I’ve been thinking about family.
Years ago, I learned from a television sitcom the concept of the A grandparents and the B grandparents. A grandparents are fun. B grandparents, in comparison, are rather dull. A grandparents are young in spirit and enjoy activities with their grandchildren. B grandparents need their rest and adhere to a strict mealtime and bedtime schedule.
Over the years, I’ve found myself extrapolating the A and B grandparents concept to families in general. Grandparents are the source of their family, after all. As the grandparents go, so do their children, and grandchildren, and great grandchildren, ad infinitum.
In the last 5 weeks, I have visited each of my parents’ families. One visit was 7 days long; the other, 5 days. One was for a funeral; the other for a family reunion. Each visit offered an opportunity for relatives who live near to and far apart from each other to spend time together.
The two visits reminded me of how drastically different my parents’ families are from one another. (And I wondered for the umpteenth time how my parents—two very different people from two very different families—came together long enough to marry and produce 2 children.) In the A family, things that didn’t go off like clockwork, were criticized but later ridiculed with great mirth. In the B family, problems were grumbled about ad nauseum. In the A family, the gen-X and post-gen-X generations managed to lead the conservative Baby Boomers to relaxation and recreation. (Three generations [ages 5 to 60-odd] bowling late, late, late into the night? Heck yeah! Four generations [ages 3 to 60-something] spending a raucously fun, hot afternoon at a waterpark? Let’s do it again!) With the B family, an overnight hotel stay was a point of contention and discussion far longer than the stay itself. (Do many families still function under the traditional [read: antiquated] model of “the elders rule”? I just don’t see why leadership from the young ‘uns is considered an affront to the elders’ wisdom.)
Alas, it is what it is. Every family is its own special stew of traits and personalities, history and traditions. These two wacky and peculiar families have helped to make me the wonderful person that I am. And above all, I’m glad that mostly we all get along just fine.