Sunday Lunch with the Family

Sunday lunch was an almost weekly event.  Well, if we're going to be technical, Sunday lunch is a weekly event since I always eat lunch and Sunday happens every week.  But what I mean is that the post-church get together for food has a tradition in most churches.  When I was in high school, it was always with the youth group.  Mom typically had lunch or we could go out to eat, but of course in high school, I needed to be with the cool kids.

College led to Sunday lunches almost always at Mazatlan (pronounced MAHZZ-uh-lawn to most Nashvillians, but I will never be able to say it like that again!) because that's where we could afford and it was relatively fast.

Post-college has taken me to a new tradition.  At least once a month, and usually more often, Ashley and I go to her parents' house or out to eat with them after church.  The Vicki-cooked meal is always welcome.  And while I boycotted the restaurant lunch for a bit feeling guilty eating on their dime, yet realizing they wouldn't let me pay, I eventually gave in.

Apparently Alma's family has the Sunday lunch thing going, too.  This past Sunday was her aunt Gaby's birthday lunch (Gaby is the one who rode with Mamá Alma to take Mom to the airport at 5:30 am!).  We celebrated with pozole, a reddish soup with special corn, meat, and the occasional bone.  Even when it is not a birthday, though, the clan gets together.  Mamá Alma is the oldest of ten: four girls and 6 boys.  Wow.  The past few Sundays we have been busy and unable to go, but I was thankful I got to participate this week!  Guests are always welcome (as at pretty much any Mexican function).  Mamá Alma introduced me as her other daughter to those I had not yet met.  We got there two hours later than most (Alma takes her sleeping in seriously on Sundays since it's the only day she can), but the conversation was nowhere near finished.  We chatted, joked, and sat in precious few moments of very comfortable familial silence.  At one point, they were all making jokes and laughing in such a way that I thought about every holiday at Grandmother's.  We tell the same stories and laugh at the same jokes year after year.  It gets old, yet never gets old.

I tried to picture this weekly coming and going in the US and I couldn't place it.  There's always the next place on the list to go.  The next "to do" to cross off.

Will I ever fit back into my former, anal, organized and planned to the second self?  (And why am I bothering thinking about this now with 4 months to go?!)