Grandparents and Kids can Enjoy Christmas Movies Together!
Looking for a way to create a truly unforgettable holiday experience with your grandchildren? Get ready to curl up on the couch, grab a bowl of popcorn, and embark on a cinematic journey.
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Everyone grows up with a certain set of values. Our families of origin have a tremendous influence on our lives, and although some values may be deemed unnecessary, or need to be adjusted later in a person’s life, others are still viable and have great impact. I have lived my life in keeping with many of the values I was taught as a child. Those values were passed down to my own children in one way or another.
Now, there were other ones, not values really, ….more like, do not ride horses (sorry, Mom), do not climb trees (sorry Mom), and do not hang out around dogs during a storm, especially no big dogs. Dogs attract lightning (sure, Mom). I know, the dog thing is batshit crazy, but she insisted it was true til the day she died. Both of my parents were kind of risk averse, which is probably why I like adventurous activities and large dogs. There was also “don’t kill anything unless you are going to eat it” because we liked to fish. During the summer there was a fish fry every Saturday night at the lake. Of course, I don’t fish now, I look at fish instead. I prefer seeing them alive.
I grew up in Southern Ohio and there were many racial/ethnic values which did not sit well with me during the time I grew up and still don’t. My Grandma warned me about dating “Papists” because the Pope was the devil. No Jews either since they “killed Jesus” (I know that is untrue, don’t worry). Oh, and only a trashy white girl would date a black guy. I never heard that one from my parents, but I did hear that I should marry within the same race…my own race (white). Hey, it was the 60s and 70s, you know? My mother grew up in Kentucky where there was segregation, and while she was not a racist, her parents were. I won’t even tell you some of the things I heard them say! I was horrified by the prejudice from an early age, so it probably helped set me on my Liberal path. My nuclear family was always pretty liberal, or non political, and encouraged debate. There was nothing you couldn’t ask, and with my endless curiosity, I asked a lot of questions.
I’d love to hear about other “family values”. Any pearls of wisdom from your family? Anyone else’s mother think that dogs attract lightning?
Today marks the two year anniversary of my husband’s double lung transplant! We are celebrating by enjoying a trip to Aspen with another couple, who stood by us all the way. Yesterday, we whitewater rafted (and floated) the Colorado River, and I think that is a fair analogy of the last couple of years!
I want to thank our friends and family who stood by us during a horribly uncertain time, and continue to give us their love and support. There really are no words to convey the depth of our gratitude…so here are some photos of the last two years.
Thank you.
Thomas Wolfe said one can’t go home again, and in a sense, that’s true. I cannot be a child again. My parents are gone, friends have moved on, and much has changed, yet the landmarks remain, and there are still people I care about. I had forgotten the beauty of the change of seasons, and the simple pleasures of the country…hayrides, fruit and vegetable farms, pumpkin patches. A piece of my heart will always be here, the place where I grew up: Montgomery County, Southern Ohio.
I have a family wedding next week in Kentucky, so I drove up a week early to spend time with my “sister” and her family. Holly isn’t really an actual relative, but our parents were best friends, and I’ve known her since I was a baby. I normally saw her at least 2 or 3 times a week, during which she and my big brother, Mike, teased and tortured me, as older siblings do. They were a team when we were little, and I was the baby. They locked me in dark closets, told me there was no Santa, and committed the usual tricks that siblings perform. I survived. Mostly, the times were good. We spent our Christmas Eves together, watched The Wizard of Oz together, and played together. Holly is 6 years older than I, and I thought she was the coolest thing ever when she was in high school, and received her driver’s license. So many of my childhood memories include Holly. She is family and an integral part of my life, as is her husband and two daughters.
And they have kept me busy! Taking drives around the area, seeing what is new, driving through the cornfields, taking hay rides, picking pumpkins, visiting Yellow Springs, Ohio where Antioch College was founded in 1852 (it is the cutest town, and very progressive). We also went to Young’s Dairy to eat ice cream and pet goats and cows. I even saw a Pumpkin Chunkin’!
I also saw old friends….people I went to elementary with, sang with, and grew up with. It is an incredible experience to sit among them again. The connections are still there, the thread of childhood and the discovery of growing up together. Those memories bind us, and always will.
Tomorrow I head for Kentucky, but this week spent with my “family” has been wonderful. I could use more sleep though….Holly and I have stayed up until 2 a.m. more than once! I have enjoyed the amazing colors of Ohio, so different from the fairly lame display we get in Texas, and I can tell you that hayrides in the cool, brisk air beats hayrides in 90 degree heat. I head out tomorrow, and I leave with a happy, full heart.
Happy autumn!
Midlife brings its share of excitement, sorrow, and puzzlement, regardless of the season. My husband’s family relations have puzzled me long before now, but during the holidays, it seems to surface more often.
