Family Quality Time = Emotional Anguish

By Roode

Let’s face it; no one wants to be with their family for the holidays. Anyone who says differently is a fucking liar. Each year many of us ruin a perfectly good Christmas by spending it with people we voluntarily severed ties with. Somehow, the rules change for the holidays. We have to be all nice and social and shit.

This is especially true during Christmas. Somewhere along the line Charles Dickens brain washed society into believing Christmas is a time for forgiveness and family. Well, I don’t forgive and family is the reason why I wake up crying at night.

Dear Charles Dickens: Fuck you.

There is no way I can avoid this train wreck. My wife is very traditional and... well, normal. She had a normal childhood with normal relatives. Her family seems to … um… do that love thing. She has two sisters, bringing the total to three girls in her immediate family. I don’t know what that was like to grow up with. I imagine it had something to do with holding hands, singing Kumbaya, and pillow fights in their underwear. Sorry. That sort of shit is in my head all the time. I mean all of them are smoking hot. Let a guy dream. Hold on. Now I have the most amazing picture in my head. Give me a minute.

Do NOT ruin this fantasy for me!

I, on the other hand, grew up with two brothers. Three boys in one family spells clusterfuck. I’m the middle child, and therefore, the most awesome. Where there may have been tickle fights among the sexy sisters in my wife’s family, there were fist fights and constant emotional pain for us. Our childhood years were devoted to seeing how many swirlies we could give each other before one of us snapped. For the record, it’s eight.

There has always been a certain amount of animosity between me and my older brother, "Greg." By animosity, I mean outright shit-tastic rage. Greg is a holier-than-thou fucker that lives to point out when I fuck up. Hey, asshole, I don’t need that. I’m married. That shit happens by default.

My little brother, "Gene", is almost as awesome as I am. Being the youngest, he doesn’t feel the need to live up to anyone’s standards. It’s completely OK if he wakes up in a dumpster smelling of cheap vodka and Chanel. It’s Gene! He so crazy!

How I hate him.

The wife makes me go home for a lot of the holidays. I guess it’s alright to a certain extent. Her family is nauseatingly affectionate. They’re so polite and sweet to each other. That shit makes me sick. There’s so much nice floating around, I usually have to step out for some air. Where’s the fucking animosity? How are you supposed to unwrap gifts without throwing a bowling ball at someone? This is just insanity.

The tree usually caught fire at some point, too.

We’re from lower/central Alberta. It’s a good twelve hour ride o’ hell from where we live in Montana. That gives me plenty of time to plan for the circus of horrors. At any given time it’s 5 degrees, but the rage Greg and I emit raises the temperature to a balmy 10. My loving and oh so naive wife gives me a pep talk every year. I don’t have the heart to tell her that it does nothing. The only thing that would truly help is a bottle of Windsor and a shit ton of explosives.

Just add alcohol.

So, why do we subject ourselves to this bullshit? Tradition? Sentiment? The possibility of putting my Yule log in my wife’s fireplace? Yeah, it’s that last one. Like you're above bartering for sex. Married sex is a game of Risk for the husband. You’re constantly attempting to figure out the other's next move. For the wife, it’s more like a game of hitting a bunch of bottles at the fair, except instead of a little shit BB gun, she has a friggin rocket launcher. Husbands just aren’t hard to get. I’m proud of that shit.

Something about this doesn't seem fair.

Everyone has some issues. Some have enough issues to fill a fucking newspaper stand in Times Square. There are a metric shit-ton of dysfunctional families out there. Even the most functional suffer a core meltdown during the holidays.

In some families it’s sibling rivalry. In others, it’s the cold hard truth that your dad always wanted a boy. There are always those precious few that have an “uncle” no one talks about. Be it Uncle Joe and his disturbing obsession with women’s underwear or Uncle Sheamus who spent the better part of the 80’s building bombs for the IRA using alarm clock parts and road flares.

Yeah... One of Sheamus ' "novelty" alarm clocks.

So, again, why do we do this to ourselves? We all have our reasons. I already told you mine (married sex). Some of you have forgotten what hellish treats the homestead has in store and need a refresher. Either way, we’re all idiots.

After surviving the arctic tundra that is southern Alberta, well pulled into my parents’ driveway. My parents love my wife. She’s the daughter they never had; which is sort of disturbing, because that would mean we’re in an incestuous relationship. That shit may happen in Manitoba, but not here, Bub. Don't believe me? This article (about inbred sparrows) says it all!

OK, I just ASSUME there's a lot of inbreeding in Manitoba. Have you ever been to Winnipeg?

My record for the shortest amount of time between arrival and being fuck-shit pissed beyond belief is one hour. Sorry, it WAS one hour. Within thirty minutes the rage fuse was lit; middle son fighting oldest son while the youngest son eggs them on and takes bets. The mother begging them to get along and the father pouring himself another highball… that’s Christmas mother fucker!

Above: Means of escape.

I won’t bore you with the bullshit details. Let’s just say that someone assaulted someone else with a wreath and that someone else returned fire with a life sized baby Jesus.

As if I need another reason to go to Hell.

After a fifteen minute bourbon break, we resumed the thirty year war. Efforts to barter for peace were futile. My nephew asked if I was “Going to kill daddy?” Being the great uncle I am, I told him “Yes.”

Yeah, I hear you judgmental pricks. “But, Roode, assaulting your brother with the baby Jesus isn’t the grown up thing to do.” Shut the fuck up! In familial situations like this, there are only three options.

1. Keep drinking Cisco until your liver literally punches a hole through your abdomen and leaves.

2. Lock yourself in the bathroom and assume the fetal position.

3. Assault your brother with a plastic baby Jesus.

At the time, number 3 (with a healthy dose of number 1) was the most logical choice.

+

= SOLUTION

Somehow, we made it through Christmas without sending someone to the hospital... again. No, I don't hate Greg. I have been programmed to love my brother. I wasn't programmed to like the son-of-a-bitch. I wouldn't want to see him killed. That is, unless, it was by my hand.

Tough love.

After the goodbyes were said, my wife begged me to be the "bigger man" and let the ceaseless war drop until next year. So I did. To her knowledge, anyway. I may or may not have shampooed his car's carpet with spoiled eggnog before we left. Suck on that fucker!

I don't know if a full and real truce will ever be reached. At the moment, we're more like Israel and Palestine; with a lot less ethnic cleansing and a lot more alcohol. I guess that would make my parents' house the Gaza Strip.

Somewhere, in there, my dad is pouring himself another highball.

Sincerely,

Roode