The Inaugural Red Neck-A-Thon 2011

Last weekend was the inaugural family reunion on my mother’s side, or as I would like to call it: Red Neck-A-Thon 2011.  It was held at my Uncle Sam’s, which meant driving ten hours to Calgary only to realize you need to drive another SEVEN HOURS to a place called BONNYVILLE which is a whopper of a town. It has TWO (count’em TWO) token Chinese restaurants. But we do not stop there. 10 minutes outside of this thriving community is a bison farm (those are buffalo for you city folks) and my Uncle’s is kitty corner.

Let me give you a glimpse into my mother’s brothers and sisters and you tell me if you still think your family is crazy.  My mother is the oldest of five children.  They grew up on a farm in southern Alberta.  Mom cannot remember ever having running water and the family pet was a cow named Betsy which they treated like a horse and rode around the farm. After my Mom comes my Uncle Elmer. Uncle Elmer is hilarious… if you think telling an 8 year old (i.e. me) that he lost all his fingers on his right hand by sucking his thumb is funny.  Let’s say I quit sucking my thumb cold turkey that summer.  He lives in the woods in Northern Alberta and has bought up all the land around him because people are really not his thing. 

Next comes my Uncle Sam who bears a striking resemblance to Yosemite Sam, drives a truck and has a Budweiser tattoo on his forearm. Uncle Sam hasn’t had a lot of luck with the Ladies.  His first wife had a son from another marriage (who I believe he is actually in jail now) and they had a daughter together.  He comes home one day to find the place was cleaned out and his wife and daughter were gone. But there was a note. “Have moved to Vancouver, I am a lesbian.”  So that was wife number one.  Wife number two also had a boy from a previous marriage, Skippy, who I believe my Uncle adopted. They then had Jean and Margaret, now in their early twenties.  One day my Uncle comes home to an empty house (I know, it’s a recurring theme) to find his wife had moved in with the neighbour.  There went wife number two. The latest woman is a LARP. Not sure if she thinks she is Maid Marian, but the idea of my Uncle in tights as Robin Hood is just disturbing.  However, I think her involvement paints a picture of what I was dealing with, personality wise. She has two kids in their early twenties from a previous marriage and they are just a bundle of JOY.  I should not say that, her son is nice enough.  But the girl, lets just say the ice pick was about to make another appearance.

Next is Aunty Sharon.  I love my Aunt dearly, but like the rest of the family she has her quirks, mainly she brings a new meaning to the word micro-managing. You would never know that Aunty Sharon grew up on a farm with chickens and dirt.  It seems more like she would have grown up on Manhatten’s upper eastside.  Aunty Kathy married Uncle Dave and they had Mark.  Mark is 14 and Mark got into trouble during Red-Neck-A-Thon 2011, which I’ll describe shortly.

Lastly is my Uncle Blake.  Oh where do I begin?! My Uncle Blake is big on precise directions and patience as my mother is fully aware.  His instructions consist of “go get the bull.”  Don’t all normal people know how to rope in a bull?  Yes, they teach that in grade 3 right after the 10 provinces and their capitals. Then, when something goes wrong, such as the bull running at you, and you move, his opportunity to display his famous grip on patience kicks in. It really is amazing how quickly blood can race to one’s head as he jumps up and down screaming at you for moving because now the bull got out. I am not sure Uncle Blake understands that small instinct to … you know … LIVE! Uncle Blake married my Aunty June who is the sweetest woman alive.  I can still remember the first time I met Aunty June.  We were driving out in the pasture to check something. She got out of the car.  Ants crawled up her pants so she rips them off.  A great first impression on a 5 year old.  Their children are Connor (17) and Chad (14)

The Midget (aka my sister) and I arrive at the farm to a very warm welcome.  We are told all of OUR family has gone fishing and that the LARP’s daughter’s dog eats little dogs and therefore our puppy Stanley needs to stay in the house.  A) Why do you have an evil dog? and B) Why is your daughter here??   The Midget and I being the problem solvers we are promptly turned the car around, found the nearest lakeside beach and started to drink. 

But really, that is nothing compared to the stunt my cousins pulled.  I guess when everyone had gone to bed on the 1^st night Chad and Mark took it upon themselves to raid the beer fridge and it did not bode well for young Mark. Chad being a farm kid, 6’2” and 220 lbs was not phased by the raiding.  Mark on the other hand might have puked in his tent and promptly passed out back into it.  You should know that Aunty Sharon and Uncle Dave are not cool with underage drinking.  They have gone so far as to convince Mark that he is allergic to alcohol and therefore should never drink it.  I am pretty sure we are all allergic to alcohol.  It is poison, correct?  Who is not allergic to poison?!  Plus anyone who drinks 3 ciders (7% alcohol content) and a few more beer to boot on their first drinking binge is going to be “allergic” all over their pillow.  The kicker (and I cannot believe that this flew with his parents) was that he told them he got sick off of candy!  Seriously?!  The Midget was all over that with “ya, when I eat too much candy I always puke and promptly pass back out into it!” The hilarious part is everyone in the family knew the kid was hung over but no one wanted to break it to his parents who seemed to have bought this “candy story.”  They did eventually clue in, but I’m not sure how. It may have been the family referring to the beer fridge as the candy fridge for the rest of the weekend.

Besides these shenanigans, the reunion was fairly uneventful.  There were just a few minor irritations like the LARP throwing a 5^th birthday party for a neighbour’s kid in the middle of the reunion and oh – and the simple presence of her daughter. Have I mentioned she was a less than desirable person – and FAT!  Yet, what was strange this time was the Midget’s and my role in the family.  As kids, we always wanted to stay up late and sit around the fire as the uncles drank and told stories. They were hilarious and oh sooo cool.  This time, they all headed to bed at a decent hour and the activities were pretty mellow.  Then one night Connor and his girlfriend emerge after his parents had gone to bed to drink with Skippy, Jean, Margaret and I.  I announce “Grandma needs to go to bed” and he looks at me and says, “Really, I was thought you would be the one to get the party going.”  This is the thing.  To my cousins, I am the cool uncle they want to hang out with – without their parents around.  It just keeps driving home this recurring theme I am struggling to come to grips with in 2011.  I am no longer the child. I am the adult. It really is an adjustment.