One of the odder sources of stress in my life is anything that involves both R and the Sibs. It was not always like this, and in fact, they are very fond of each other. But making plans that involve both of them always puts me smack in the middle of a conflict. The plans for today involved going out to lunch with the Sibs and Wonderful Niece and her twin brother, J2. And my two girls and I, of course. IT started when R said if we were going to Applebee's (the Sibs' and my default eating location) she wasn't going with us, and she didn't want to go before 1. I presented this to the Sibs (but not as a demand from R) and she said no problem.Then the tree fell down in front of her house. Then her cable went out. And someone's got to stay home for the cable guy, but her husband, The Keeper, had to go do something at their high school with their youngest, Little K. Then J2 isn't there yet, and then there's a huge truck blocking her driveway so they can't get out and ....
And now, if they can't get out on time, the Sibs suggests a different restaurant than we had planned because that one is too far away and now R is pissed because that's the one she wanted to go to.
And where am I? I am the mediator, talking on the phone to one and calling up the stairs to the other, and I hate hate hate it. Why does each one of them need to be in charge but neither one of them willing to make the final call? Only I have to do that, and it ends up satisfying neither of them and just leaving me surrounded by everyone and not getting to enjoy anyone's company. Bah.
This is how it started, because I know how it started. When R was little, she worshipped the Sibs, and her favorite place in the world to be was at the Sibs' house, playing with her cousins. She looked up to them with awe, and she spent lots and lots of time there. When she started school (1st grade) she spent a half hour there every morning and then she and the twins walked to school together. (One block.) She loved it there and all its folk.
The problem started when we went to DisneyWorld. This was ... I'm thinking ... 1994. The whole crazy story of the trip is here, but in a nutshell, the Sibs and I and my two kids and her twins went to DW for a week in August, driving down in my Astro van and staying in one of the Fort Wilderness mobile homes. The planning for this trip was insane, as befits the group of people who were going, but the upshot was that my sister called a lot of the shots for the trip based on what her kids wanted and what she thought was good for them, and K was too little to notice, but R did and resented it. And I, the mediator, had allowed it to happen, something I've always regretted. But it was very tough to buck this trend as it was going on, because so much of it was based on J2's diabetes, which was only a year diagnosed at the time.
There are two examples of what happened that really stand out in my memory. First, we told the kids that because this was a vacation, we would relax some rules, and they could each pick out certain foods to bring that they loved. This was a general thing; everyone would get to pick a favorite. R wanted Lucky Charms for breakfast, but as we went shopping, the Sibs said something like "Oh, I don't think that's a good idea; it would make J2 feel bad if we had Lucky Charms around since he can't eat them" and put them back on the shelf. I should have gotten them anyway, but I didn't.
The other one is just so strange. You know, everyone has a different way of being. One of my things is that when I'm walking around anywhere, I hate to carry things. Usually, I keep my wallet in one pocket, my cell phone in another; it's one of the reasons I always wear jeans, the pockets. On that trip, I wore a child's backpack; it had just enough room for me, it wasn't heavy, and I didn't have to carry it in my hands. R hates to carry things too, and she had worked it out so that when we were walking around the Disney parks, her hands were totally free. It's the way she is.
The Sibs, on the other hand, always carries a huge, over-stuffed purse wherever she goes. Which is fine. Except there was no room in her purse for J2's kit that has to go with him everywhere: his glucose monitor, the insulin, the needles. It's a black case about the size of a large paperback book, and he usually just carries it himself by the handstrap. But he got tired of carrying it around sometimes, and so he would ask his mother to carry it for awhile. Her bag, however, was full, and seeing R carrying nothing, the Sibs would ask her to carry it for J2 for awhile. Again, I should have stopped it -- I probably could have squeezed it into my backpack -- but I didn't realize at the time how much it bothered her. It bothered her a lot.
Oh, we had also agreed to stick together at all times, but one evening the Sibs let the twins go off on their own for a few hours. They were 16 and R 13, and she really resented being officially relegated to the status of child.
Interestingly, she has never shown any resentment to the twins themselves for any of this, and nothing openly to the Sibs. But whenever we try to make plans, I can see that she's got her back up, that she's not going to be walked all over again. And I can't blame her, not at all.
I just wish that I weren't in the middle, like I was in DW where I was so ineffective. As I write, it's 20 to 1:00 and we were supposed to be in the restaurant at 1:00 -- it's at least 20 minutes away -- but I'm waiting for that phone call. I don't care where we eat; I just want life to be without conflict. I just want everybody to get along.
