Loving the family from a distance

As a disclaimer let me say that I do love my family very much. Without them, I wouldn't be who I am and there are several therapists in my past who wouldn't have new cars because of me. So I would first like to thank my parents for the gifts of humour and talent they gave me and also for helping keep the American economy going.

Most of my family lives in Seattle. I do have a brother who also lives in Canada but for us siblings it seems important to keep a minimum of at least 200 miles distance between each other so that we all get along. Doing holidays is of course difficult, that involves moving quickly from room to room so as not to have more then two siblings in the same room at any given time because a combination of 3 siblings in a room creates the same kind of dangerous chemical reaction as what happened at Chernobyl and 3 mile Island.

I have found in my time here on the prairies an equation that I call the dysfunctional family love equation which is - if you multiply the number of miles I am away from my family times (1750 miles) how much I love my family (10) then you will see I love my family 17500 times more then if I lived in their home (10) or if I lived in the same city about 15 miles from them (150). So you see from this mathematical equation, by moving to Canada, to the prairies, to Regina, I have actually improved my relations with my family, have created enough distance between my sibilings so as not to cause a mass murder and therefore have all around done a great service for my family and myself and my country.

But I do call them because they are elderly and I miss them. The equation I discussed above can also be used for missing them. Replace "love" for "missing" and you see that by being out here I miss them a lot.

I am not sure where the post is going. Last time I talked to my parents I found out that a rogue coyote had chased my sister from the cabin she lives on in my parents property to the house. This would seem disturbing to any normal person and I certainly don't want my sister attacked or hurt by coyotes or vultures or any other animal. But I do find a certain ironic humour in this coyote story when I think back on how my one sister tried to break into my other sister's bedroom with a fork and stab her. Please be aware that if I bring this story up, everyone will deny and call me a liar. I might be a liar, for all I know it was a spoon. But there was a situation that did involve a kitchen untensil and my two sisters chasing each other. As we all know in most stories there is some truth and some story telling to make it more entertaining. With our family there is rarely a need to make things up, because most people can't believe our true stories anyway.

Back to the talking to my mother. She said that one of the wild life biologists who was setting traps on their property dated me in high school. I informed her that I never went on a date with anyone in high school, unless you count the guy who wanted to steal my parents car to go joy riding and that wasn't a date because no one goes joy riding in a volkswagon bus and I didn't go out with him. So she said OK the guy you dated when you were a mormon. Wrong again mother, I didn't date any mormons either, when I was one for that year, before I found softball and drinking. I said my no one ever leaves that area do they? (Seattle) She said it is a beautiful area and no smart person would leave, i.e. me.

This is where that equation discussed above changes. Distance (A) x love (B) - guilt and rage (C) changes the whole equation. Let us look at it again shall we?

(1750 miles x 10 love) - 1,000,000 guilt and rage = -982500

Which puts me in a deficit concerning my family, plus you add phone charges and wow, I am going to have to move to siberia to get this puppy back to a positive number.

So you all can see that my advice is to anyone who has a family like mine is, distance does make the heart grow fonder and thank god for the bonus airmiles I get at Safeway cause I think I am going to need them.