Family Gathering
Many, many years ago in a land far away…. Ok get real. It was five years ago in upstate NY. My sister invited us up to visit her at her new home in the Thousand Islands. I had three very busy girls and she had a newborn. Thanks dear sister for the invite, but we will rent a place and then we can stay friends. She was good enough to find us this huge purple colored Victorian mansion overlooking the water. Fabulous view, great big porch with filled with wicker furniture and right in the center of al the fun. So for the next four years we rented the purple house. Every year my middle sister,the zoo vet, and my brother, the brain surgeon, ( I am not making this stuff up) would bring their families to the river and always stay with my sister. Again, not staying with me so that we could remain friends. If I were not so thick skinned and a little selfish with my space I might have taken insult to this. But as you get to know me, you will see that I took this as my good fortune. My parents would show up and yes, they too stayed with my baby sister. This started the August Family Gathering on the River. Last year we bought our own cottage. This was due in large part to the fact that the purple house, though lovely, was infested with bats. Thousands and thousand of bats! I have the rabies vaccination to prove it. And if that was not incentive enough I needed to garden and have projects like painting decks and decorating even on vacation.
It is August once again and my middle sister and her 6-year-old daughter have arrived as have my parents. We are now awaiting the arrival of my baby brother, his wife and three kids. The exact location of where they will stay this year is up in the air as there was a little controversy last year. It is about that staying friend’s thing and invading someone’s space.
Last year my baby sister told my brother that since his wife was such a good cook (we come from a large family of mediocre and uninterested cooks) that as part of their stay at her home for the week they would be in charge of two dinners. Seemed like a fair deal to me. I would have had him paint the deck! Well, he was highly insulted and said forget it; he wasn’t coming if there were restrictions on his visit. Baby sister said no problem, less cleaning and fuss for me. He mentioned calling me instead and then she mentioned the deck thing so I never got the call. Now I have to tell you, honestly, what a big fat baby. Two dinners and one could have been pizza. What is the big deal? We were all sad that they wouldn’t be joining us and all the little cousins wouldn’t be together. We tried to get mom to call him but she said “too bad for him – the big baby”. Tough Love! Well, he did show up three days later. Since he was only staying for half a week he figured one dinner ought to do it and somehow, this made him feel better. Baby sis agreed and we all went out to dinner on him. So much for the home cooked meal. Can we get a decent meal cooked at home out of this family? So it is with great trepidation that we await his arrival to find out where he is staying this year. Baby sis and I have been ping ponging him back and forth, unbeknownst to him, for the last week. And darn if that deck doesn’t need a sanding and a good coat of paint.