Family is French for F*ck you.
Ahh, the holidays. Who among us doesn’t get stressed out about having to smile and make small talk with family members that you’ve managed to successfully avoid all year long? Last year I got out of Thanksgiving dinner because I had to do a photoshoot, and it was the guy’s only day off from work. Plus I needed the cash. This year, you’d think having two surgeries 2 weeks apart would be all I needed but apparently not!
My brother began his telephone assault two weeks before Thanksgiving, bothering me and my mother about coming down to his home an hour away. I had my excuse ready, but I forgot that my brother’s brain is made of lead and he doesn’t get the point as easily as one might hope. Two days later he’s asking me again if I’m coming to dinner. ”If I’m up for driving that far, yes. If not, no.” That’s nicer than saying “I don’t want to be around your fake ass family for s’me ol’ bullshit that I could whip up right in my own kitchen and then eat it while I play games on my XBOX and not have to have my nerves wrecked by these people I share bloodlines with.” Long story short, when he stopped bothering me I decided to go, and I was actually happy about going, and got excited as the day approached. And I remained that optimistic until I crossed the threshold.
When I got out of the car I heard one of my nieces scream, she hadn’t seen me in over a year. She ran outside to hug me and I was so glad to be there. Then I got to the door and there was another niece standing there hugging my mother. This particular one has an issue with me because she and I had words over me not coming to last year’s dinner. Long story short but let’s just say that I was absolutely right, and she can’t apologize to save her life (that’s coming from her sisters, not me). She sees me and does this very smooth shuffle away from the door so she doesn’t have to hug me, but can just say hi. Oookay. My brother is over the moon to see me and makes it known, as was his wife and various other family members, including my younger nieces and nephews.
My cousin shows up with his wife. She hugs me, we talk, and then I hug him. A few moments later, he asks me “So, you get anymore tattoos?” I show him the one on my arm that I had done for a friend who was in a very serious motorcycle accident. I said “Just this one but it was done last year.” He says “Oh good, you’ve come to your senses.” ….hm. Then the conversation turns to tattoos and how they just don’t belong in the workplace, with my sister-in-law saying that someone she hired and eventually became friends with has a tattoo on her leg, and that she told her if they had seen that during the interview she wouldn’t have given her the job. My cousin’s wife pipes up and says “See, that should teach you not to judge a book by its cover,” which seemed to go right over my SIL’s head. Another cousin comes up behind me, says to her mother, my father’s sister, “Ooh look at the tattoo on her neck,” and then proceeds to tug my shirt down in the back so they can see what’s probably peeking out. Mind you, I have a “Om Mani Padme Hum” in Tibetan Script on my neck and a lotus below it on my back. My cousin at some point comes up behind me and grabs one of my dreadlocks and is pulling it for some odd reason, until I remove it from his hand and slap him.
So, the family had a lot of appetizers which we were all eating, and then it was almost time for dinner but no one was hungry, too many good appetizers, so we made a call and said “Buffet style!” and everyone could eat when they wanted to. Some of us adjourn to the living room where a game of Monopoly was started. I took a plate with me, which had taco dip on it, some tortilla chips, and a segment of a chicken wing. One of my smaller nephews spills some pop on the table where the game is being played, so I stand up, I grab my plate and someone else’s, and a couple cups to take them into the kitchen. My mother says “I think you need a longer shirt, hon” because my shirt had gone up to my waist, and my fat was grotesquely protruding over the cut of my low rise jeans. Cuz shirts don’t go up when you sit down, and I had a third hand to pull it down so no one had to witness such a sight. I was pissed.
Two hours later, the game is over and we all get up to eat. I get some turkey, a piece of ham, a spoonful of stuffing, and a spoonful of mac and cheese. I sit down to eat and now my father’s sister (shut up about it) says “Ohh you got yourself another plate of food huh?” and trust me when I say that her tone was to indicate that I was making a pig of myself. I said “I just had appetizers, thought I’d have some real food now,” in an effort to keep things light. Add some more fuel to my fire. As I’m sitting there eating, my cousin again pulls my hair. I slap his hand away. Then he says “Why do you have those?” I said “Because I want them now leave my hair alone.” ”How do you comb them?” I say “You don’t, now quit being stupid.” My cousin is 47 years old and last time I checked, a black man. Don’t be an asshole. He messes with my hair a few more times and I’m close to losing my shit, I can feel it. I’ve been picked at all day and I’m over it.
Luckily the weather is getting bad, foggy, rainy, and I have an hour drive ahead of me, so I start getting my things together. SIL makes me take food with me so I pretend to pack up some stuff just so she’ll feel better, and begin saying bye to my family. Everyone hugs me except for the same niece who shuffled away from the door, she pretends to be asleep. Oh yeah – she looked to see who was leaving and then put her head right back down. Whatever. I drive home, the whole way constantly swallowing saliva, and I know what that means… the second I get home and safely in my house, and securely in the bathroom, I throw up everything I ate while I was gone.
If that isn’t enough, today I call my sister to discuss our mother’s Christmas gift, and I told her about my surgical scars healing up well and that I was going to send her a photo. She makes a comment about how her best friend looked at a photo I posted a few days after my latest surgery and asked if Frankenstein did my procedure. As if half of her foot isn’t over the line, she then goes on to tell me about the photos of my “body parts” that I’ve posted online. I said “What the hell are you talking about because I’ve NEVER done anything like that.” First she can’t remember, then she comments on the photos I took, NINE YEARS AGO, of my surgical scars after my gastric bypass surgery. I said “Your tone was as if I was posting photos of my vagina online,” and she remarks that I’ve just made choices that she would never make, “that’s all.” So I tell her that I’m going to get off the phone because I’m mad, and I do just that.
Then I go to my photos that I’ve taken with my mobile phone and I see the photo I took of my scar after my breast reduction, then another photo where I’m in the ER because of cramps I’m having and I’m about to give a urine sample so I take a picture of me looking at the cup, and then another photo where I’m at the plastic surgeon’s office in a gown that’s too small, with what I thought was a funny look on my face, a photo I took once when I was in the process of getting a pap smear (cuz my doctor said to entertain myself so I did), and then it dawns on me… the one person in my family that I thought GOT me and took me as is…. DOESN’T.
I’m 41 years old and I know exactly who I am, what I like, and my sense of humor is unmatched. And it’s disgusting that members of my family keep trying to cram me into a box that they can deal with and relate to instead of either realizing that they’re too rigid in their thinking or just deal with me being me and let it go. Apparently to be in my family I need to remove my piercings, straighten my hair, have my tattoos lasered off, listen to strictly Hip hop, R&B and Soul, go to church and be a God fearing Christian, and show up at any and all family gatherings. Oh and get a real job, the artsy thing has played itself out for too long.
Yeah. I’m gonna get right on that.
