Back to the macaroni gathering.

I’m sure you’ve all heard me say “why spoil a perfectly good holiday by spending it with my family”.  Sounds harsh but when my whole family is together, it gets weird fast.  The last time we were all together before my father’s death we were asked not to return to an Embers.  An Embers!

I wasn’t looking forward to the macaroni gathering but it’s one thing to `dis your family for decades behind their backs and another thing entirely to `dis them to their faces.  So Nonny and I got the condo ready; Nonny made her salad and I heated up the macaroni. 

The group included both my middle sister and her husband, my little sister, my niece, my niece’s partner, two nephews, one nephew’s partner and two boys. Oh, and Nonny and me.  It started out a little strained.  Even the St. Louis group doesn’t gather all that often and I know that my two sisters don’t approve all that much of the other one’s choices. 

At one point my middle sister starting telling a story about baby possums that had gotten into their house and how they had to catch to them release them outside.  My youngest nephew is all about animal rescue, trap/neuter/release and knows quite a bit about wild animal relocation.  He was horrified by my sister’s story, jumping in to express indignation and to educate us all about how most people handle relocation incorrectly.  My brother-in-law (let’s call him David) is a very nice man but in the dictionary, out in the margin next to the phrase “pours gas on the fire” is David’s picture.  As soon as he realized he had a captive audience, he was off and running.  There was an outrageous story about trapping possums under a trash can followed by his exhortation that you can’t keep possums in the house because when they grow up, then there is “possum mating”.  This was accompanied by him stamping his feet and slapping his hands together to illustrate how this mating would keep you up at night.  It was the funniest thing ever; it was a good thing I was sitting on the floor at the time because I would have fallen off my chair laughing. 

Unfortunately the one person in the room who did not get the joke and wasn’t laughing was my nephew.  He looked horrified.  I had to ask him if he understood the phrase “yanking your chain”.  Even once I explained it, you could tell he wasn’t too thrilled to join in the hilarity.  But the gas on the fire did the trick and loosened some of the tension.  Not perfect, but we did manage to spend another hour together without any incidents!

My middle sister is already asking when I think I’ll be visiting next year so we can do it again!  Oops.

Do you have any “gas on the fire” friends or relatives?  Or “gas on the fire” stories?