As any bride or grooms knows, marriage isn’t just about a union between two people. It’s also a union between two families. And even under the best of circumstances, there can be some difficulties with the merger. For example: the mother of groom thinks that the wedding should be held at her house by the lake and the mother of the bride thinks that’s maybe the stupidest idea she’s ever heard.
The good news is that everyone chills out after the wedding...for about a week or so. And then the real chess match begins: the pursuit of your weekends. You have to remember you’re the “hottest thing off the press” for both your families. They want any chance they can get to spend with you. And that’s okay! Just be careful to balance it out so you’re not stuck with 52 (a full year’s worth) weekends of events.
Weekends are, of course, already a valuable time. Even when you’re single and antisocial, weekends still feel like a precious resource that you want to keep locked away in your safe deposit box.
When you begin dating, the weekend time crunch is felt even more, as you slowly begin to combine your social lives. And so, by the time you tie the knot, it feels like you have maybe ten free weekends a year. Your parents, understandably, start jockeying for when they’ll get to see you – a summer barbeque here, a ski weekend there – and lo and behold those ten free weekends fill right up.
Now that you’re married and have gained an extra measure of independence from your parents, they suddenly feel the urge to reel you back in. (Hottest thing off the press? What did I tell you!) Mostly this is done out of love – what parent wouldn’t want to see their kid as often as possible? But a tiny bit of this has to do with vanity. Your parents are getting older, and the fact that you’re now married is as sure a sign as any that they’ll soon qualify for the senior discount at the movies. And so your parents figure that if everyone comes home for Labor Day it will be just like old times and their lower back pains and nearsighted vision will magically vanish. (Of course, while you growing up you didn’t really “come home” for Labor Day as much as you just “came downstairs for dinner because you still lived with your parents.”)
To make matters more complicated, you now have two sets of parents – yours and your spouse’s – who are feeling this way. Those ten free weekends you had weren’t enough. The requests keep coming in until, suddenly, you’re booked during all fifty-two weekends of the year.
Sound impossible? Here’s a breakdown:
Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, 4th of July, Thanksgiving:
4 weekends x 2 (one for each family) = 8 total weekends
Religious Holidays That At Least One Family Apparently Now Celebrates
Easter, Palm Sunday, Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur, Passover, Hanukkah, St, Patrick’s Day (yes – someone in your family has the audacity to classify St. Patrick’s Day as a religious holiday):
+ 7 more weekends = 15 total
Random Events Specific to This Year
Someone’s turning 60, someone else is turning 80, someone else is graduating, someone else bought a home and is having a housewarming party, someone else had a baby and you need to go visit them...twice. Oh, and you weren’t the only ones getting married this year. There’s two other family weddings, plus three more weddings of random friends of your families:
+ 11 more weekends = 26 total
Vacations
Two weekends for the vacation with the groom’s family, plus two weekends for the vacation the bride’s family just planned once they learned the groom’s family was taking a vacation with you. And there’s a ski weekend. And a beach weekend. And that ill advised trip to the wine country in which your brother-in-law got arrested for excessive Merlot consumption:
+ 7 more weekends = 33 total
Miscellaneous Weekends
Can you help your dad with the garage sale? And your mom is having a dinner party and needs to be shown your fabulous recipe for lamb stew. And we’ve got Seahawks tickets that one weekend if you guys want to go. There’s guaranteed to be one of these each month:
+ 12 more weekends = 45 total
The Inevitable
There’s seven weekends left: New Year’s, Valentine’s Day, President’s Day, Memorial Day, Labor Day, Columbus Day, and, of course, your anniversary. But, seriously, what are you really going to do those weekends? Why don’t you guys just come home? We’ll have dinner and play an incredibly competitive game of trivial pursuit. It will be fun!
Overwhelmed? It’s okay. We’ve all been there and if we haven’t we will eventually. Just pull on your “putting my foot down” shoes and prepare yourselves to juggle the family events. Don’t be afraid to be a little selfish though. Everyone needs a jammies-and-tv weekend once in awhile.
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