48 Hours of Purgatory

Those of you that have good relationships with your parents, I applaud you. I hope that when I am older, my children will have some respect for me and a nice, healthy relationship. Unfortunately, I do not have that relationship with my parents. Short of laying on a couch for many days to analyze the issues, let's just say that there is a serious lack of respect on my part toward my parents, and consequently, I try to limit my time with them to the extent that I can while making sure that my children get to know them and have some sort of relationship with them.

My 48 hours started with a trip to Somerset Mall on Wednesday with my teenage daughters to meet my parents for some shopping and bonding. As explained above, the bonding thing was not going to be any fun and I hate malls. The upside was going to be some time with my girls and that can be fun most of the time. My parents are 80 years old and do not move quite as quickly as they used to, so it was going to be a sloooow trip around the mall. We made it to lunch and then split up to go our separate ways. They were going to spend the next two nights at my house, so no problem having some time away.

Everybody made it back to the house by late afternoon for some real close time. The preparations for Thanksgiving Day provided a fair amount of diversion to keep everyone from going off the deep end. There were no real battles. The only problem was a trend that continued through the next day and a half of my mother following my wife around like a puppy dog. Unfortunately, a very judgemental and harsh puppy dog. Somehow my wife did not snap mentally or verbally.

Thanksgiving Day was actually pretty fun once the afternoon came around. My brother's family showed up mid afternoon with his boys (4 year old twins and a 6 year old) and they provided plenty of entertainment. By 6:30 all 22 of us sat down to a great feast and all got along. This includes my parents getting along with my in-laws whom they have told me they do not like at all in the past. After cleaning up and sitting down at the end of the night, my father said what a great time he had and what wonderful people my wifes' family were. Thank God I had my hip waders on, it was getting deep.

To my relief, they left this morning at 9am and there was no blood drawn. I don't think there were even any harsh words spoken. The mental stress on me was incredible!! I rode early yesterday morning and tried to do some attack intervals, I struggled mightily due to a lack of sleep the night before. The stress of my parents visiting was palpable. Looking forward to riding this afternoon. Hopefully I recover in time for Bloomer on Sunday.

Happy Holidays!