Join the Fam

Oh, in case you didn't know, Little Sister is engaged.

You know those emojis with hearts coming out of their eyes? That's what Little Sister looks like. Hearts are coming out of her eyes. Every. Day. Nonstop. If it weren't so novel, it would get old.

The future Mr. Little Sister is one of Little Sister's longtime friends. His family lives just a few blocks from my family. He and Little Sister grew up together; they were even baptized on the same day. It's a good match.

One can't help but feeling sorry for Mr. Little Sister, though. Why? Well, never having dated anyone, I didn't realize this until just recently...but, I mean, think about it. What is a family? A family is essentially a clique that has been together their entire lives. They have years and years of not only shared genes but also experience, stories, and jokes. Think about trying to break into that exclusive group.

Yikes.

I wouldn't say that we Obnoxiouses are snobs. For the most part, my family on both sides has a history of welcoming all kinds of people, related or not, and making them part of us. However, just because we're welcoming, that doesn't mean it's easy to fit in with us. We are a peculiar people.

On Sundays, I go to my parents' house for family dinner. Mr. Little Sister has joined us each week since the engagement. Each week, I've analyzed our dinner conversations from the viewpoint of an outsider. Here's how it's gone:

Week One Topic of Conversation: Family joke night. We told Mr. Little Sister every stupid joke we know. Most of them aren't funny but he, bless his heart, still laughed.

We also burst into song at one point. Luckily, Mr. Little Sister comes from a musical family, so he was able to join in right away. Good job, Mr. Little Sister!

Week Two Topic of Conversation: Nancy Drew and...nope, that's pretty much it. We essentially spent all of dinner talking about our favorite Nancy Drew games. Mr. Little Sister hasn't played those games (although I'm sure that will change shortly). He was left listening valiantly to our ramblings.

Week Three Topic of Conversation: Ginger Cousin. Musical theatre (that is something Mr. Little Sister knows quite a lot about). And then we took a dramatic veer and started trying to decide which Greek goddess is most like our mom.

Apparently, you need to brush up on your mythology if you want to eat dinner with our family.

And did I mention that all six of the Obnoxious children can carry on two conversations at once? I can either talk to one sibling while listening to another sibling talk to me, or I can listen to two siblings talking to me simultaneously. Often, dinner devolves into all of us talking over one another in a chain of conversation. We don't even notice we're doing it until somebody points it out to us!

It seems that, after three weeks of being initiated into our family, most people would have concluded that we are too much to be borne. The fact that Mr. Little Sister has stuck around tells me that he and Little Sister are meant to be.