Of Nanner Pudding and Attack Beagles

Last Friday night, The Amazon and I were invited to have spaghetti with Cousin Sassy, her hubby and Cousin H's youngins, the oldest of which I hadn't seen since her daddy's wedding. She's going off to college in the fall, but I still pictured her as a wee little thing.

Time is weird.

And Cousin H can still bite me, in case you were wondering.

Cousin Sassy went to a lot of trouble to accommodate me, cooking whole wheat pasta (for my "diabeetus") and fixin' the meat and sauce in separate pots. Desert was banana pudding, which I'm pretty sure had sugar in it, but it was banana pudding.

I will risk my blood sugar for a little southern banana pudding. You can't give up every damn thing.

Cousin Sassy, her hubby Cousin Larry and their two dogs live in a cute little trailer in a nice looking trailer park over on the high fallootin' side of the county. Neither of them have jobs, both are on disability for an assortment of ailments and the trailer belongs to Sassy's parents. They bought it to lease out for some extra income, but I think there's been kinfolk of one flavor or another living in it since the beginning. 

As ya'll know, I'm not big on social gatherings. My anxiety attacks run rampant, more so with family and close friends than with total strangers. Oh and Bossholio. He has the ability to look at me wrong and send me into a fit of nerves.

Let my just interject here, sometimes well meaning people toss the phrase "anxiety attack" around a little loosely.. which is fine, but I want to clarify that I'm referring to a full fledged panic event. 

So anywho, now that we've made the level of my nuttiness crystal clear, know that I only felt the fear rise up in my chest once during the evening. Cousin Sassy had permanently affixed herself to an office chair in front of the kitchen table, where I assume she spends the majority of her time, while the rest of us distributed ourselves around the living room, watching Cousin Larry prepare food and cater to Sassy's every need. When the announcement was made to "come on and gityerself a plate," I kinda panicked. I had managed to avoid any real conversation by focusing on Sassy's extremely hyper terrier mix, who doesn't want to be petted, but did make a peace offering of a big, half chewed, tennis shoe. For a couple of seconds, the thought of leaving the security of the overstuffed couch, where I could kinda hide, and walking to the kitchen for food that I was going to eat in front of people, gave me the heeby jeebies.

I had to talk myself down off the mental cliff. The promise of nanner pudding did the trick.

When stuff like this happens, I am frozen with fear in the moment, then I feel like a total turdburger after I calm down. Knowing that Cousin Larry suffers from PTSD as well helped. We are a family of misfits.

After I calmed my silly ass down and partook of the specially prepared noodles and sauce with salad and garlic bread (yeah I know.. carbs. It didn't kill me,) stories were exchanged of years gone by. The Amazon heard some new ones and Cousin Sassy and I tried to fill in some of the gaps of the past 20 or so years that I've kept myself pretty much cut off from all things family related. It seemed fitting that we were in a trailer park as tales of intruder attacking beagles, pulled guns, knife incidents and a weed eating accident that left Cousin Larry at the bottom of an embankment and damn near got Sassy arrested.

I might get used to being a part of something again. Who knows? Time will tell.

Ya'll have a good one. Later Taters!!

Tweet Pin It