Thanksgiving

My family is all in Georgia at my sister’s house with her little boys. Both of my other sisters, the little sister’s husband, and my mom and dad. I am taking smug comfort in the fact that despite my being the aunt least good at sending packages and letters and calling, I am the one the boys remember since I saw them at Labor Day, so they are calling my two younger sisters by my name (since all three of us are big blond women, and the boys are two and almost four, the confusion is understandable). My middle-little sister (the designations of birth order in a group of four can be confusing; there’s middle-little and baby-little, and they’re about 30 and 27 respectively) sat the boys down with a photo album on her phone and showed them the difference between her and me, but it didn’t really take and they’re all still getting called my name.

Ha!

I’m being thankful that I have a family I miss, today. A lot of people seem to have been complaining about the stress of having to spend a day with family, or have been sharing truly shocking tales of the abuses families can perpetuate on one another. I have a minor complex about my weight and another about asking for things I need, but those all came out of a wonderfully loving environment that just wasn’t quite sure how to always be supportive. I know so many people aren’t that lucky. I love my family so much, and my parents worked so hard to give me a good upbringing, and spending time with them is the absolute opposite of a trial even though we have all these crazy in-laws now, heh heh.

So there’s that. I also have thinky thoughts on the origins of Thanksgiving but it’s a point I made before in the depths of the Internet and I don’t know that I’m up to re-doing the research to make it coherent again.

<3

Being thankful that I have family that I miss, as opposed to family I actively avoid/dread seeing.
Called big sister in GA, where the whole family is gathered, to wish her older son a happy birthday-- his 4th-- and say hi to everyone. The nephew has been made the cake he wanted, which is in the shape of a destroyer sailing on the ocean, complete with a radar tower made of marshmallows, and licorice rigging.
The noise was absolute bedlam. Three large dogs, two little boys, three full-grown sisters-of-mine (we're impressive in full cry), our mother, our father, and two husbands-- older sister's and baby sister's. It was just a house full of sound and excitement. And I was sad not to be there.
But I'm about to go hang out with the family of Z, over at his aunt's house, and that's not so bad at all. Gonna drink half a beer before I go, though, just to get a little head-start and make my knee feel better. I'm wearing a knee brace today; a tripping mishap at derby practice on Tuesday did something to that lower patellar tendon on my right leg, which has been bothering me and now is really angry with me. (The knee's not swollen, I can bend it right double and sit on it, but extending it hurts. It's absolutely the tendon. Well, at least it's not the meniscus.)

And I'm wearing a cute dress so that's something too. Mm this is good beer.