Secret's Out

...and it's time for the gossipping to begin!

Last night my husband and I joined his family for the rehearsal dinner for his stepbrother's wedding. We had the unfortunate seating arrangement of being surrounded by (a) our nephews, who were tired, cranky and fidgety and (b) the notorious Aunt S (the one who cornered us on the boat at the reunion and spent half an hour on a rant about couples who get married and "waste" too much time having fun before doing what's important -- starting a family -- and how parents who only have one child are horribly selfish), complete with three glasses of wine before we even arrived. Luckily, Aunt S was next to my husband -- I had to help watch and discipline the middle nephew, who adores me but is nonetheless a giant PITA who doesn't listen and is in his mockery stage where he repeats everything anyone says. FUN! But again, I had the easy job.

Aunt S's daughter was getting visibly annoyed by the boys. While she's got a case of the baby rabies herself right now (she recently issued an ultimatum to her husband -- they either start trying in one year or it's divorce), she wants girls and only girls. A houseful of girls. Well, Aunt S taunted her and said "you're going to have all boys," which set her off. It wasn't a pretty scene.

She then asked A, "so when are you two going to start trying?" I was busy wrangling the two oldest nephews when I heard "…if we decide to have kids," followed by Aunt S's loud gasp. "If? DECIDE? What do you mean, IF?" Now, I'm all for being honest and opening up with the family about this, but S +4 (she's quick) glasses of wine is probably NOT the best test case to try this out on. She got very very flustered and only dropped it when her sister (A's stepmom) told her to stop making a scene. She was getting very defensive and A had tried to lighten it with comedy, but she was getting more and more defiant.

A prelude, perhaps? Who knows. S is a big lush and gets very boisterous and opinionated (her opinion = she is right) after the wine starts flowing. (I learned this the hard way at my first Christmas with the family.) I know this conversation with her isn't over (it never is), but maybe it will lead to finally coming out and dealing with the problems.

But at least it's out there. Although we *have* decided for certain, it's probably best to open the discussion with the notion that we're still making up our minds -- give them some time to get used to the idea before we come out and say "we're sure about this".