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#Post#: 18564--------------------------------------------------
Weird things your family does
By: Nikola Date: July 25, 2019, 6:05 am
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This is something that hit me as I was watching my parents try
to squeeze 11 square meters of furniture into 12 square meters
of space after my brother gave them his old leather sofa and
armchair. They never really cared much for free space that would
be uncluttered with furniture. I recall our old 100 square meter
flat in Prague having an unhealthy furniture/free space
proportion but it never felt strange to me until I went to other
people's places and noticed that they could walk around their
rooms.
I remember Steven mentioning this in his "alcoholic brother"
thread. I'm not trying to get back to the thread and discuss
politics, it's just that he mentioned how you don't notice the
weird things your family does until you meet people who do it
differently. Is there anything your family does or used to do
that now strikes you as a bit... let's say unusual? And how does
it even happen that two people from different families with
different weird habits create their own, shared habits,
different from everyone else? I've never been married so I
wonder, do they sit down and hold a meeting about what their
very own "weird thing" is going to be and how they're going to
go about it?
#Post#: 18565--------------------------------------------------
Re: Weird things your family does
By: Aliph Date: July 25, 2019, 6:50 am
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One weird thing about my mother was that she constantly changed
the place of the furniture in our flat, painted the walls with
new colors, sewed new curtains. I went to school in the morning
and when I came home at five p.m. I would find a new house. I do
not know where she found the energy to do that all by herself.
The result was usually pleasant but a bit destabilizing. Other
children thought that we were very rich.
My sister has the same energy but she absolutely throws away all
the items that she didn’t use since a bit more than six months.
I can only admire her. Her house is as neat and tidy as if she
would expect the visit of a photographer for one of those “Home
and Garden” magazines.
When I met my husband, he was living in an appartement with
piles of books and an archive with hundreds of boxes with
articles he had cut out from newspapers and magazines. When we
married he put the whole stuff in the basement. We then moved
around and finally the internet and digital archives replaced
the dusty papers.
I still love paper. I have books everywhere even if I barely
read them. I prefer to read on an ebook-reader.
#Post#: 18566--------------------------------------------------
Re: Weird things your family does
By: Alharacas Date: July 25, 2019, 7:27 am
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Oof! Where shall I start? :D
For one thing, in my mother's family, everybody calls each other
by a pet name. Not just when they're feeling particularly
emotional, but always. They write those names in letters, they
use those silly names when talking about each other to people
not related to them. Even my mother's friends and godchildren
call her (aunt) Schnucki, Cutie. I only noticed how strange this
was when somebody once asked grown-up me whether I had any aunts
or uncles. I'll never forget the utterly weirded-out look I got
when I answered that my aunt Cluckie was dead, and that my uncle
Laddie lived in the Eastern part of Germany (giving a rough
translation here).
My parents' strangely frugal habits can probably be ascribed to
their growing up in war-time. Still, it never ceases to amaze me
how my mother will buy something she actually needs, like new
slippers - only to then store the new items carefully away,
because otherwise they'll look worn too quickly. Or because they
need to be "saved" for some unspecified grand occasion (which,
likely as not, never arises). Of course, being over 90, she then
promptly forgets she's bought these things.
In my childhood home, there were no less than three enormous
freezers (of the kind you could comfortably store several dead
bodies in) in the basement. Because, obviously, the answer to
having one freezer brimful of food is to buy another one - at
least to my otherwise really penny-pinching father. Also, the
only solution to shelves bending under the weight of decade-old
jars of jam and stewed fruit - until my mother's divorce, I'd
thought you could only have delicious desserts in restaurants -
was apparently to put up new shelves, not to simply stop
bottling fruit.
And that's why I think I can give an answer of sorts your
question, Nikola. It seems to me that in a marriage, things are
usually arranged according to how important they are to either
partner.
Because in my parents' subsequent marriages, things were handled
differently. To this day, my mother will not touch homemade jam,
however delicious. And the pantry in my stepfather's house was
full of beautiful dishes and exotic kitchen accessories, but
otherwise contained only the odd box of Belgian chocolates, and
a can or two from an expensive delicatessen.
My stepmother, on the other hand, used to send every visitor to
a hotel, including her own son, even though she had a huge house
and a housekeeper, and could have put up half a dozen people
without any problems. This probably came as a relief to my
father, who'd never really liked my mother filling the house
with friends and relatives all year round. However, my
stepmother's basement was also starting to overflow with all
kinds of food when the house was sold. ;)
#Post#: 18568--------------------------------------------------
Re: Weird things your family does
By: Allie Date: July 25, 2019, 7:42 am
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[quote author=Nikola link=topic=1273.msg18564#msg18564
date=1564052715]
And how does it even happen that two people from different
families with different weird habits create their own, shared
habits, different from everyone else? I've never been married so
I wonder, do they sit down and hold a meeting about what their
very own "weird thing" is going to be and how they're going to
go about it?
[/quote]
Yeah, that's pretty much it.
We arranged at a meeting, sat at the desk and negotiated
clauses.
