This isn’t exactly a straight answer, just philosophy.
“normality” is relative to who your personality considers compatible, the climate which your physique finds most comfortable, and the culture[S], or country, or ;)planet;) you grew up on.
I thank God everyday for a loving, “normal” family. I think I am the weird one. I got married one year out of high school. My parents got married after going to college and had a child “me” 8 months later. I have an amazing brother and the sweetest sister. My parents can be a little controlling, but I turned out okay…I think.
I think my family is pretty “normal.” 2 parents, 2 kids, no divorce. Mom and dad always owned their own businesses when we were little, so both had to work, but Grandma lived with us and babysat. I graduated high school, got a job, got married. My sister did drop out, but she got her GED, got a job, and got married. Dad has passed away, but we visit mom or she visits us about once a week or so.
Of course, being “normal” doesn’t mean everything is peachy keen all the time. Our family problems usually were not wrapped up in a tidy little ending in 30 mintues (not so thinly veiled sitcom reference). Dad, sister, and I are all disabled, and his illness and death were especially traumatic. But our family has a strong, stable, “normal” relationship.
Now don’t get me started on my husband’s family! :rolleyes:
My friends in college would tease me about how “normal” my family is. My parents (happily married 30 years TODAY and still going strong) did a kick-ass job of bringing us up, and I feel damn lucky to have been born into the family that I was. We went through the usual growing-up angst that you see on the sitcoms, but no real crises or disasters. I wish I knew how my parents pulled it off.
This is my family. As my aunt so eloquently put it, “we all have our dysfunctions. But in this family, all the dysfunctions dovetail neatly into each other, and we all get along just fine.”
My grandparents divorced before I was born, but not before they had five kids together. They both remarried people with kids. I have more stepfamily than blood kin. I understand who’s who, but the first question people who are meeting my family for the first time usually ask is “please tell me there’s no test on this.”
I won’t even go in to the adoption stories. While they’ve all got happy endings, they’re just too damn long!
In a nutshell, I love my family and they love me. I grew up secure, and fairly normal. I wouldn’t trade it for the world. They call people like me “adult survivors of happy childhoods.” Yep. That’s me.
Where shall I start?
Ancestors:
One of my ancestors was the leader of a band of abolitionist guerrillas. They raped and pillaged along the Missouri border during the Civil War. They did manage to free some slaves and help them escape to Iowa, however.
My great-great-grandfather: I don’t remember his name. He was a grand dragon of the Klu Klux Klan in Missouri. Kind of odd…I have an abolitionist on my dad’s side and a Klansman on my mom’s side.
My great-grandparents on my dad’s side, my grandfather’s parents: Complete alcoholics. Great-grandmother is still alive (we’re taking bets on when the old bag’s going to bite the dust) A quote from dear old great grandma: “Rum isn’t booze! Rum is food!”
Great aunt Jane: Conniving, thieving, miserly bitch. Also a world-renowned lecturer. She’s been on Oprah. oooo aaaaah rolls eyes
My grandparents are pretty normal, loving, wonderful people, on both sides of my family, even.
Now, in this section of my family history, things may get a big confusing and strange. Do not be afraid, these people are basically harmless. For the most part.
We’ll start with my dad’s side of the family, they’re more normal:
Actually, no, unless I want to get into second cousins and stuff, nothing on my dad’s side is worth mentioning.
My mom’s side of the family:
Okay, my mom is the eldest of seven children, by age:
Uncle Bobby: Lives in a trailer on my grandfather’s farm. He’s a Christian fundamentalist, the really extreme kind. He once engaged me in a debate over homosexuality over the phone. I hung up on him when he yelled, “it’s Adam and Eve, not Adam and Steve!” Good god. He was normal, once, you know. He even went to a strip club with my dad. Then the baptists got him.
Uncle Marlin: Used to be married to a girl named PJ, and they had a little girl together, Sarah. PJ left Marlin for his brother Darren when Sarah was still a baby. Sarah has no idea that her uncle Marlin is really her father, and Marlin isn’t “allowed” to treat Sarah any differently than the rest of his nieces and nephews. I hear for a short time, PJ might have sort of gone back to Marlin, but I don’t know, could have been a rumor. But she’s definitely with Darren now.
Also, we think Marlin is gay. This would be fine, but he’s also the most homophobic person I know, except, perhaps, for Bobby.
Aunt Janice: Every time she gets pregnant, she almost dies. She is now pregnant with her fourth child.
Her first husband was jailed for child molestation. She didn’t decide to divorce him until a year after he went to prison.
Then, she married Everett! All was well at first, sure, he was an alcoholic, but he treated Janice well. Then, one night he returned home from a bender, and he’s lying in bed, when someone walks in through the front door. Everett, without checking to see who it is, reaches down, grabs his shotgun, and blows the intruder’s head off. It turned out to be Sonny, Everett’s drinking buddy. The conclusion of the “investigation” was that it was accidental. Everett was never even arrested. Now, he’s beating the kids and Janice refuses to do anything about it.
Uncle Darren: Well, he’s pretty normal, aside from the above mess with PJ.
Aunt Susan: Recently left her four children and husband for a man she met on the internet and hung out with him for a while, then showed up with him at my grandfather’s farm, my uncle Chris the cop discovered that the internet guy had two warrants out for his arrest, so he turned him in. Susan convinced my grandfather to bail him out, and then they skipped, stealing uncle Marlin’s gun. Susan is actually back with her family now, but no one knows where the boyfriend is.
Uncle Chris: Used to be married to Carolyn, who tried to kill him on several occasions, just because he left her at home alone because he had to go to work. They divorced after their twin boys were born stillborn. Carolyn went on to marry another man, who inexplicably turned up shot. It was ruled a suicide. We kind of doubt it.
Everyone in my generation are either totally normal, or too young to tell.
You think this is long? You should have seen it when I was including my mom’s cousins. It’s a miracle I’m sane…