could a rookie mother and grandmother negotiate that well-known minefield: Who's in charge of baby?

"We both worried," says Matkowski, who has rich memories of a close, connected family in Port Richmond.

"It was a lot of change at once," says Sanderson. "But we did it."

So far, it's working. Limits have been set. Baby-sitting is not taken for granted, nor are spontaneous visits.

"I think Stella will be the one who really benefits in the end," says Sanderson. "I guess a baby just can't have too much love!"