To "we will walk naked around the house", I answered "ok, but no
guest room, we will have a yoga room"
And so the rules of the household were stablished
#Post#: 18570--------------------------------------------------
Re: Weird things your family does
By: Allie Date: July 25, 2019, 7:48 am
---------------------------------------------------------
[quote author=Alharacas link=topic=1273.msg18566#msg18566
date=1564057643]
Oof! Where shall I start? :D
For one thing, in my mother's family, everybody calls each other
by a pet name. Not just when they're feeling particularly
emotional, but always. They write those names in letters, they
use those silly names when talking about each other to people
not related to them. Even my mother's friends and godchildren
call her (aunt) Schnucki, Cutie. I only noticed how strange this
was when somebody once asked grown-up me whether I had any aunts
or uncles. I'll never forget the utterly weirded-out look I got
when I answered that my aunt Cluckie was dead, and that my uncle
Laddie lived in the Eastern part of Germany (giving a rough
translation here).
[/quote]
That's actually extremely common here. I'd say practically the
rule, except for my family. Our weird thing was not having pet
names/nicknames.
At school/work or any other social situation, if someone tried
to give us a pet name or shorten our names, we were instructed
to say "My name is Erik. My parents paid for it, so it must be
used"
As for the other quirks of my family, I think I mentioned before
we are pretty cold. We kind of lost touch with other relatives
(in the country and out of it) and our family gatherings were
seldom and restricted to the nuclear family.
I always envied the big Christmas family reunions and to this
day I struggle with the words to describe family (in every
language, as it's not really a language issue, but more how
abstract those terms are to me). Every time I need to use words
such as "cousin", "nephew", "sister-in-law" and etc, I have to
think a little and I get them wrong pretty often
#Post#: 18571--------------------------------------------------
Re: Weird things your family does
By: NealC Date: July 25, 2019, 8:07 am
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When I was growing up my mother did ceramics, it was mostly in
the basement so it was not too big a deal. She did give classes
in it so all the neighborhood moms would come over and 'do
ceramics', which mostly meant smoke and gossip about non ceramic
moms. The problem was now half the neighborhood moms knew my
mom and could report on me. The other half knew they were being
gossiped about at my house so they hated me. Not good.
When she was older my mother collected dolls. I don't mean she
had a few Barbies, I mean expensive little beady eyed dolls all
over the damn place. Finally when my sister moved out my father
had my mother put her doll collection in my sister's room. A
room full of dolls, doll display cases and doll furniture with
dolls sitting and having tea, or getting dressed, or going to
bed. It was a bit creepy.
Good old mom. She was nuts but I miss her.
#Post#: 18572--------------------------------------------------
Re: Weird things your family does
By: Nikola Date: July 25, 2019, 8:13 am
---------------------------------------------------------
[quote author=Alharacas link=topic=1273.msg18566#msg18566
date=1564057643]
In my childhood home, there were no less than three enormous
freezers (of the kind you could comfortably store several dead
bodies in) in the basement. Because, obviously, the answer to
having one freezer brimful of food is to buy another one - at
least to my otherwise really penny-pinching father. Also, the
only solution to shelves bending under the weight of decade-old
jars of jam and stewed fruit - until my mother's divorce, I'd
thought you could only have delicious desserts in restaurants -
was apparently to put up new shelves, not to simply stop
bottling fruit.
[/quote]
I thought we were the only ones collecting freezers. We have a
huge one in the basement, next to a more conventional one (the
size of a big fridge) and another one in the kitchen. And
they're all full.
Jam and fruit in jars, yeah, we have that, too, but it gets
eaten (and given to people who come to visit) so we have to make
fresh stuff every year. But overall, there's so much food in our
basement we'd probably survive a year underground.
#Post#: 18577--------------------------------------------------
Re: Weird things your family does
By: Nikola Date: July 25, 2019, 8:36 am
---------------------------------------------------------
[quote author=Sofia link=topic=1273.msg18565#msg18565
date=1564055459]
One weird thing about my mother was that she constantly changed
the place of the furniture in our flat, painted the walls with
new colors, sewed new curtains. I went to school in the morning
and when I came home at five p.m. I would find a new house. I do
not know where she found the energy to do that all by herself.
The result was usually pleasant but a bit destabilizing. Other
children thought that we were very rich.
[/quote]
I never understood this as a kid and thought I would one day but
the day never came. I take pleasure in furnishing a new, empty
place but then rarely feel the need to change anything about it.
If I start living somewhere that's already furnished, I don't
know if it's the lack of motivation, lack of confidence, the
state of enlightenment or complete nihilism but I tend to leave
it exactly as it is. And when someone changes things around, it
takes me a while to get used to it. I would make a terrible
interior designer. I would probably say: "Yes, we could change
things a little but it would make the room look different. I'm
not sure that's what we're looking for. Oh, it is, you say.
Right."
#Post#: 18599--------------------------------------------------
Re: Weird things your family does
By: Alharacas Date: July 25, 2019, 9:48 am
---------------------------------------------------------
[quote author=Human Being link=topic=1273.msg18568#msg18568
date=1564058555]
We arranged at a meeting, sat at the desk and negotiated
clauses.
To "we will walk naked around the house", I answered "ok, but no
guest room, we will have a yoga room"
And so the rules of the household were stablished
[/quote]
Wait - you mean walking around the house naked is not normal?
:o
#Post#: 18602--------------------------------------------------
Re: Weird things your family does
By: Allie Date: July 25, 2019, 9:56 am
---------------------------------------------------------
Right!?
Apparently neighbours think otherwise
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