I am writing this in my father-in-law’s house, with around 40 people in the next room gathered for the annual family reunion. It’s a holiday tradition. Everyone gathers, get sick on too much alcohol and cholesterol, the kids run around the room until they break something, after which they are herded in front of the television to watch a Disney movie. There’s a lot of screaming, and singing, tantrums — all the gaiety and misery that are family reunions.

I wouldn’t miss it for the world. And thanks to WiFi, I don’t have to. Even if I’m in the middle of a party, I can still write an article, email it, and still be able to join in a drunken chorus of Frank Sinatra’s “My Way” echoing from the living room. That’s freedom. That’s convenience.

Of course not everyone can understand the technology. My mother-in-law, who still writes letters by hand and asks my wife to retype it and email it for her, can’t get the concept of WiFi and information being sent to another computer thousands of miles away without any wires or connections. “So it’s just…floating?” she says, peering suspiciously at my laptop, as if letters will suddenly spring out of it any second like a cartoon. But though she can’t grasp how it works, she certainly appreciates WiFi’s purpose—especially when we log on to the online photo album of my cousin in California, and the family crowds around me to look at the pictures of the new baby, born just two weeks go. “Let’s toast to the new member of the family!” someone says, as if anyone needed any excuse to open another bottle of champagne.

And with my article done, and sent, thanks to the convenience of WiFi, I stand up to join them in the toast.