My husband’s family went into business together long ago (I know, first mistake, right?) and tempers flared. It did not have a happy ending as far as family relationships go. I have always been sorry for my children, and my nieces and nephews, that they didn’t grow up together and form lifelong relationships. Long story short, one of my sisters-in-law decided to break relations with her husband’s brothers, and their entire families. I fought it for many years…and while the kids were young we did have some little contact, but as the years went by, we were absolutely frozen out. Persona non grata. I have never understood people who cut off family members (unless they were convicted of an ax murder or something). My family is not perfect, but I have stayed as close as a sister to one of my cousins, and reconnected with another. My brother and I are close. It is so important, to have those bonds of love and affection, to have a sense of belonging. We live in different parts of the country, but that does not lessen the ties that bind us together.
I held out hope for a very long time that the attitude of my husband’s family would soften, at least between the cousins, but I have come to realize that there will be no change. Even though the kids are all adults now, and should act like adults, there is no sign of melting ice. Actually, the final straw for me occurred last week. My father in law is frail, and in his late 80s now. One of his granddaughters was in from out of town, and he wanted to get his 3 granddaughters together for an evening with him. They all said yes…but at the last minute, he received a phone call from one, cancelling the evening. The other two cousins went, and both said Grandpa’s heart was broken, and he cried on and off all night because the 3rd granddaughter would not join them. It broke their hearts to see him like that, and it breaks mine to hear about it.
My family always makes fun of me for saying this, but I am serious: why can’t people just be nice? What is the use of hanging onto anger and feuds that have nothing to do with the present, and had nothing to do with the children in the family? I understand being hurt. I just don’t understand perpetuating hurt until it becomes intractable anger and bitterness. I believe we have all lost, but especially the children. They are now adults, and don’t even know one another.
Although I will never understand it, I finally accept it. Last year my husband had a life threatening health catastrophe and we came very close to losing him. My children and I received not one phone call, not even an email, to express concern, or to offer help. I suppose that says it all.
I try to live my life with optimism and hope. Ghandi said, “The weak cannot forgive. Forgiveness is an attribute of the strong.” I forgave long ago, but what I finally understand is that there are some individuals who are just not capable of love or forgiveness, and those people bring toxicity to our lives. It is best to wish them well, and let them go out of our lives.
I know this is not an unheard of issue between family members. The holidays can often be tense when families gather. What about others out there? Do you have family members who have cut you out of their lives? Or that you don’t speak to? How do you handle it?
It seems strange not to be planning a gift and what we will do for my mom on Mother’s Day. She passed away last June, and there are still times I think, “I want to tell mom that”, before realizing she’s not here anymore. Our relationship was never smooth, in fact it was pretty contentious, but she was a daily part of my life for my entire life, whether I wanted her to be or not.
Growing up, we never quite jelled. She wanted a daughter who wanted to sew and cook and shop and do girly things while I wanted to play baseball and hockey with the boys or play with my animals. Our viewpoints as I grew older were always different. Mom was also one of those “hysterical” moms, the kind that cries and just knows that if you ride a horse you will be killed (the first time I rode I did get thrown…). She was a “doom and gloom” type of mom: I would be sorry for this, I would be sorry for that, I was ruining my life, etc, etc. Our fights and arguments were sometimes epic. My mother spent most of my childhood and teen years worried about what I was doing, and voicing that worry constantly. If not for my dad and brother, Mike, who acted as buffers, I have no idea how bad the explosion would have been.
After I left home things were better because I was not constantly under her microscope. I lived quite far away in a time before personal computers and cell phones, so our contact was what we considered frequent then, a once or twice weekly phone call. After my father died, when I was only 25, we went right back to contentious. According to mom, the only person deeply affected by dad’s death was her. She just wallowed in her misery, and soon the only thing that made her happy was gambling and Las Vegas. Mom became a compulsive gambler, but we were slow to realize it.
She was a wonderful grandmother to my two children, and she moved to Dallas so she could be close to them. My father left her extremely well provided for, but she was gambling that money away quickly. She spent with no concern whatsoever. After we put her money in a trust she started getting cash from her credit cards. She would run them up as high as $30,000.00 a year. Yes, there were many contentious exchanges.
But we had our good times too. She was good to my children and they adored her; on extended family visits it was fun to play poker or yahtzee with her; she went on vacation with us and watched the kids. And hey, she was my mom. I partially supported her for many years, and there was very little left when she passed last summer. She was usually mad at me for something, especially the last few years. I was told that I would be “sick and sorry” when she was gone, and that she would “haunt” me for being so mean to her (you know, doing things like making sure she wore her oxygen and having home health in to check on her. Boy, did that piss her off!) She died of lung disease, and as less and less oxygen made it to her brain, she became extremely difficult. She weighed 85 pounds at 5’4″, and still would not believe how sick she was. “I’m fine!” she would shout at me (and my brother, and her grandchildren, and her doctor….). At 80 pounds she went into the hospital for 2 weeks, with my brother and I at her side, and she finally went to sleep and didn’t wake up.
I miss you, mom. No one has threatened me with dire consequences for almost a year now, and I have yet to be haunted. My husband became critically ill after mom died and we had to cancel her interment. As my husband recovers slowly, I try to plan a time to do it. I mean, I feel terrible that she is still here, and not with dad (her ashes). But a childhood friend said to me, “Tammy, don’t worry about it. As long as she is someplace where she can drive you crazy, she’s happy”. That’s about right!
