Family Dinners

The following is intended to be a free-flow of thought.

Hold on to your butts.

When I think of family dinners, I think back to the times in my childhood when my mother, father, sister and I would gather around the television and eat the same food as each other at the same time as each other and watch the same show as each other. Or when we would actually eat at the "dinner table", sans TV and talk. That is, I think there was talking. I can't say that I remember contributing much to the conversations, but I am almost certain there were words of some kind.

As we all got older and evolved in one way or another as individuals, the family dinners became less and less frequent. Then the divorce, then my sister and I got jobs and before you knew it: everyone was in a different direction and we were all part of a memory of a family we used to know.

I actually liked it better when we were all doing our own thing; I was an incredibly private and constantly overwhelmed individual and as such, it just made for an easier time for me to be ignored / not a part of a greater party.

THEN. I started dating. Suddenly I was part of a greater party and once again finding myself at family dinners. At first it was terrifying / made me very anxious - there were people paying attention to me in that intense way again. And this time they were strangers. And even though I was older now, the strangers were older, too, and still felt like the position of authority (I didn't know any better back then). It just sucked me back to being younger, and not in a fuzzy, Perry Como, Christmas sort of way. I just felt uncomfortable. Then, once I got to know the "strangers" better (well... some of them, anyway) I began to relax and enjoy such things. I even got really excited to attend the significant other's family holiday gatherings. It was cool to pretend I had a large family that got along. Even if they only saw each other in the colder seasons (perhaps this was the secret?).

Now that I am older still and have completely adopted my own lifestyle and created my own principals and schedules to adhere to, my time has become precious. And I have become very certain about protecting it. Ergo, I am choosier about the people I spend time with and the activities in which I participate in. I still go to family dinners, but it's so much better. I don't go because of obligation, I go because I love and respect my partner. (These people are important to you? Okay, I'll come, no problem.) I have also learned to create my own family, and in doing so have lessened a great deal of stress that used to come with splitting holidays between my family's and the s/o's family's time. I am also just SO much more confident and comfortable in general, which naturally makes everything better.