Family Affairs

Last week I finished my first 'Christmas Gift' book, Dress Your Family In Corduroy And Denim by David Sedaris.  Brian bought this one for me.  He and Bri know how much I love to read about families that are 'as' or 'more' dysfunctional than we are at times. LOL!

This book is a collection of articles that humorist David Sedaris has written about his immediate family.  I was hooked from the very beginning when Mr. Sedaris recounts a 'Snow Day' from his childhood.  After suffering through a morning with housebound children, his mother sends David and his sisters out to play in the snow.  She then proceeds to lock the door so that they can't get back in!  After several attempts to gain reentry, they decide to get her attention one way or another...and, boy, do they ever!

But, as in any family, there were also stories that were hard for me to read.  Perhaps the most difficult for me personally was the account of a dinner party in Paris.  When Mr. Sedaris begins to recount an experience he had that day with a man with a rubber arm, his partner, Hugh, questions and denounces in front of the guests that it must have been a plastic arm.  I know that I have been guilty of questioning Jim in front of guests about something that didn't really matter in the grand scheme of things and only ended up making everyone around us uncomfortable. 

Yet, my favorite account was of David going to visit his newborn niece, the daughter of his younger brother who he 'lovingly' refers to as The Rooster.  I could just imagine in my mind's eye this rough and tough man's man who spews forth obscenities at the drop of a hat, bent over his daughter's crib cooing over her with words that would make a preacher's ears glow red!

This book contains some language and adult subject matter.  As I said before, some of the chapters were hard for me to read...and for various reasons.  But all in all, I enjoyed most of the stories compiled in this book. 

And as to whether or not we are more dysfunctional than the Sedaris family...well, I will leave that to my children to determine.  Who knows, they may even make a lot of money by recounting stories of us some day!