I remember when I first came to Germany, I was flying into Frankfurt and catching a train down to where we live. Josh couldn't get off work, so a cousin of mine was going to pick me up at the train station. I was stressed about the whole ordeal because I couldn't help but think what if something went wrong? What if I missed my train or my flight was late? Without a working cell phone I'd have no way to tell anyone, and no one would be the wiser. My poor mom and cousin Noelle got to experience this feeling as well on their trip over here. Their flight out of Minneapolis was three hours late due to some mechanical problems. I knew about this because my dad emailed me to let me know. I checked their flight status and saw that they would not make their connecting flight in Amsterdam. I could see there was another flight they could make later in the afternoon, but I really had no way of knowing if they were going to be on that flight or not. I was starting to think if they didn't make the afternoon flight out of Amsterdam I would just drive the 3.5 hours to go get them. As it turns out, they were able to get on the later flight and were able to use a credit card to call me and let me know. It worked out. They arrived a bit later and worse for wear, but they were here.
My mom decided to let my cousin have the guest bedroom and slept on the couch. Josh accidentally forgot to turn off his alarm on Thanksgiving morning, so we woke up at 5. Neither one of us could go back to sleep, so we decided to get up and do some more prep work. At first I thought the light from the kitchen and the noise of us moving around would wake my mom up... but not so. We worked in the kitchen for close to two hours, and she snoozed away the whole time. I was impressed. We finally woke her up simply because we needed to start moving tables and things around. I am thankful I had extra hands available. For the most part I had things under control, and really I didn't have too much I had to do. Most of my cooking was pretty simple, done right before we were ready to eat. I had done most of my cooking days prior. Josh had the most work with the meat. So it gave me a chance to talk with guests and relax (somewhat).
At first I thought some people weren't going to show up, so it was going to be a smaller Thanksgiving than I planned. But, at the last minute everyone arrived and we had 12 adults, 1 toddler, 1 infant, and 2 scared cats. Dinner went off without a hitch, everyone seemed happy. People ate, we hung out, we watched movies. All seemed to go well.
Until.
There is a moment in time when you host something where you decide you are done. You're done hosting, you're done being polite, you are done having people at your house and you want them to leave. This happened for me around 6. I had fed people at 3, they had had time to sit, socialize, enjoy dessert... I was ready for people to start to go so I could clean up and relax. I think part of this was due to the fact that my friend Melissa left, and I was suddenly the only sober person in room full of drunks. My patience level quickly deteriorated. Seriously people? You got a free meal. Get the f*ck out. Even though I was thinking this, I continued to play good hostess and smile.
As the night wore on, people got drunker. Josh and some of his work buddies were huddled outside on our balcony drinking beer and smoking cigars. It was nice that they were out of the way, but they kept tracking dirt on the floor and letting in cold air every time someone went in or out. There was also a female guest (who I had not met prior to Thanksgiving - she was a friend of a friend) who was quite drunk... and quite obnoxious. I wasn't the only one who was annoyed with her, Jimmy was beyond annoyed as well. Then there was Cody. Cody, who under all other circumstances is a kind, polite person... was a drunk mess. He spent most of Thanksgiving trying (successfully) to flirt with my cousin while (successfully) spilling his drink all over the couch. And himself. Multiple times. The first few times it was almost amusing. Melissa had cleaned up the couch a few times. After Melissa left, it was up to me to clean the couch. And... after doing it once, I was ready to kill him. Then drunk Cody was rude and obnoxious to my cousin... and then he attempted to pick a fight with one of Josh's co-workers. Jimmy and I decided it was time for Cody to go home, so I drove the two of them to Cody's house.
When I got home, I was even more annoyed. Everyone was drunk. People were obnoxious. It was close to 11 and all I wanted to do was clean up and go to bed. But... having people around the house made cleaning up impossible, and well, going to bed would be rude. So I stuck it out, trying to make conversation and mingle... all the while feeling more and more annoyed wishing people would take a hint and leave. Finally, at midnight, I decided I had been more than fair and I didn't care if it seemed rude, I was going to bed. No one realized at first that I had slipped off to bed. Josh finally got everyone out of the house around 1:30.
But here is my lesson. As much as I really want to make sure that everyone is fed and has somewhere to go... this Thanksgiving was not fun for me. Towards the end it was a touch miserable. I really want to have the power to tell people to leave (which, I know I did... I just don't know if I have the nerve to use that ability). I like people to have a good time, but having everyone dissolve into a drunken mess really was annoying. I don't know what our plans for Christmas are, but I've already decided if we host, it will be smaller and only consist of close friends (i.e. Melissa). I really don't feel like going through that stress twice in one year so close together.
The silver lining to it all was in the morning. My mom was up right away and helped to get things put away. While I washed dishes, Josh and my mom sorted out garbage and got things put back in place. Jimmy showed up and helped to mop the floors. My house was back in order in a short amount of time. The highlight to all of this cleaning was when Cody showed up. Jimmy had told him of his behavior the day before, and he felt horrible. If someone were going to apologize with some sort of present, they would bring over flowers, or a bottle of wine, or a card. Not Cody. Cody brought over apology cake. Not one, three. One for me, one for my mom, and one for Noelle. All the cakes were basically identical. He had asked the bakery at the Commissary to write "I'm sorry, I hope you like cake" on all three cakes. The writing had no punctuation and looked like it had been done by a three-year-old. It was, in a way, endearing. It was also hilarious. I really was never mad at Cody because I have known him for awhile and he has always been a good guest (prior to Thanksgiving).
How can you not find this funny?
So lesson learned. From now on smaller hosting. And growing a pair to tell people to leave.
The rest of Mom and Noelle's adventure I'll post later....
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