This year I decided to go to my parents house for Christmas. With the birth of my daughter I figured it would be an awesome way for them to meet her and her father for the first time. I was pretty stoked about it. I hadn’t seen them for 2 years ever since I left Milwaukee, Wisconsin to come to Oregon. “How was it?” You ask with good Christmas cheer…. “BAH! HUMBUG!” I reply with utter disdain. It was incredibly awkward. And that’s putting it mildly. Let me of course start at the beginning.
We arrived after two plane flights in the cold frigid city of Milwaukee at roughly 11pm. My family was waiting for us at the terminal and consisted of my mother, father and 14 year old sister. We hugged clearly happy to see each other and I introduced them to Dustin and Amelia. So far pretty straight forward. They had taken two cars to get us so that we’d have room enough for 2 large suitcases and a stroller. Dustin, Amelia and I also ended up being split between the cars. Dustin with my Dad, me and Amelia with my mother and sister. We all made it way out to their house in Racine, unloaded the car and proceeded to settle in for the night.
It was 12am central time. But being from Oregon we were still 2 hours behind and still wide awake. After we got Amelia settled I asked my mother for the password to her wireless network so I could hop online, check my email and get some entertainment while Dustin and I were up. My mothers response was that it was a secure network and we could wait til the morning to check our email. I wasn’t quite sure what the point of telling us it was a secure network was all about. Plus it was way that she said it that bothered me the most. It was spoken in a condescending sort of tone. What could we have possibly done to her “secure network” that would compromise it? This would be the first of many infuriating situations. We ended up just going to bed.
The next day was the official hang out with the family time. I had mentioned going to Candy Cane Lane which is an awesome set of about 5 streets that get together and put up amazing Christmas displays. It’s all done for charity so you can donate or not, your choice. I thought it would be a nice way for the family to do something together and also show Dustin a little of Milwaukee. My suggestion was greeted with groans and ho hums. No one wanted to leave the sanctuary of their home. I was disappointed but not deterred. I had some time set up with my friend Swampy to hang out with him. So he came by and we were able to get out of the house for a bit. He took us to George Webbs and I got to introduce Dustin to their good cheap food. Swampy was also nice enough to let us stop at the store to pick up the last Christmas gift I had for my family, a Wii. After that we took a tour of the city, ran by the lake front and explored the super rich houses around it.
We came back after being out for several hours and we were feeling pretty good. It was a productive day. Then dinner came around. My mother was cool enough to have some ham, potatoes and vegetables ready for us and set up on the dining room table. Now how Dustin and I usually do dinner situations is one of us eats first while the other hangs with Amelia. Then we switch. I went first this time. As I got into the dining room I notice that there are only 2 plates set. Everyone else has disappeared. This is our first official day here and my family couldn’t even be bothered to have dinner with us. I was hurt. Dustin came in and wondered where everyone had run off to just as my Dad came up from his den in the basement. He asked us why we were sitting in the dark eating dinner. It was how it had been left for us and granted wasn’t completely dark we had a decent lighting from the attached kitchen and I hadn’t thought much of turning on a light. I was more upset about eating alone. So I piped up to my Dad, “Apparently, no one wants to eat with us.” My Dad kindly explained that this is how it always is, Jackie disappears upstairs to watch her favorite tv show and my mother wanted to watch the news.
Ok fine, I get that people have routines. But I don’t think it would have killed them to have dinner with us on the first day. When you have people staying with you, you should give certain considerations to them as well as your own routines. Clearly you aren’t going to be able to do everything the same as you had before. So why not be a friggen family and eat dinner together. BAH!!
So after dinner we twiddled our thumbs and wondered what to do. I decided to go up to my sisters room and see if she wanted to play any games with us. Her response, “No, I can’t. I have to do dishes.” So of course I inquire as to what about afterwards? “Um, I have to check my email. We’ll do something tomorrow.” …Seriously? I haven’t been home in 2 years and you suddenly don’t have time to do anything? Dishes and checking your email is more important? Alright, I’ll take that we’ll do something tomorrow and leave it at that. I was disappointed again. So Dustin, Amelia and I ended up in our room on the internet and playing with stuffed toys. Ah yes, we had gotten permission to use the internet in the morning. Suddenly it was no longer an issue…thank goodness. I don’t know what we would have done without the sweet delicious web.
Day 3. We were stuck in the house ALL day. We couldn’t use my parents cars. So we desperately sort interaction of some kind. To no avail. Finally after failing to find anyone of my friends that could hang out with us, we went downstairs to see what the family was up to. After watching them disappear again in the morning I didn’t have much hope, but I was wrong. My mother and sister were playing a British card game called Black Jack. It’s kinda like Uno but with regular playing cards. So I sat down and joined in. It was pretty fun, Jackie was picking it up fairly quickly but she kept throwing out random phrases that I could only assume came from the tv show she loved to watch. “Ya’ll be breezy!” She’d said. Mum and I were both like.. “what?” So she’d repeat it again. I could only respond with what my generation would probably have translated that into, “You be cool too!” I think Samuel L. Jackson would have been proud though slightly disappointed with the lack of explicit language at the end.
We continued to play with my mother kicking our asses most of the time. But it was pretty fun. Dustin had disappeared downstairs to the den with my Dad and I believe they had a good time too. So Wednesday wasn’t a complete waste. Afterward Dustin, Amelia and I went downstairs to watch the Dark Knight with my Dad. He thought it was pretty good. And so we put in his bootlegged copy of Star Trek. Around this time I noticed Dustin’s wide eyed expression. The walls, you see, were closing in on him. The movie helped a bit but as all bootlegs are want to do, this one had it’s flaws. It was almost like we were in the Lost show. We would be at a particularly crucial part of the movie and then a static bar would flick across the screen causing the dvd to skip right over the whole rather important story part. This happened from half way into the movie all the way to the very end. It was pretty frustrating to people who’ve seen the movie and know which big pieces were missing. And all the while an excited Dustin would yell, “Oh my gooses! We should just go out and get the real movie right now so you can see what your missing.” Clearly a plea to get out of the house. But it was a fruitless effort, my father was content with his bootleg and would get the movie later. We had at least successfully killed a good 5 hours though.
To wrap up this day that seemed to drag on forever we decided to bundle Amelia up and go for a walk around the neighborhood. Snow was lightly falling and it was chilly, but overall it was a decent night. So I figured I’d ask my sister if she wanted to tag along with us. No and No. Pissed off was I. But we went anyway, even if my family didn’t want to see Candy Cane Lane, we could at least see some of the decorations around the surrounding streets. Upon our journey we realized just how far away we were from anything. It was all suburban houses with a lonely gas station on the main street. Oh joy. Nothing really in walking distance. We did get to see some pretty lights though. And the fresh air was nice. Eventually though we had to make our way back to the house. Our evening ended with internet again.
So thrilling yes?! Yeah exactly. The next couple of days are bitter sweet. They had their ups and downs, but I’m going to leave that for a later post. For tonight I have just gotten home from our grand vacation and I need to get some sleep for work tomorrow. See you guys tomorrow where hopefully I can wrap up this exciting adventure.
