family

My father's brother lives out in Los Angeles, but he and my father were not on speaking terms for a long time. After I moved out here, they finally reconciled, and they saw each other for the first time in 16 years last month, when my parents came to visit me. It was great--suddenly, I had an aunt and uncle right around the corner. So tonight, my aunt and uncle invited me over for dinner. I was a little nervous about going over there alone because, though we're related, they are basically strangers to me. It's hard to know how to act--you can't be too polite, but then you can't be too familiar either.

Luckily my uncle took care of that real quickly. Ten minutes into the dinner, he said, "So, tell me--how did you get to be so fat?"

Ah, Uncle. You really are family. I told him my mom had sent me a weight-loss hypnosis book, and he was appeased.