I know I’ve brought this up in comments before, so if you’ve already read my family Jerry Springer moment, well… just humor me for a long moment…

Growing up, our house shared a large rural lot and driveway with my paternal grandparents. As a kid, I thought it was great – got to see Grandma whenever I wanted and get spoiled rotten. What’s not to like? Ask my mother – she could keep you for hours telling you how much she hated it… now. My mom is a fairly good emotion stuffer and believes the man is the head of the household and you follow what he wants, even if it makes you miserable. So, she silently seethed until she boiled over one fine summer day.

Grandma is a take charge gal, and if you’re a follower type person, she’ll have you saluting her in no time flat. She’s also a wee bit bossy (well, a lot). Between my Grandpa’s family (of 10 siblings), Grandma’s (3 siblings and lots of cousins), and Mom being one of 4 kids, we were at family functions and events ALL THE TIME. Most of them were for Grandma and Grandpa’s side, and Grandma ordered us to all. And we went – even when no one wanted to.

One day, we were going up the driveway and Grandma flags us down. She leans in to tell Mom that we’re to attend some family function that weekend, Mom says “Okay” and starts to pull forward. Then she stops and floors it backwards, spinning gravel out at Grandma like shrapnel. She throws open the door and proceeds to spew out a good 15+ years worth of anger at Grandma. We weren’t so rural that we didn’t have neighbors, all of whom got to witness quite a show while Sister and I slunk down in the back seat, eyes popping out of our heads. We did not attend whatever family function was that weekend. Mom didn’t talk to Grandma for 2 years after that – even though we lived right behind her!

That whole ramble was to explain that I was used to having innumerable family functions to attend… or so I thought. Once I married Saresh, my mind boggled at the number of Indian functions (as D said in a comment – something like 3,569,245 per year). Suddenly my childhood seemed like a vast expanse of free time I had squandered. Luckily, I’m not an emotion stuffer like my mom, and Saresh is capable of saying “No” to his mother when he doesn’t want to do something (unlike my father). Thus we have never attended all 3 million events per year. I think we attend enough important things to (mostly) satisfy family and community obligations while maintaining our sanity. And it’s not like we don’t going – just not to all 3 mil.

For a while, we got invited to everything – every wedding, shower, pooja, dinner, bbq, it’s a full moon, it’s Tuesday – you get the picture. If MIL hosted some event or other, all those invited expected us to attend similar functions they were having, even if it was in a different city! And if you went to one person’s event, everyone there took notice and expected you to attend whatever their next bash was (though my great aunts are a lot like this as well – hence my mom’s meltdown).

Over the years, invites have gone from a flood to just a heavy trickle. We don’t get invited to as much anymore, I think because we don’t attend everything so we’re either forgotten or they just figure we probably wouldn’t come. Also, I think MIL sometimes just mentions things to Saresh and he doesn’t even bother to tell me (probably in case I’d actually want to go and he doesn’t!). At any rate, with our calendar largely to ourselves, CBC and Saresh now commence doing the gleeful happy dance of freedom!

Though sometimes, I freedom dance too soon – like for this Memorial Day weekend. Saresh’s cousins are coming in town and I was trying to plan a night out for all of us and another couple we’re all friends with. I truly don’t know why I bothered. They’re going to be here for 4 days and this is how the schedule has turned out so far:

Friday night: Party at someone’s house (no occasion) – We will likely get invited to this, but we’re not going. However, Saresh’s aunt and uncle have already committed to going and want their kids to go.

Saturday night: Graduation party – this is not a regular graduation party. This is graduation party Indian-style. Three families, one hotel, whole Village. We don’t even know any of the three kids, but we’re going.

Sunday: Big Indian wedding, festivities all day long. We’re not going to this, but cousins and in-laws are.

Monday: Our only day open… so far. I have no doubt someone will plan something that some of us are going to have to attend. Hopefully not (crossing fingers).

We told MIL we’d just have the cousins over to the house on Monday instead and she says, “Oh! That’s a good idea – you can all come here and I’ll cook.” Saresh and I felt bad telling her “No” – it was nice, but we’re going for a “no parents, no more Indian festivities” type of thing. I felt like we were 16, trying to get away unsupervised – just us “kids”.