Sexuality Happens

I’m not a very spontaneous person, but last Wednesday, I did a very spontaneous thing. I book last minute stand by flights to and from New York so I could go home with Q for Christmas.

I’m Jewish. Christmas has never been a big deal to my family. Perhaps brunch at a nice hotel, or going to see an opening day movie. But then again, holidays have never really been a big deal period.  Latkes for channukah with me, my sister, my mother, and when he was alive, my father.  When I had my bat mitzvah, my uncle, aunt and two of my three cousins attended from Israel, as well as my grandfather and aunt from Florida. My sister’s bat mitvah was the same deal, although a different two cousins.  Right now, my entire family in the world is ten people; my grandfather in FL, my aunt and her partner in Fl, my uncle, aunt and three cousins in Israel, and my mother and sister in CO.  That’s it.

So coming home with Q was…interesting…to say the least. On her father’s side alone, there are 12 or 13 cousins.  Three aunts, three uncles. Grandparents. Great aunts. Grandmother in laws (what?). Dogs. Birds. Etc. We flew in and went straight to her dad’s side’s Christmas Eve dinner. There were at least 25 people at this dinner. Overwhelming to say the least…at to that they are an incredibly enmeshed Italian family on Long Island, and yeah.  A bit crazy.

Christmas day was on her mother’s side.  It was just us two, her sister, her mother, and her two aunts. Plus a visit to Nana after. Much more manageable, but still hard.  Q and two of her cousins are the only three people FROM EITHER SIDE who do not live in New York, or New Jersey. The only ones. Everyone knows everyone’s business (her great aunt on her dad’s side told me she “knew” who I was, because she’d seen me on Q’s facebook!), everyone is giving guilt trips, and mentioning events and people for which I’m completely out of the loop, and poor Q feels overwhelmed, and guilty for not coming home more often, and I feel just…so out of place. People I’ve never met are kissing me on the cheek, I’m making up back stories for what my degree is in, and we’re playing the “do they REALLY understand what it means that we’re partners” game.  Oh yes, add to all this the fact I’m a strict vegetarian (as in no chicken broth in my mashed potatoes, none the less eating little shrimps), and they had less than 24 hours of notice that I was coming.

I’m typing this on the plane on the way home (I actually was supposed to fly out Saturday night. It’s now Monday afternoon).  Everyone has been offering me Zanax (xanax?) all weekend. For anxiety, for family issues, for the high pain problems I’ve been having. Perhaps I should have taken them up on the offer. I am so glad I came – her family IS very nice (some of them actually gave me presents!) and I am in love with her Nana. What a wonderful woman.  It was good to meet all of her family, and I have a better understanding of some of her quirks now.

But I couldn’t do this on any regular basis. I’m exhausted. Q broke down in tears this morning (very rare) because she felt like she was disappointing them by not being home more often, and because she was having Catholic (oh yes, I forgot to mention that part) guilt thrown at her by all sides. I’m so glad they didn’t hate me, or so I think…but I can’t imagine doing this all the time. Q’s sister  lives 20 minutes from everyone, and I see the poor thing being pulled in so many directions, trying to please everyone. It breaks my heart.

I look forward to seeing them again in March, and Christmas next year.  But for once in my life, I’m glad to have a small family that doesn’t put a ton of importance on the holidays.  I’ve been able to get through life so far without popping Xanax and I attribute my distance from and the small size of my family for this.

Give me a day or two, and I’m sure I’ll bounce right back. Let me just say that I have a new level of respect for people in huge families, especially when they live close by.

-Essin’ Em