It's been a couple of days since I've returned from Christmas in a wood cabin in the snowy wilderness of the Adirondacks and I nearly feel like myself again. As I think everyone who reads this is aware of the once-in-a-century snowstorm that hit Portland on the day we were living I won't go into the trials of the trip out there. Just start off with the understanding that the six days in the cabin started with me in a state of exhaustion.
The cabin is owned by my parents-in-law, two gentle, kind caring people who clearly love the place, who clearly love their family and whose greatest joy was to spend the holidays with their family. These are nice people. Not just nice people, but Nice People. They smile a lot, they like sweaters, gentle music, uplifting stories. They love where they are from and don't really feel the need to be anywhere else, they know what they like and are going to keep doing it for the rest of their lives. They volunteer, they give, they cause no harm, they care about the environment, they are highly educated, they have raised lovely daughters. These are the sort of people that the world needs.
My family argues. We have tempers. We are strong, independent characters, restless people. We have opinions, moods, flights of fancy and dark depressions. We discuss and debate philosophy, politics, love, and hate as a basic level of our beings. We need to hide from people in solitary caves, exhausted by other people and frightened of what we might do or say. In groups we tend to lead or rebel. When my family is together it is the most interesting thing going on in the vicinity, but we do not change, submit, or follow. It is hard to be with the members of my family.
The cabin is a two story structure, but open inside with a gorgeous spiral staircase wound tightly through the center. The dimensions are, at a guess fifty feet by thirty feet, and there are three doors inside the building, two bedrooms and the bathroom. There is no place within the building that a conversation above a whisper cannot be heard anywhere else in the building. Because of the small space there is a specific place for everything, cups, dishes, cleaning supplies. You name it and it's in that cabin in a specific place. Towels are rolled, not folded, and hung with washcloth. The water is on-demand electric heat and septic tank, so you can't take a shower and have dishes done, or wash your hands, or anything else at the same time. Dishes cannot be done with running water. Wood for the fire is stacked in a particular order to dry and fetched from the special shed with a bag, emptied into a box, placed in the stove in a particular fashion and completely burned. This provides temperatures of near 80 degrees until the stove is left for a while and the freezing air from outside leaks in. Clothing is flannel nightgowns, pajamas, wool sweaters, slippers or snow boots. Each person has their own glass (marked with a tag) their own napkin (marked with a napkin holder) throughout the week. Before supper hands are held around the table and grace is said (or even sung!). Outside are drifts of snow, winds, and no people, shops or bars within reach. Within this cabin were six adults and a baby.
What I'm trying to point out is that even niceness can be oppressive and exhausting when it is not your niceness. At every single moment I felt the pressure that every culture on the earth exerts to get people to conform. There is not a single group of people on the planet that does not unconsciously do things in a certain way without thinking why, and that reacts to otherness with a certain amount of distaste. There was a right way to do every single thing, and every single time it was not the way I would have done it, and every time I got something wrong I felt the discomfort. I also felt the discomfort at my discomfort. I gave myself a C, a passing grade, having only made a complete arse of myself on three or four occasions of which I am aware an not permanently ruining any relationships. My hosts certainly did better than I.
The people at the cabin all read this blog. I'm sure none of them would have written about this subject, but I'm home, on my blog and I'm free to do what I want again.
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2 comments:
Sounds like a good time, actually. Family get-togethers are always fraught with peril, so when they don't end disastrously, I tend to count it as a success.
The generosity Dan and Christina showed Leslie Anne and me is humbling. They went to a great expense of money and time and endured significant travel hardships to give us the best Christmas and Anniversary gift possible: their presence and good humor.
The scene is well set; a prolonged, isolated, multi-generation, high population density, family encounter. The cabin interior is even smaller than Dan's estimate...24' x 36' footprint, perhaps 1300 sq ft of "stand up" floor-space. Dan failed to mention the added stressors of a 12 hour power outage; a septic system "slow down"; and weather that see-sawed from sub-zero to 50 deg F and back; with snow, sleet, freezing-rain, rain, and back to snow. These discomforts were not important while we enjoyed each others company.
Despite the oppression of "nice"; despite a heritage of contrariness; Dan engaged his in-law family and survived. It's a good thing Dan's self grading won't be on his transcript. I come from a pre grade-inflation era and can give him "B / B+" (family decorum / patching up and moving on). The joint adventure has moved us along the continuum: strangers to friends to loved-ones.
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