My family is a little fuzzy on boundaries. My dad was a pastor of a nondenominational church in downtown Las Vegas when I was a teenager. It was not at all uncommon for him to bring home homeless people. I spent time in my teenage years sharing my room with ex-hookers, and recovering drug addicts. We had a large house and at any given time there were up to six non-family members sharing the house with us. I can, and will at some point, say all sorts of true, horrible things about my dad, but in spite of his many, many faults, he is completely generous, and hospitable. Since I have lived in California, Roser and I have had an open door policy for my family. Sometimes it caused a little tension, like the time my dad called me to tell me that my then 17 and 19 year old brothers were on there way with 4 friends and would be at my house in about an hour. That was a little stressful because I already had 2 out of town guests staying with me. My guests and I left when I got the message from my dad, and when we returned a few hours later, my home had all the evidence of a full scale invasion. We tripped over gigantic shoes near my front door. There were duffels stacked in the front room like it was basic training, and the house reeked of boy sweat and cheap cologne. The actual boys, all six of them, were out, getting lunch.
In spite of the inconvenience, and annoyance, I loved the noise and chaos they brought with them when my brothers and their friends came out. I loved feeding all of them. I loved the vitality that filled the house. I just would have appreciated a little warning.
Roser, on the other hand, is one of 2 children. His father was never a pastor, and he never brought hookers home, at least not that we know of. Roser's extended family is mostly tucked safely away in Indiana, and would never dream of dropping in on anybody. His family is identified by its sense of propriety, and consideration. It has been a very easy family to be a part of because of these things. Roser has been amazing with my family, that is so different from his, and is loving on the days that I want to go after all of them with a hammer. None of this has made the Italian invasion from the north any easier to deal with.
Now that my family is local, they are dropping in, A Lot. I still kind of love it. Roser, not so much. He is very protective of his time with the family. I would love to have kids over all the time, but I need to balance that with Roser's need for time alone with us. We were supposed to go to a Christmas party on Saturday night, the one that got cancelled. When my dad found out were going, he asked me to ask the hostess if he could attend. When the party got cancelled, Roser and I decided to have a family night and put up the Christmas tree. When I told my dad this, he was hurt. I figured he would not be coming around for a while. I was wrong.
He showed up on Sunday without calling, as Roser and I were on our way out to do some errands. He settled in, even though we were leaving, and let us know that my brother, his wife, and my sister (the tattooed) would be coming by. I got totally forced to offer to make dinner for everyone. Roser was livid. He does not want to have no control over when people come over. Because it is my family, I don't care. It feels like the house I grew up in, and the type of house I always wanted to have.
I made baked rigatoni with spicy Italian sausage and green beans with garlic, olive oil and Parmesan cheese. My sister-in-law's little brother, who is a very good friend of both my own Xy17 and SibXX16 came over and ate too. I was really happy. Until 9pm, when they were showing no signs of leaving. My dad had been at my house for 13 hours, watching TV, reading the paper, hassling me about my weight, (sweetly though, if you can imagine it,) and I was done. It took a full hour to get them all out of there. An hour and tons of hints. I am not the girl I was. Apparently, I need time with just my immediate family too. Roser has rubbed off on me.
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