Relatives Roulette: Skipping your holiday meal doesn’t mean they don’t love you…probably

It’s the beginning of the holiday season. Soon, it will be chaos on the loose, tangled tinsel, and sanity on vacation. It is what it is, and what it is, is a festive frenzy.

One of the culprits behind the chaos is when our kids face the annual challenge of figuring out whose house to visit for the holiday meals. Who will be disappointed? Step right up and play Relatives Roulette. Remember…skipping your holiday meal doesn’t mean they don’t love you…probably.

Back in the day

When I was a kid, the holidays seemed simpler. I knew I would have fun wherever we landed. We usually ended up at my maternal grandparents’ house, especially if my mom was between marriages. I’d spend the week between Christmas and New Years, which is my birthday, at my dad’s house. And when my mom married her fourth husband, who was one of 10 children, we added the various houses of his siblings to the mix.

I have distinct fond memories from all those family gatherings.

When we went to grandma’s for Christmas, for example, all the cousins would sleep in sleeping bags scattered around the living room. After my grandpa read “The Night Before Christmas,” we’d fall asleep to Bing Crosby singing softly on the ol’ record console, the glow and crackle of the fire, and the mesmerizing percolation of the bubble lights on the tree. My uncle would crash with us kids. We thought it was because he was one of us…just bigger. In hindsight, I realize it was his job to make sure Santa didn’t get outed.

Knowing him, he probably snuck a cookie or two from Santa’s plate. My grandpa didn’t care much for sweets anyway.

For any holiday meal eaten at my grandmother’s house, the whole family sat around a huge dining table that had clawed feet. All the adults stayed at the table long after the dessert plates had been cleared, just to talk and laugh. As a little kid, I might not have understood all the jokes and stories, but it didn’t matter. Being there and watching everyone enjoy the time together filled me with happiness and a sense that everything in the world was alright.

Even when it wasn’t alright back at our house.

On the holidays we spent with my stepdad’s family, the feelings were the same even though the scene was very different. We spent the first Thanksgiving after my mom and stepdad were married with his family. One of his sisters hosted it in her double-wide mobile home. Somehow, she managed to fit enough tables and chairs in that house for 30-40 family members to sit down. Every available space was filled. Looking back, it’s a wonder everyone wasn’t annoyed as hell with each other by the time we finished our pie.

Like at grandma’s, the rooms were filled with conversation, jokes and laughter. The big difference being that it all came from a big crowd. If you’ve never experienced it, eating Thanksgiving dinner with more than 30 relatives crammed into a small house is like trying to enjoy a serene picnic in a blender set to “turkey overload” – it’s as loud as a parade of drum-playing elephants, as crowded as a mall on Black Friday, and as endearing as a sitcom with too many lively characters vying for attention.

It was a blast!

We spent many holiday meals with my stepdad’s side of the family growing up, but that first one sticks in my mind and my heart. As overwhelming and foreign as it was for me, there was room for all, and no one went hungry (even though you had to be quick to get what you wanted before the dish disappeared).

Now that I’m old(er)

Now that I’m over 50, and my children are all grown and on their own, I’m usually not the one who has to figure out where I will be on any given holiday. My grandparents, my mom, my stepdad, and all but one of his siblings are dead now. My dad is in a nursing home. I typically prepare a meal at my house for both major holidays and those who can make it show up at whichever one works for them.

As lovely as it is to have any of them show up on a holiday, the day fails to fit the ideal I’ve created in my mind. It’s been more than nine years since all of the kids have been in the same room. And never have they all been together with all their spouses and our grandbaby — not for holidays, not for weddings and not even for funerals.

I hope that someday all my kids and their kids will return home for the holidays and gather in love and fellowship like a Walton family Christmas special. We will have family photos taken to document such a rare and momentous occasion. And for a few hours, all the pieces of my heart will be one.

Our family isn’t that wholesome, though. Instead, the event would probably resemble a Clark Griswold meltdown.

It’s complicated

I realize my kids are now in the position of having to figure out which side of the family they will see when holidays roll around. I am divorced from their father and we have both remarried. Many of my kids are now married and have in-laws to visit. And these days, it’s very popular to skip visiting family and gather with friends instead.

That’s a lot of people to please — people who, like me, just want to enjoy the kids’ company.

Complicating things more is that a couple of the kids live out-of-state, and traveling by air during the holidays is like trying to untangle a ball of Christmas lights while riding a roller coaster made of dollar bills – chaotic, expensive, and enough to make even Santa question his life choices.

There is no easy solution. In a perfect world, all my kids would spend one of the holidays together at our house and the other holiday with their spouses’ side of the family. And all the kids in those families would arrange to join them for that holiday. And so on and so on.

That way, all us parents would get to have all our kids together for at least one holiday a year.

But if you throw in divorced families, blended households and Friendsgivings, you snap out of the delusion. Everyone is just trying to make everyone happy without making themselves miserable.

As I used to tell my kids when I would dole out their Happy Meal toys on road trips, “You get what you get and you don’t throw a fit.”

At the core of that flippant saying is gratitude. Be grateful for what you get. And I am grateful for every minute of their time that my kids share with me.

The Holiday Hustle

In the land of tinsel and festive cheer, where relatives gather, both far and near. There’s a dance we all know, a familiar prance, It’s the holiday hustle, our annual trance.

Thanksgiving’s coming, the turkey will be carved, But the real challenge has just been starved. Aunts and uncles, cousins galore, Whose house to visit? Oh, what a chore!

The holiday hustle, a yearly game, like musical chairs, but not quite the same. “We went to your house last year,” we plea, “But the in-laws insist, we’re a package deal, you see.”

Grandma’s house or Uncle Joe’s, the decision-making tension steadily grows. MapQuest and GPS, we consult them all, to determine the place for our festive sprawl.

The in-laws’ stuffing or Aunt Sue’s pecan pie? Choosing sides can make strong men cry. “We love you all,” we say with a grin, But deep down inside, the competition blazes within.

The holiday hustle, a strategic dance, navigating relationships, giving everyone a chance. We RSVP to dinners, we juggle and we twirl, hopping from house to house, in this holiday swirl.

Santa’s watching, but so is Aunt Marge, Comparing the feasts, dish by dish, charge by charge. The eggnog’s spiked, the laughter’s loud, as we navigate this unruly holiday crowd.

So here’s to the holiday hustle, a comedic waltz, a dance of diplomacy, avoiding family faults. No matter where you end up, be it near or far, may your holidays be merry, wherever you are!