Family gatherings

I think the whole idea behind family gatherings, of getting in touch with cousins and elders is a very cool idea....in principle that is! That being said, I'm quite sure that I miss half of what goes on at get-togethers, because while the male relatives say hello, how are you, sit down, and stay relatively silent, the women in the house, especially the elders.....well, what can I say!!

With the women in the family....there's always a constant torrent of noise (No disrespect to the women folk though...just my observations). Every female relative in a family gathering insists on dissecting things in minute detail afterwards so that car rides are filled with "Can you believe she said that?", "Why did he say that?" or "Why don't they remember what happened?"

The male cousins just tend to sit in a sort of silence. Any topic brought out is met with either agreement, a polite surprise or inquiry or occasionally a fascinated discussion. And just like it started, the conversations just fade to an acceptable relaxed level. Most of the times, the male cousins are not great conversationalists.  But the women in the family....I figure they are all significantly more vociferous. The male cousins keep chatting in a low simmer and the women most times keep yapping it up in the next room. But sometimes even this yapping is very very amusing :) You feel some kind of void if the noise is not there!

It all starts when we're all around a table, sharing food and talking. This is exactly when the really awkward questions start - "When are you getting married dear?", "How's that new job of yours?", "Why don't we get to see you more often?" etc. etc... Judgement is such an ugly phenomenon when it comes from relatives, isn't it?

If you haven't experienced this yet or are puzzled about what I'm talking...may be you will experience it too...in time. I'm not exactly sure how or why it happens, but it does...all the time!!! Which is why I sneak out of the room when such topics arise and always find the most comfortable place in the house to close my eyes and sleep when I can't add anything to such conversations. 

I always feel that there needs to be some sort of bluetooth-based messaging system or something of that sort for people like me around a table...people who have cellphones and want to message or communicate something to each other without texting so that we can keep ourselves occupied in-between awkward questions, the cheesy family jokes, and unrelated conversations...

Now that this is out of my system...I'm gonna move on and listen to some feet tapping numbers...Highly recommended :)