The Annual Family Reunion Picnic

It was the annual Drysdale Family Picnic this past weekend. Which explains why I haven't been able to post a report - or do much of anything else other than lay on the couch with my belt undone ever since.

Too much potato salad. And baked beans. And the biggest corn on the cob I've ever seen. Meatballs, sausage in saurkraut, devilled eggs (I've always said, you just can't have a picnic or a party without devilled eggs,) coleslaw, ham, chicken wings and about five different variations on potato salad. And if that wasn't enough, someone also brought a couple of buckets of Kentucky Fried Chicken. Afterwards there was a dessert selection which included about 10 different pies. As usual, I was too stuffed by then. It was like a Dagwood Bumstead wet dream.

This year, my contribution was my own version of a Greek Salad. What I do is, I get one of those boxes of 'Cold Pasta Salad' put out by the same people who make Kraft Dinner. I make it up, add hard-boiled eggs and then combine it with two different kinds of Greek salad from the deli-department of Loblaws. And pass it off as my own.

What I also brought this year was the photo at the top of the this post. Everyone was asked to bring a baby-picture of themselves and when they were all up on a bulletin board, whoever correctly guessed the most true identities would win a prize.

I didn't bother with the game part. All babies look the same. Except me of course. Take a close look at that photo. C'est moi. No baby had such beautiful naturally curly hair as I did.

I've looked the same since I was about 11 months old. Family legend has it that I was born with a full set of teeth. My parents didn't bother with breast-feeding or a bottle. Just handed me a cob of corn and I've been knawing on them ever since.

So the food was good. And even though it piss-poured rain the entire day and we had to stay inside, that was fine. My kin can be a bit goofy when they become a mob, but they have the sense to know that potato-sack races and the three-legged race aren't good ideas in the rain. No matter how many times the jug gets passed around.

Despite the rain, the turnout was good. But I've noticed a trend in the past two or three years. It's mostly the older generation who shows up.

Back when these family reunions started, oh, nigh on 10 year ago, I was able to bribe my girls into going. Once. They were teenagers though, and that was the end of that. The Gnut always came because he was a kid and didn't know any better. Plus my cousin who hosts it every year has a pool. But now the boy is older and has missed the last two reunions. Interestingly enough, ever since officially becoming a teenager.

I try to talk them into coming but they won't. They use the same arguement I did at their age. "I don't want to go. It's boring."

When they get to the part about "I don't know any of those people - why should I go?" I tell them about my youngest sister. She died about twenty years ago at the age of 24 from the cancer. It was one of the first funerals I had ever been to. Certainly the first for anyone in my immediate family. And that day, I was just amazed at all the relatives who showed up. They were ALL there. And of course, until that day, I hadn't seen any of them in years. Not since the last family reunion I had gone to - not long after I had become a teenager.

So every year, just as a formality, I ask my kids if they want to come. When they use the I-don't-know-any-of-those-people excuse, I remember the turn-out for my little sister and remind them -

"It's because they are your FAMILY. They have the same DNA in them as you do. They are your BLOOD. If you were to die tomorrow, everyone at that family reunion would show up for your funeral.

To which they say, "What do I care? I'll be dead."

Hard to argue with that kind of logic. Kids today. What can you do? Shit, every year, I go. If only for the hope of some free KFC.