Over Christmas, I spent a lot of time at my momma’s new house in the mountains.
It’s so peaceful, and pretty. The frangipani trees are huge, the air is fresh and cooling, and the view is ridiculous. You can see all the way down to the coast and it never gets old. I spent a lot of time with my family, which isn’t something that happens often. We are spread far and wide, always busy, time goes too fast and there’s that whole business of keeping ourselves to ourselves that’s been a theme in the family, for better or worse, for the whole time I’ve been growing up. I guess that sort of happens when everyone lives so far apart, we get together sporadically when we can, but we are ok with that. We’re all pretty headstrong, independent people, but the dynamics swing back to old rhythms pretty quickly when we are together again.
The pictures I took are lies, all lies. We look relaxed, happy and quiet. In all honesty, we were sort of frazzled, awfully happy and not the least bit quiet at all. Everyone says it is true of their own families that they’re crazy, and loud and nobody understands their humour but them… and that’s the way it goes with us too. It is ridiculously loud. There are seventeen conversations, all with different people, all going on at once. It is uproariously hilarious. Fun gets poked, drinks get drunk, jokes get made, and babies are kissed. Mostly by me.
This is my Aunty Mim. “You better put me on your blog while I’m here, or I’ll punch you,” she says.
Lulz.
It’s nice for my kiddies to see their family and get to know them. For all our space and apartness and stubborn strong-headedness, we do being there for each other pretty well. Plus my kids are really cute and who wouldn’t want to blow bubbles for them fourteen hours a day, or dance Gangnam Style repeatedly, and have tea parties and watch cartoons?
I am not biased in the slightest.
It is wild and crazy and I left every day with a headache, but it made me feel good. It’s holidays, it’s relaxed, its a sneaky glass of wine at lunch, it’s several pairs of hands to hold the baby and someone always knows where the toddler is. It’s people telling stories of when you were little, getting to know the people you love’s people they love, and laughing until you squeak and go several shades of beetroot.
It’s also really, really quiet now.
