A Family Affair (or two)

As I was skiing with a lot of my cousins on Christmas Eve, Karolyn kept talking about the Italian feast her parents were making at home.  I knew that our only plans for the night were going to mass, but nothing else, so I kept joking that I was going to crash dinner. Well, after mass, we headed over and there was so much food.  Clam something-or-other as an appetizer, then homemade pasta for lasagna, and fettucine alfredo, meatballs & sausage, chicken parm and veal parm.  Yes, looking at this meal made me high (^400 to be exact).  As we're sitting around the counter, we were talking about how many year it had been since "something" passed (I don't remember what the something was), and of course the "I've had diabetes for 21 years so that means it's...." From there we figured out how long it had been since "something" had happened.  And then, my uncle turned around, looked at me and said, "Ya know, that day sucked."  We were at their house on that day, and then, of course, everything changed.  "You were so little, and so sick"  And then my mom looks at my aunt and says "And that's when Kate got chicken pox because you couldn't bring her to visit."  It's funny the things you remember based on the biggest day of your life; things that otherwise wouldn't be remembered.  Our conversation continued, not related to diabetes, but the impact of this dinner with family was altered, from just a few simple statements.


We have a lot of family & family friends with young children and/or expecting within the next year.  The topic of "sleeping in" on Christmas gets discussed and how no child ever sleeps in on December 25.  And that is when my mom and I pipe in with, "Well..."  I am the oldest grandchild on my father's side, and we have room in our house to host.  So my father's lone sister spent the night because really, who wants to miss a 3 year old on Christmas morning?  All four of my grandparents were also in attendance and the story goes that they were all awake and sitting in the living room, in front of the fireplace and the stockings and the evidence of Santa delivering his goodies, just waiting for precious little me to wake up.  I looked at my mother and said, "Was I three or four?"  And we both answered: I had to have been three because I wasn't allowed to sleep in post-diabetes-diagnosis.  One simple day, and all of a sudden a story has a specific date.