In September, I spent a weekend with family in Huntley, Illinois.

My sisters and brother and I were heartily enjoying a delicious Mom-cooked feast on the three-season porch, the golden rays of evening sun and backyards greens visible in every direction. I don’t want to make this seem too idyllic or anything, but there were definitely butterflies humping around the yard, I’m sure of it.

With some hesitation, Mom announced, “Dad has a subject he wants to discuss.”

It’s not uncommon for Mom to queue up Dad in this way:  she’ll often announce Dad’s intention to discuss a topic with us. (It always feels like the dreaded parental ’sex talk’ is right around the corner, but all four of us kids are either almost-forty or over forty. I think it’s a little late for that chat.) But Dad is often equally surprised as us kids and he will turn his big startled eyes turns to her and croak, “I do? I have a topic?”

But this September evening he was ready for her softball.

Dad looked at us over his glasses. “We think one of you is stealing our silverware.”

Matt and I looked at each other. Eileen and I looked at each other. Andrea and I shared a surprised glance.

“We think it’s an inside job.” he insinuated. “Which means its one of you.”

“It’s probably Eileen.” I suggested. “She has the most opportunity.”

“Oh right.” she complained. “What motive do I have? It’s probably Andrea.”

“What?” Andrea cried. “MOM!”

Mom can usually be counted upon to adjudicate, especially when Dad is being ‘this way.’ She has put up with him for years and often has to defend his behavior in front of strangers or almost-strangers. Sometimes, like tonight, she participates.

“We think it’s Teddy.” she smiles and nods towards me. “Because he lives out of state. You can’t trust those people.”

As the sun set over Huntley that fine September evening, we argued over the stolen silverware, Matt and Dad calculating the estimated worth at roughly 6 cents per missing piece. At one point, Matt offered to pay the damn 18 cents if it meant his own father would quit insinuating that a thieving child of his has unresolved silverware issues.

of course, we started accusing Dad of accusing us to hide his own petty thefts.

This is how we spend dinner many nights. Arguing over, well, nothing. (Two of the three missing pieces of silverware were later found embedded between couch cushions.)
A very popular topic for evening bickering is who has to wash and dry dishes after dinner. Mom and Dad have no dishwasher (other than Dad) and Mom likes to make big meals, so there’s always a lot of scuzzy dishes. Each of us argue why we should be excused from dishes that night, sore knees, big day at work tomorrow, etc. Very popular is insisting that “I’ll be part of the Management Team (management does no actual work other other than to criticize how everyone else dries the dishes).

A new excuse came out in September.

“I’m an Alpha,” Dad protested. “I can’t be part of the Omega work.”

He had worked out this logic that if you help put together the dinner, help with preparations, you’re an Alpha. You’re excused. We railed against him for this trumped up division of labor and argued that anyone, anyone can be an Omega.

“You got the dinner plates out of the cabinet and put them on the table.” Eileen retorted. “That’s barely any work!”

“No, no,” Dad protests, “You can’t define an Alpha by the quantity of work he does, but rather it’s more of his nature. He just can’t wash dishes.”

Eileen herself has found a sure-fire way to get out of doing the dishes. She always looks at her fingernails and then volunteers. “I’ll wash,” she’ll say. “My fingernails are dirty and could use a good soak.”

Eileen is instantly off the hook; everyone else volunteers to wash instead.

The interesting thing is that most of the time we all willingly do the dishes together anyway. We like to.

But this is how we play.

Last week I went to Huntley for Thanksgiving and for more of this insanity:  the arguing over dishes, trumped up accusations, the faux bickering and strange competitions we invent as games. On the post-turkey slump on Thanksgiving night, I openly accused my three siblings of stealing my car keys when I couldn’t find them on the kitchen counter.

“I know this is awkward, especially on the night of Thanksgiving.” I apologize. “But one of you is a thief.”

“Have you looked upstairs in that mess you made in our room?” Matt asked lazily.

“No.”

“So your first response - instead of looking for your keys - is to accuse us.” He says.

“Like I said, I’m sorry to have to accuse all three of you when only one of you is a stealing klepto…”

“Nice.” Eileen remarked. “Happy Thanksgiving to you too. Could you get me a diet Pepsi, since you’re already up.”

No one is too upset by my accusations. It’s not like I haven’t accused them of something like this before.

The keys are eventually found under my duffle bag which I insist is further proof the thief got nervous and returned them in an unlikely spot.This raises another chorus of protests and accusations back at me of a certain level of paranoia.

It’s not all accusations and bickering. Over the weekend, Andrea and I challenged each other to timed sudoku competitions and during one such game, we bent the rules to include a two-pronged goal:  solve the sudoku first AND solve the most puzzles on Wheel of Fortune. We would figure out where the 3s were supposed to go, then yell out missing words on the TV screen, following a byzantine collection of rules our family has developed for claiming victory for puzzle solving on The Wheel.

Andrea won.

When I left Huntley to drive back to Minnesota, I hugged my Mom and brother goodbye. Mom was already worried about the weather and extracted my promise to call. During this goodbying, Dad’s voice rang out from the kitchen. “Mom, be sure to frisk him for silverware!”

Ah, family.

This entry was posted on Sunday, December 7th, 2008 at 12:57 pm and is filed under Gratitude. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.