Hosting

If it were me and I had family coming into town for a visit for the holidays, especially for Christmas, and that family happened to have two young kids who want to have a magical Christmas with Santa, family and gifts... If I was the one hosting, knowing that the family spent a lot of money for plane tickets to see me, and that traveling with two young kids is always very challenging... If it were my family members going through all that trouble to visit me...

... Well simply put, I'd try to do everything I could to help make the trip easier for them. Knowing that they have a lot to carry through the airport... two car seats, luggage AND two wiggly, hopefully cheerful, but most likely not, children... let alone Christmas presents... and acknowledging that they would have to pay for shipping of Christmas presents ordered online regardless... and that they are arriving on Christmas Eve and probably won't have time to arrange for the getting anything done in town... I would totally expect them to ship the presents to my house. I may not know when I would get around to wrapping them, but I would do it even if it meant requesting that they send the presents soon so that I could be sure I'd have plenty of time to wrap them. It would make things easier for my visiters. There is nothing much I could do to ease their load for their return trip home, but I would not see any point in them needing to drag all the gifts through the airport in BOTH directions.

But that's just me. Just saying.

Christmas is all about the... treats?

I realize that this blog has become a place where I vent about my mother and my sister. This post is no exception, though in my defense it fascinates me to see how my sister is developing her own "family" and the decisions she makes along the way.

Christmas has always been my sister's favorite time of the year (something we both have in common). She loves the decorations, the warm apple cider, the presents, the lights, the baking... She loves it all. In fact, she has a dozen versions of the song "It's the most wonderful time of the year." I kid you not.

So it comes as a surprise to me that this year she has decided to NOT celebrate Christmas. In fact, she said she'll only join us if it's convenient. Instead, she is going to celebrate Hanukkah because her boyfriend is Jewish.

I think it's great that he's Jewish. I always assumed it would be a wonderful opportunity for them to expose their children to different holidays and traditions. But instead of doing that, my sister is giving up her beloved Christmas. It's not even like he's insisting. I don't think he really cares.

But when she told me, she came across as having a rebelous teenage attitude about it. Almost like she was saying "Look what I'm doing and there is nothing you can say about it! So neener neener." I know plenty of teenagers who use the word Neener. lol.

We all change for the people we want to be with, but how much have you changed? Would you give up your favorite holiday season for the one you loved? Would you do it even if he didn't care much one way or the other?

Divorce... who knew?

I realize that divorce has suddenly become a very common theme to my posts here. I guess it goes to show how much I don't understand it.

The latest is that my sister's boyfriend's ex (did you get that connection?) has decided to move back to Pittsburgh to be closer to her family. It's a reasonable decision on her part but it sucks for everyone else involved. I believe she wants to take the kids with her which leaves my sister's boyfriend to decide if he's going to stay in Colorado or follow suit. There are so many aspects of divorce (when kids are involved) that I never ever thought about before.

What would you do? Would you follow your ex so that you can stay close to your children? And my sister? What would you do if you were her? It's not an easy choice and I'm sure I'll be posting about how he chooses to handle it.

Naive Reffin?

During my heated conversation with my mom, she made a comment about how maybe it's lack of experience on my part, more experience on her part, her being older and wiser, or simply more jaded... call it what you will... but you come to a point in your life where you realize that sometimes you can't "just play nice" and expect things to turn out for you. Her pending divorce (call it what you will) has turned out to be a full-out game where neither player (my mom nor her husband) are playing nice.

Is that the way it is? When I get older, will I be jaded like her out of pure necessity? That's just what happens as people age? They grow less and less naive that the Golden Rule really works? I hope not. But who I am to tell? I obviously don't have the same experiences that my mom has under her belt.

Way to go, Reffin?

I recently offended my mother by accident. I wish it was possible to say something, one might call it "positive criticism" but it's not even that, without my family reading more into it than I intend. I don't know if it's the way I say it or if it's just my family needing drama all the time, but I wish it were different.

Anyway, I insulted my mother without intending to. Without going into details, I ended up talking to her about it the next day. As I feared, she had taken my simple statement as a huge judgement. And of course, this led to an intense conversation that opened up Pandora's box.

What was different about this conversation, however, was that I REALLY feel like I was able to not only clean up the mess, but I was able to do so AND still stand my ground. This might be a first for Reffin and it's almost unheard of when people confront my mother. I think I was actually able to explain that there is a difference between an "opinion" and a "judgement" so Go Reffin!

The thing that makes me feel great about it though (as great as I can for having such a heated conversation with my mom during a particularly vulnerable point in her life) was that I think it was the best I've ever REALLY stood up for my husband. Not that he has needed a lot of defending in the past, but usually I take the stance of "Just keep your mouth shut and this will all be over soon."

So... Go me?!

Ugly People

You always hear that divorce often brings out the worst in people. Strangely, even though I'm no stranger to divorce (my mom went through quite a few while I was younger), I had never actually witnessed it until now.

Without going into details, I see how my mom is acting during her current divorce and I've never seen her more ugly.

I'm sure it's one of those things I just can't fully understand unless it happens to me, but I REALLY REALLY feel like ***IF*** Michael and I were to divorce, we'd treat each other with so much more respect.

I'd like to think that if that were to ever happen to me, I would avoid becoming a person I have little respect for. I hope to never be so ugly.

What might have been III

Well it looks like I get to find out...

He's back in the picture. I won't go into too many details, but my mom has decided she can't work things out with her husband and is filing for divorce. Meanwhile, she and her ex have gotten back together. I'm going to pass on going into any details on the negatives of the stories... whether or not I approve... whether or not I think she's doing the right thing... things like that. Instead, let's just focus on the happy stuff, because let's face it... I haven't been able to decide how I feel about the entire situation, so what would make me think I could decide now?

Anyway... they're back together. I have said in the past that I thought he'd make a better grandpa than my mom's current husband, and now I'm faced with that being a real possibility. So... as the responsible mother that I am, I have two questions.

1. What, if anything, do I tell Ellie about Grandpa no longer being in the picture?

Do I explain to her that he is no longer around? Do I just wait until she asks and then what? Or do I just assume he'd slowly fade away from her memory?

2. What about Grandpa being replaced by this other guy? How do I introduce him to her?

They've met before and we called him "Gramma's friend, Cary" but if I'm completely honest with myself, ideally they would call him something cute like Papa, Papap, Gramps or Grampster (ha!). Would that be applying too much pressure on the relationship between him and my mom?

Seriously... it's hard for me to hold back and not jump to the assumption that things are going to be great with him in our lives. It's something I've always wanted even if I didn't know how to work it with all the other details.

So.... uh huh.