After Douglas and I married in the fall of 1968, we spent many weekends at my parents’ house. The house was small and it wasn’t exactly in an idyllic community. The backyard also was tiny and not especially cheery. We didn’t do anything special with my parents, either. We’d have dinner and go to a movie and then laze around the house.
- The young couple and their crazy parents in “Meet The Fockers”
So why did a newly married couple of 21-year-olds want to spend weekends like this?
I scratch my head trying to come up with a suitable answer and the only one I can think of is that we were babies, not ready to be grown-up married people. We needed the “security” of being home with mommy and daddy, even though they never gave me much of a feeling of security before I married.
Many FOFs love when their grown children–married or not– come home for a day, a weekend, and, of course, for the holidays. But EVERY WEEKEND? A bit much, I say. I wish I could ask my mom and dad now how they felt about their constant house guests back in the day.
0 Responses to “The Constant Guests”
Duchesse says:
I guess you both got something from the exchange or it would not have happened?
Marsha Calhoun says:
Can’t win for losing, I guess. My late husband’s parents used to visit him and his then-wife every single weekend as a matter of course, driving about an hour each way, until my husband’s stepfather asked why my husband always paid his bills while they were visiting instead of sitting around and talking, and my husband responded that Saturdays were the only time available to do that – I think they got the hint. On the other hand, my only child is across the country, and I would dearly love to see her every week, as I do some of my stepchildren who leave nearby – can’t live with ’em, can’t live without ’em. (Until they became older and ill, I pretty much avoided my parents who lived an hour away, performing only duty visits on holidays, but there was good reason for that – we never felt especially welcome by my mother in particular and my parents never adjusted to the fact of my husband.)
Kate Line Snider says:
Thank you for bringing this up!
I was also married (to someone now deceased) in 1968, and we used to spend a lot of time with my parents. (My relationship with my parents was so dysfunctional I now can’t imagine WHY! )Yep, every weekend. It was SICK. Or maybe it was free food?
I think I have a pretty good relationship with my adult kids (AKA The Gang of Five – or 15, if you count spouses and children). Most of them are out of their twenties, however.They all live here in the same city area.I love to see them, but I am thankful they have plenty to do in their own lives and don’t gather here every weekend.
I was recently reminded of the blessing of peaceful alone-time weekends when we held an Independence Day cookout and they all showed up- and it rained. It was fun, but it will hold us until around Christmas.