The ties that bind

So, to catch you up: I survived the work stress, in large part because Minnams is a saint and a rock star rolled up into one, and because of her, I didn't have to skip my family vacation this week. Which made my mother very happy.

Two years ago, I tracked daily lessons from our 19-person family vacation in North Carolina. I sort of wish I'd read those before we took off again a week ago, because I'd forgotten some of what I'd learned two years ago. Although part of me wonders why I'm ever surprised by anything about my family, because any time you throw us all under one roof, we all regress, and it's like we're children again, like we've never left our parents' house.

We did remember enough about the last trip to leave the karaoke machine at home, and to bring two good games, Apples to Apples and Whoonu, that were huge hits with the grown-ups and the kids alike. We also had better weather this time around, so we took long walks or runs on the beach almost every morning, swam in both the ocean and the pool every day, and had several rousing games of wiffle ball on the beach after dinner (my two favorite moments there: (1) my parents standing in the outfield, hugging each other, grinning ear to ear and looking so proud and happy to have gathered their whole brood; and (2) imploring my six-year-old nephew, "Cover your base!" and him responding by kneeling in the sand and burying the neon pool toy that was serving as the marker for second base).

There were other lovely moments: My littlest nephew, who's five, is uber-cuddly right now (although he grew less so as the trip wore on) and as I lay on the couch reading before dinner one night, he padded over and climbed up next to me and snuggled into the crook of my arm; he was practically asleep, but couldn't quite get comfortable, so he flopped around for like 15 minutes, not even opening his eyes, and wound up crossways on my torso, holding my hand, until it was time for dinner. I am so sad as I realize that, next time we do this trip, he will likely not be so interested in snuggling with me.

Last night, after we'd packed away Apples to Apples and Whoonu in preparation for our 5:45 a.m. departure this morning, we played what my sister calls The Sentence Game, although it's really The Sentence, Picture, Sentence Game. Basically, it's a variation on "telephone" or "whisper down the lane": everyone around the table writes a sentence at the top of a piece of paper and passes it to the right. Then everyone has to draw a picture to illustrate the sentence, folds over the sentence so the next person can't see it, and then the next person has to write a sentence describing the picture. At the end, you see how close -- or not -- the last sentence is to what you started off with.

My oldest sister's husband, somehow, did not get the concept, at all, so he was screwing everything up, writing sentences beneath sentences and drawing pictures beneath pictures, or sometimes doing sort of a rebus (snaps to the Smelmooo for being the first to use that term). He insisted the instructions were not clear; we quickly but relatively politely pointed out that every other person at the table, including his 10-year-old son, understood. Anyway, it made for some ludicrous interpretations, including my "The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog" becoming something like, "I find it thrilling, rather than scary, to skateboard on the highway."

But the most memorable part of the trip, by far, was the family photo. Oh, it gives me a knot in my stomach even to think about it, and I'm not sure I can even do it justice. We didn't do a family picture at my dad's 70th birthday party, which we probably should have, but we thought it'd be nice, in theory at least, to have a family photo at the beach.

I think it was for my mom's 60th birthday, in 1999, that we hired a photographer to come to our parents' house and do a family photo, everyone dressed in denim and white. It was sort of cheesy, but it worked, and turned out pretty nicely. Then, there were more grandkids, and the Smelmooo joined the crew, so we did another photo the summer we got engaged, that time with white shirts and khakis (this works less well, especially given that we are a fairly pasty lot), and with my brother-in-law's camera set up with the timer. I've never been crazy about those shots, but at least we're all together. Except for my youngest niece, who was born two years later, so we had exactly zero pictures with our whole family.

So anyway, everyone together at the beach, great weather, deck with an oceanfront view that would be perfect. My mom went into town and got everyone Duck (as in Duck, North Carolina, but also with little ducks on them) t-shirts to wear for the occasion. [I do not for a second understand why we always need to wear a uniform for the family photo, but it's my mom, so I roll with it, and I think it's sweet.] The plan was to take the photo after dinner one night, around sunset.

And then, there were all kinds of delays with dinner, and our littlest niece was sleeping, and my oldest sister's husband -- owner of the camera with the timer -- started freaking out about losing the light, despite the fact that it was not quite 6 o'clock, on the third-longest-day of the year, and there was lots of confusion and sniping and shirt-changing and "I think I need a glass of wine"-ing.

I fully expected that there would be little pieces of paper taped to the deck, or at least some sort of chart, to show us where to stand, because there was a clear plan in my oldest sister's head. "NO SUNGLASSES!" she barked at our one sister, who responded with a "Kiss my ass," and a staunch refusal to remove the sunglasses.

"Okay, siblings, and mom and dad!"

Followed by "Spouses, too!"

Followed by "Kids and whole family tomorrow!"

At which point my brother woke his sleeping youngest, who fussed and screamed and refused to put on the Duck shirt, which I thought would be a deal-breaker for my sister, but there was clearly no way that we were all getting back on that deck, in those shirts, the following night, so we took just one shot of the whole family, and were done. And, of course, not everyone's looking at the camera, and my littlest niece's face is tear-stained, and my sister's wearing her sunglasses, but overall it's not so bad for a one-shot deal.

I sort of wish I had taken control and sucked it up and shelled out what would surely have been a ridiculous sum of money to get a professional photographer to come to the beach house, because it would be nice to have a photo that's better than "not so bad," and it might be a little less agita if we hired someone to be in charge. Maybe that is the important lesson for me to remember for our next family gathering: hire a professional.

Although, really, it almost wouldn't matter, because it's suddenly coming back to me that my oldest sister sort of bossed around our wedding photographer. And I think I'll remember the circumstances surrounding this one much more vividly than the professional shot at my parents' house nine years ago, and every time I look at it, I'm sure I'll smirk and chuckle and roll my eyes, in a good way.