Today is my father’s birthday. Despite the impression one may get from my last thread, I do love the old man. Knowing this was coming up (luckily, Dad’s birthday is on the same date every year :D), I took him out to dinner last night; tonight I have another commitment I would rather not bail on; it’s a class I’m teaching, and my not showing up pretty much ruins the event for the students. I gave Dad his present last night as well.
One of my brothers lives on the other side of the state. Technically, anyway–he travels a great deal for work, and in an average month is probably home 10-15 days out of 30. I got a call from him an hour ago saying that he and his wife had come in to surprise Dad for his birthday, and my sisters and I are all invited to have dinner, his treat. They’ll be here all weekend. I told my brother that I’d not be able to join them because of the prior engagement but would see him tomorrow. Not long after this one of my many busybody sisters called, complaining that I was, as usual, bailing on a family event. This sister knew about the surprise ahead of time; my brother told her and no one else.
This is, unfortunately, the brother I like. If it were my other brother, whom I refrain from murdering for entirely selfish reasons, I’d have replied, “I’d come, dude, but first I have to finish sharpening my emasculating knives.”
You made time for your father ahead of time because of other commitments. Good for you. It would not be fair to now pull out of those commitments just because of the family guilt trip.
As already mentioned, you have all weekend for the family.
If it were a milestone birthday and if I knew it would be important to him, or if my dad were in poor health and I thought it would be important to him, I’d go.
Otherwise, I’d tell my sister how inconsiderate it was of them to schedule a family even on a day when I couldn’t attend due to my work schedule.
It’s not really fair to your students if you bail on the class. Your duty to your Dad is covered. If your brother/other family want you to attend something, they need to give reasonable notice. This is on them, not you.
This should not be a big deal. Your brother came into town as a surprise for dad’s birthday (great). He invited you to dinner *on him *(how nice). You can’t go because you have plans (too bad), but you already celebrated with dad (that’s good). If anything, you’re brother owes you an apology for not letting you know sooner (assuming he knew well in advance that he would be coming into town). Your sister can hug a nut.
It’s not a formal, for-credit class; it’s a gathering of enthusiasts in my hobby. I’m “teaching” because I happen to be the group’s expert in this sub-category of the field. I’d have happily cancelled it even yesterday if I’d known my brother was coming in town.
You are concerned that you are going to look bad because you are considerate enough to keep commitments you have made? Not a hard decision really. You become and provide an example to others how to a better person for meeting your commitments.
IMO, Your family sounds a lot like mine and whether your show up at this surprise dinner or not they will not care in a week.
Enjoy the class and spend the rest of the weekend with family if you dare…
So do the class, perhaps in a summary fashion and/or “Part 1 of 2” format, but wrap it up in time to get over to the family gig in time to have dessert if you like.
Even for a non-credit class, people have already made arrangements to get there from work, and chances are at least one person scheduled an outing with their own friends or family so they could be at your class tonight. If you want people to take the class seriously enough that they bother to put it in their calendar then you should show.
And it’s a bad precedent for your sister, she knows what to do next time she wants to get you to do something.
No, don’t let family guilt trip you. Either they learn to let you in on things and clear their plans with you or they don’t, but that burden should be on them, not you.
Given this and your other thread about the “family” picnic over Labor Day, I think your sisters sound a little nutty.
First, they were upset with you for not attending an event you had no reason to think you were invited to, and now, they say that not abandoning your commitments at a moment’s notice shows that you don’t care about family, even though you already had your own event with the family member in question, and you did this in advance specifically because you *didn’t *want to “bail” on him.
And what I also don’t get is why this had to be a secret from anyone but your Dad. I’ve planned a few surprise parties in my time, and I always thought the point was to surprise the honoree, not the entire guest list. If it was really important to your brother for you to be there, I assume he would have told you sooner.
Oh! Is it possible he told your sister to pass on the information to you, and she just dropped the ball? And she’s deflecting her embarassment onto you as anger?
Exacatly. If fact, you should *demand *he apologize for scheduling a family event without talking it over with you first. The rule for family squabbles is the same as for any other form of warfare - always take the offensive.
So this sister could take the time now to call you and give you a ration of shit, but couldn’t take the time earlier to inform you of the plans? I’d say it’s time for her to take a flying leap.
I went to both. My brother was cool with me not coming (the crap wasn’t coming from him in the first place), and since he was paying, he asked me what time I’d be done with the class and rescheduled the dinner accordingly.
There was still drama, though. Rhymers are incapable of doing things without drama. That’s one of our two major flaws.
