For all y’all who are celebrating today, Happy Easter. For all y’all who aren’t, happy first Sunday after the full moon occurring on or after the vernal equinox. In any event, I hope you’re having a lovely day.
For many years, my friends and I would take an Easter Day hike along the Savannah River, followed by pizza-by-the-slice and nachos. I’m changing it up this year and spending the weekend with my family.
My siblings and parents live almost exactly 1,111 miles away, according to google maps. Or more accurately, I’m the one who lives far away from all of them.
I manage to see them several times a year. We generally have a pretty good time. We rarely fight. We mostly eat or make food or make plans to eat or clean up from eating, unless we’re undertaking a Project™ like working on one of our homes.
I have no shortage of pictures of shenanigans from my visits. But time and memory being the weird animals that they are, these trips seem to sort of all sort of blend together in one swirl of Connecticut.
Except one trip, when a very motivated version of myself took notes. I have zero memory of writing them or of any of the documented shenanigans, except for #11. I am eternally grateful for May 2018 Rubi who captured the experience in a Google doc that I wouldn’t see again for 6 years. Thank you to March 2024 Rubi who thought organizing her Google drive was a valuable use of time.
I wouldn’t share it with you if it wasn’t worth reading.
I’m visiting my family for 4 days. I know where every one of my dinners will be coming from.
Last weekend I texted my sister and told her to make sure she buys bananas so they’d be perfect for pancakes on Saturday. She said she was making blueberry scones for my visit, but we could have them on Friday morning. She also told me she got the ingredients for me to make rice Krispie cookies with her kid while she’s at work.
My bag is overweight. Aside from clothes, I carry
2 packages of tortillas from Santa Fe farmers Market
Sourdough starter
English muffins I made yesterday
6 different kinds of cheese: 3 local from Santa Fe Farmers market, 3 French cheeses from Caribbean islands
Container of truffles (the chocolate kind)
4 packets of Chili powder, from Santa Fe farmers market
My flights are delayed, it is midnight when I get to my brother's house. We have wine and he pulls out a bag of veggie straws. I eat only and all of the orange ones. He notices.
We debate which is better: coffee you make yourself at home to your exacting standards, or the coffee that is ready and made for you at work
He offers me his daughter's animal crackers, which he says suck. I disagree and eat three handfuls. They taste like crunchy donuts.
He says he wants to do a cookie bracket. I ask store bought? He says yes. I say, how are you going to deal with a final showdown of Oreos versus Fig Newtons? He says how can you pretend Walkers Shortbread isn’t a big deal here?!
Thursday we have a lunchtime pizza party for my niece's 1st birthday. My brother orders 7 pizzas, 3 are left over. My mother says, I’m so full I can’t eat for days. I remind her we have dinner in 4 hours.
On the way to dinner, my brother and I intensely debate the role teenage pregnancy plays in poverty. I interrupt to ask about a new pizza place we pass. We agree we are so grateful we grew up in America’s pizza pocket and not the Bible Belt then never return to debate.
Friday morning, my sister goes to work. My parents and I hang with my 3 year old nephew. Every member of my family eats our homemade scone breakfast off of a paper towel. None of us find this odd.
My mother observes Holly’s scones are so amazing, I don’t know how she does it she wonders. I know exactly how she does it, I inform her, because I gave her my recipe.
My sister texts to ask why there are bananas distributed randomly through her kitchen. I explain that after she went to bed her drunk husband tried to convince her drunk sister (me) that bananas ripen faster on their own, and I was experimenting to see if they’d be ready for banana pancakes the next morning.
My sister decides to use paper plates for dinner, she says they are thin, we’ll have to double up. My mom says I have a package of thicker paper plates in my car, I’ll go get them. I ask my sister if she has crackers for all of our cheese. She says no. Mom pipes in, Will Town House work? I have a package in my car. I’ll go get them.
My mom gifts me 3 one pound bags of coffee she knows it’ll be at least a week before I get home with lots of traveling. But they were on sale, she says.
My father’s go-to present for all of his kids are gift cards to his favorite ice cream parlor. All total my siblings have over $250 worth of ice cream gift cards.
Sunday 10:30 am we arrive at my parents’ place. On my second trip schlepping bags into the house I find my dad poised over last night's leftover chocolate cake with a spoon in his hand. It’s not cake time, I say. He pretends he’s not holding a spoon and says oh, I was just smelling it.
Coming up soon, tips on writing your own notes to future self.
Thanks for the laughs!!! Happy Easter my friend… definitely document all of the shenanignas❤️
I wrote down hilarious things my son did/said when he was younger, not so much anymore but I still update it every so often. Love going back to read it.