Grasshopper New Media Presents...

I just came back from a trip to visit my husband’s family.  They’re a jovial, fun-loving bunch, always telling jokes and stories.   On this visit, I started to notice how we all develop a certain sense of infamy in our own families and extended families- a reputation, so to speak, a character sketch, a role that we fill.  The stories that get most repeated are those that reinforce these family-created stereotypes and roles, even if they feel strange to us in our “normal” lives.

For example, the year my husband and I got engaged, I asked for a Kitchenaid Mixer for Christmas.  For me, this meant getting a powerful tool for my kitchen, something to add to my cooking arsenal.  It was the equivalent of my husband asking for a new router for the wood shop- something that fed a hobby, so to speak.

My Mother In Law, in contrast, has never been a passionate cook, and could easily be labled a feminist, and my sisters-in-law are somewhat cut from the same cloth.  The idea a modern woman would actually want something like a mixer or a cuisinart, and especially at the holidays, was not something they fully understood.  In fact, they thought my husband was off his rocker to even think such a thing was an appropriate Christmas gift.  Yet, when the gift arrived, I whipped up fantastic mashed potatoes in a flash for Christmas dinner, and they saw, maybe, a touch of utility in a gift that seemed remarkably old-fashioned and distinctly non-feminist.

This story gets told and retold as a family legend.  It always strikes me as funny, because I see myself as a very self-assured person, a modern woman, not a 1950’s June Cleaver type at all.  I am not all that fond of house cleaning, but I love cooking and in that regard, I am a bit of a “gear-head”.  I see this fondness for things like a bread maker not as a disease, but another gadget to play with and have something to show for it in the end.

I also have a pretty nice sewing machine I’ve used to make quilts, christmas gifts, hem pants and the like.  I also knit, and give in to my niece’s request for fancy french braids when I come to visit.  So I can see, that from the perspective of other women who do none of those things, I look pretty retro- a girly-girl, a crafty girl, with knowledge of some of those secret talents they really didn’t get exposed to when growing up.

Yet, I am also the person they ask all the computer and technology questions.  I recently helped my mother in law put an ad on Craig’s List to rent her condo, and we got a great response in less than three hours, making me look like a superhero.  I talk to them about ways to help market their businesses better online, or solve other thorny problems.  And while this adds to my general geekiness profile in their eyes, I think they are still floored by my fondness for practical gifts as well as the esoteric. (I don’t think I should mention the new washer-dryer we got recently- it will only make them shake their heads even more).

Likewise, my husband was the bright kid, the responsible one, growing up.  Yet he was also nick-named Crash for the way he goes down stairs, with what we can call a general lack of ballerina-like grace.  He was the boy in a household full of women, and the stories that are told are largely ones about practical jokes, messy bathrooms, or sibling rivalry at its finest.

Now he is a doctor, an OB-GYN, who spends his days caring for people and doing clinical research to try and make patient care better.  His family will always ask for medical advice when they need it, but often, when he is there, he still seems very much the little goofy brother.   (This is actually the best role to have, because we can go grab all the kids and head out to the water park or arcade, while the other adults do whatever- we get to have all the fun!)

I’m always amazed at how easy it is to slip in and out of all these family roles, and how different our roles seem to be when we are not around our extended family.  And I wonder what kind of roles we are carving out for our own kids, and whether they will feel these are comfortable places, or maybe too restrictive as they grow up themselves.

Does this happen in your family?  What is your role?  Do they stories that are told emphasize this myth, and how do you help your family realize you are more than just the role you play in the family drama?  And is your role any different with your spouse and kids than it is with your folks or in-laws?

I’m gradually coming to terms with my role as the female version of “Bill Nye the Science Guy” meets Martha Stewart in the eyes of my in-laws, even if at home I feel a little more like Geeky Mom.  And strangely enough, it all works for me in the end, mostly because I am finally pretty comfortable with who am, regardless of the labels from outside, and I suppose that’s what matters the most.

by Whitney Hoffman

Photo graciously provided by kkelly2007, through a Creative Commons license, some rights reserved