Today my entire clan got together at my Uncle Phil & Auntie Evelyn’s house for a double celebration. My Uncle Phil’s Birthday come Family Reunion. To say I was dreading it would be the understatement of the month!
I love my parents and sibling like you wouldn’t believe. I would take a bullet for them. I can tolerate my Aunts, Uncles and Cousins in very small doses and hence why I was dreading this celebration.
My extended family are truly lovely people on a one on one basis but put them all together in the same place and the same time and they become headaches. Everyone talks over one another, they debate about trivial shit and say if one uncle doesn’t agree with something an aunt has to say then an argument ensues. When you tell them to shut the fuck (not in exactly those words) it tends to make them even more animated.
They are the type of folk that are extremely passionate in their beliefs and there is nothing wrong with that but if you don’t think like them, if you don’t agree with them and if you don’t conform to their expectations then it gets rather heated.
My father, God love him, is the type of character who tells you what he thinks whether you asked for his opinion or not, he is also a very cheeky man who stirs up the pot so he can sit back and wet himself from laughter as the remainder of his siblings start arguing. It CAN be rather funny and there has been many a time when I have been in the corner of the room giggling like a schoolgirl but it’s also a tad embarrassing when your father is the instigator of these episodes.
I have many cousins who are nice people but The Husband and I really have nothing, and I mean nothing, in common with them whatsoever. Being that I am one of the youngest of about 13 cousins and the majority of my cousins are in the 55+ regions there is no real connection there. I don’t blame anyone its just the circumstance. When I was born they were all in their early to mid teens. I was also the token brat whom like my father would tell them what I thought of them from a young age and I was the brat who used to catch them smoking and drinking and bribe them to give me chocolate or money or else I was going to dob them in.
Yes, yes, I wasn’t a fair player but I was only like that from the ages of 5-10. I was a cheeky brat who knew from a very early age the power and art of manipulation. I don’t know where I picked that up from but I believe that this trait was just in me. My bad LOL!
Whilst my cousins were having children I was somewhere around the world on one of my many overseas adventures. They were all headed in the direction of marriage and then children whilst I was out drinking, partying, smoking, finding myself and having adventures in some far away land.
The last time we were all together was at my wedding 2 years ago. It was lovely and pleasant seeing them all on my big day and they were all very complimentary and sweet but after a few drinks at our reception they were slightly inebriated and their misery spewed forth with a few of them cornering me and slurring “Why did you get married for?” Like the saying goes misery loves company and if you aren’t miserable like they are then we can’t connect.
I apprehensively got ready for this reunion as did The Husband and we really just did not want to attend. We got there, we ate, we were ignored by the cousins and they all spoke about what they wanted without one of them asking us about us. It sounds like my cousins are rude and mean but they really aren’t they are just not on the same planet as The Husband and I. I like the believe that The Husband and I think a little bit outside of the box and my extended family tend to think and act inside the box.
Overall, it was lovely seeing them all, but I wish we could have just done a hit and run. Hit and run being we walk in say HI, say HAPPY BIRTHDAY and then run! Sadly I have come to the realization that at the end of the day I am related to these people and I had no choice in the matter and that really my life journey doesn’t really include any of them. It is, as narcissistic as this is going to sound, just about The Husband and I.
So glad to be finally home!
DH
xoxo
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