Does everyone think she’s crazy?

When I moved I called up a 3rd cousin to help me with the unpacking. We live in the same area and hadn’t hung out. Well I think she’s also about 7 yrs younger, but she was one of the cousins I hung out with at the awkward family get togethers.

When I was young we didn’t go to those things often. And when we did it seemed my grand parents rarely went so I really didn’t know anyone. By the time I was 13, when we started going with some regularity, I was too young for the older kids and adults and the perfect age for supervising the younger kids. That was fine by me, there was always tension, and this gave me an excuse to be excused to go play. I always had the feeling my sister and I weren’t really liked. It was in the way adults, who in my experience would try to make conversation with bright kids (such as my sister and myself), would stare at me silently as I grasped for a way to keep a conversation going. I tried to make the effort because I knew there was bad blood there somewhere.

According to my mom, the brothers and sisters had some issues (her dad and all the great Aunts and Uncles). Apparently grandpa had gone through two farms and the rest had been good stewards. But there was other stuff to. Her parents weren’t really fond of us either; they preferred their “boy” grand children (all 5) produced by her brother, but (to be fair) they weren’t terribly fond of my mother either. I’ll probably never be sure why. All I know is my mom got her collar bone broken for laying her horses bridal on the deep freeze when she was growing up, my father was told “no one else wants her” as a response to getting permission to marry her, and there were lots of angry letters, in my grandmothers impossible handwriting, buried in my moms glove drawer.

Now that we are older my sister and I have tried to explain, to our mother, how uncomfortable these get togethers make us feel. Fighting the fact that these are mandatory. Now that we are old enough to speak with the adults, we still have nothing in common and still know (like you are supposed to know relatives) hardly anyone. So it was nice to call a distant cousin over to hang out and help unpack. We did a little work and began to drink. It had been a high stress and shitty day for me (what with the move and the movers wrecking the gate) and the drinks went down smooth. I began to get tipsy sitting on the ottoman with my cousin chatting. When we started talking about the family. It was a new experience for me. Having someone to talk about them with. Some of the relationships (which great Aunt was connected to which 3rd cousin) she had to help me out with. But she talked about everyone. So it really shouldn’t have surprised me then when she said “So&so is such a gossip so I had to hear you were engaged from your own mouth. You know I told my mom that she really shouldn’t just take what they say at face value. I keep telling her to get to know your mom for herself”.

The words stunned me, the next day as I sobered up. I called my sister, “So what’s up with that? I had no idea they talked about momma? I mean it just never occurred to me.” Her tone let me know I was still a little naive adolescent and I suddenly felt really protective and sorry for my mom. “I thought it was just us. Does everyone think she’s crazy?”