So the beginning of the holiday season is upon us. It's a wonderful time of the year, you get to eat until you can't breathe, you get to see family you haven't seen since last year and it's the time of year that everyone is just generally nicer to each other. But, if you're like me, getting to see that family you haven't seen all year tends to cause a couple of problems. You're usually hit with questions like "Why don't you have a boyfriend yet?"; "So how's school going?"; "What are your grades like?"; and the ever so lovely "What are you doing with your life?" that sends you spiraling into an existential crisis. So here are some of the family members you run into on the holidays that are asking these horrible questions.
1. Your Drunk Aunt
Your aunt that you see once a year who had way too many glasses of wine with the Thanksgiving Turkey. It starts off pretty funny but usually ends in a giant family argument.
2. Your Perverted "Uncle"
The guy who has been a part of your family ever since you were a kid but isn't actually a part of your family. He hasn't looked at you the same since puberty and hugs you a little too tightly.
3. Your mother, who says she doesn't need any help but when company leaves there's a total meltdown
You spend most of the morning and early afternoon asking her if she needs any help cooking or setting up before the family gets there, she says no. So you go do your own thing - mentally preparing before family arrives. Later in the evening when everyone has finished eating and the dishes are stacked to the ceiling, you ask if you can help out and she declines again. After the family leaves, you get the speech about how you're lazy and ungrateful and how you never do anything to help out around the house - even though you practically begged her to let you help her out all day.
4. The overly religious Grandmother
We all love our grandmothers but when you have that beautiful buffet of delicious food sitting directly in front of you... and you can't touch that food until your gran says grace - you begin to doubt your faith in God because if he was real and if he was listening... you would have begun eating fifteen minutes ago. Instead, you're sitting there listening to your grandmother bless the corn, the turkey, the exhaust fan in the kitchen, the women who does her nails, the man who built her home, and every single person she has ever met in her 85 years of life.
5. The cousin who raids your medicine cabinet and steals all your loose change
This one is pretty self-explanatory. This is the cousin that your mother invites to be polite and prays doesn't show up because her prescription Xanax is going to go missing and so is her jar of coins on her nightstand. The family ignores that this cousin has a problem.
6. The cousin you apparently spent your entire childhood with but have no recollection of
The cousin who is around your age who insists that you spent all the time you possibly could together as kids. They tell stories about all the cool things you two did together and how much fun you had; they sound like it might have been you... yet you have no recollection of this person whatsoever. How do you completely forget about the existence of someone you apparently spent so much time with?
7. The snarky aunt who low-key insults you the entire night
The one who implies that there must be something wrong with you because you're in your late teens / early twenties and have no idea what you're doing with your life or who you'll spend it with. Because "back in her day" everyone was married at eighteen and had a house and kids by nineteen. Unfortunately, it's not 1960 and we've come a long way. Men don't objectify women (as much) as they did back then so we aren't forced to settle down with the first guy we're with. You learn to just tune this aunt out... but she definitely gets frustrating at times.
Once again, the holidays are a beautiful time of year. No matter what religion you are, it's always great to get together with family and make great memories with the people you love, but with big families comes big drama and it's never a good night until drunk Aunt Carol is arguing with snarky Aunt Karen. The holidays are a great time to bond with people you don't get to see all year, and promise these people who you'll keep in contact this year knowing damn well you don't even know what state they live in. It gets rough trying to deal with all the family drama but just rough it out - it's only for a few days a year.
Be nice, be safe, and have a great holiday season!
