About A Boy

Family Dynamics at Holiday Gatherings

Now that is an interesting sight to see, my large blended family doing their best to make it through the holiday seasons. I sometimes sit back and watch from the outside looking in as my cousins and siblings and all the adults either get along blissfully or begin WWIII in the living room...There is one family member in particular that tends to enjoy making things difficult, every family has one. In mine it is my aunt. She is my uncle's second wife, and let's just say everyone wishes he would have stayed with the first one! On my step dad's side, I never know what to expect. They are all so conservative and polite-completely opposite to my mother's wild southern clan. The first years we visited his family, there is no other way to describe it other than awkward. They all knew Rob (my step father), but we were foreign strangers to them, and here we were walking in to eat their food and unwrap their presents on Christmas day! I always tried to keep to myself, but the past three years have begun to blossom with unexpected friendships. People have spoken to me that I had no idea could speak! And I found out that I have some really cool cousins near my age, if only I would have opened up sooner! I stopped going to my biological father's house for holidays long ago. They were nothing but disastrous; the adults got drunk and cursed and told bad jokes, and...well that's enough to speak for itself. One year, my poor little brother went out there and I stayed home, and he had to witness a fight break out between our dad and his brother. I was so infuriated. I am so thankful for my safe, warm, loving environment at my nana and papas. Although their gathering is full of misfits (my die hard football loving guy cousins, my far out artistic girl cousin and her coming of age text messaging obsessed sister, my loud crazy little sister, my little brother who barely speaks, my little brother who can't stop talking, my often frantic mother, my nana who won't stop taking pictures, my aunt stirring up trouble and her husband shaking his head in shame, and me who always somehow ends up in the spot light because if worse comes to worst Lord knows I will be forced into singing a song to settle things down) there is familiarity in our strangeness. It's wonderful. I love Christmas.