Agreed. And sometimes I do feel like it is more of a danger in the US than other developed nations simply because of the extreme, rugged individualism, individuals' rights kind of mentality that is often so prevalent here. We forget that we are a community, a society, that there is interdependence necessary in order to keep it going.

True. I think a lot people are quite confused about what happens during a government shut down. They may also not understand what "essential personnel" means so think that trash is essential. I honestly wish that when things like this happen, instead of a lot of the nonsense that pollutes the news cycle, it would be nice if journalists would do some good, public education stories like "what to expect during the shut down and in detail" which could then be shared and posted all over social media. Too many people do not understand what is going on, and that's a real problem.

In terms of assets, living together generally does not give one a legal right to your assets. So that is one aspect. Another is that many people have estates that are more complicated than just whose name is on the house. Retirement benefits, pensions, insurance policies that are not so straight forward, overseas holdings, etc. In a community property state, marriage makes those assets marital assets. Living together does not. And in some states, the laws really do not favor live in domestic partners and they can be evicted pretty easily. In my uncle's case, he and his long term girlfriend were VERY private and kept their relationship quite low key in terms of the niece and nephew he fostered while they were young. People do that. They really do limit contact if that is their priority. He had babysitters, and they went out. They sometimes spent a week or so of summer vacation with my grandparents, so he and his girlfriend would take a cruise or whatever. If something happened to DH and I decided to date again, I would not have the new person around my adult kids at all, and that might be something I would choose to maintain for many, many years. But if I married that person, permanently shared a domicile, etc. it would be a lot tougher. In MIL's case, we have never met her boyfriend's children. They have no desire to meet us. The twain shall not meet apparently. That's fine. That is their choice, and we don't view them as family or anything so have no vested emotional interest in them either. With young children it might not be easy, but it absolutely can be done.

LOL, we have this problem with the boy majoring in Anthropology. He always thinks of some human behavior thing to discuss. He is usually bouncing with excitement when he gets out of the movie theater because he just can't wait to gush about some aspect and have a discussion.

Not too often really. Like years in between. But I had the hankering this summer, late August, to try it. It didn't work out. I am glad I tried the cut because I've always wanted to, but was partially a razor cut style and my hair didn't respond well or blow dry the way it needed to which is the case for some people. Some textures are better for that than others. So I'm growing it out. Right now it is in a nice stage where the razor cut ends have been cut and are gone, and it isn't so long that I am losing volume, but not so short I can't do anything with it since I have fairly straight hair that just doesn't respond to much blow drying. I will likely keep it about this length. The new cut had a lot more layers than the old one, and it is the one aspect that I am keeping. It does "wash and wear" nicely, and for a performance I had last month, I spent about five minutes with a 1.5" barrel curling iron just putting in some curls and then fluffing with my fingers. It looked really nice. At the current length I could also pull it up on the sides, and maybe even put a pretty pin in it for a half up do which would be good because I have a black tie event in February and need to do something special with it. Since I now know I can actually manage a little curling, I can probably manage the half up and will not need to spend the money to get my hair done for the event. So the change ended up with positives though I pretty much hated my hair until it grew out to this current stage. Prior to that, I hadn't tried a new hairstyle for about a decade.

I lot of what dh, our kids, and I know about treating the environment with respect came from being raised camping, traipsing around the landscape with responsible adults when we were young, participating in 4H or Scouts and other such civic education groups. I think that likely this generation has had far less exposure and upbringing, and it could be regional as well. Here in Michigan, camping and the great outdoors is still a very, very popular thing, and the "how" is still being passed down from generation to generation. It is rare for us to go into a state park, at least on our side of the state, and see the kinds of problems being described. Our national Lakeshores - Pictured Rocks, Sleeping Bear Dune, National Park - Isle Royale, and National Forest - Hiawatha, are not experiencing this. However, I also have to admit that right now, these areas are also not so heavily frequented due to cold weather. They are also heavily monitored by grad school students as all of our better state schools have major DNR conservation study programs, environmental science programs, etc. and these national areas probably have a ton of students and volunteers pitching in. Maybe if the shut down occurred during the summer when we have more tourists from our of state, we would see it. Hard to say. It would not be seen on Isle Royale. That National Park is only available by expensive ferry ride from the Keeweenaw Peninsula, and you can only take what you can back pack in. No vehicles, rough camping - ie you will find some potable water on the island for drinking, but no electricity, and only composting toilets. It is rugged, gorgeous terrain whose only regulars are park rangers, and a lot of research groups, especially grad students, and the most ardent, die hard hikers. It isn't the kind of place that the lazy would go. The population of regulars is low enough that the rangers can actually figure out who messed up and littered. They will find out, and since all visitors are registered, they will fine you. The fines are expensive, very expensive. So potentially maybe we don't see this kind of thing due to weather at the moment, but also due to the culture of the Great Lakes Region being one of handing down proper camping and hiking/backpacking from generation to generation. I also wonder about school culture. When I was a kid, during good weather the teachers often had us all take our lunches outside and eat in the landscaped area of the school, sitting on blankets that they brought from home. They would point out the different flowers and trees that had been planted, and when we were done eating, we got the lecture about bussing out EVERYTHING and not leaving a hint of litter there, of caring for our beautiful yard, etc. It was just part and parcel of the civics education that we were given as elementary and middle school students. I never see that now. I drive pass my old elementary school all the time, and no one is eating outdoors no matter how nice the weather. I've heard that the teachers no longer eat with their students either. The lunchroom has something like 150 students at a time monitored by just three or four lunch room workers. Times have definitely changed in this regard. It makes me very glad that although I did not enjoy camping with little people because it is so much work, we did it anyway.

The legal ramifications, and it isn't easy in this day and age to extract oneself from a bad relationship once the paperwork is signed. It is pretty darn expensive, and way more emotionally damaging because the process through the courts is fairly awful, some states being worse than others. My MIL has a boyfriend. But she's an 82 year old widower with a complicated trust for her estate, and if she married, the whole thing would have to be re-done. Michigan is a community property state, and they each both have three grown children and herd of grandchildren. His kids would have a cow if he remarried. We also said no. Because marriage has legal responsibilities that come with it, and we aren't going to be involved in decision making with his grown kids from another state whom we have never met. Our lives are complicated enough without that! Both of their health is failing so easily something could happen to one of them before all of the complicated financial and legal mess was sorted out, and that would leave all six of us in a whale of a disaster on top of which one of his kids has indicated he'd really like to end up with MIL's house. Of course he does. He's a recovering drug addict, and we live six miles away. His father has even indicated how it would be nice for us to look after the grown son! UHM NO! So they hang out, the travel together, they go to church together, and they genuinely do love each other, but their lives remain legally, formally separate. That's the way it should be. My uncle had a long term relationship for 30 years before he died in his sixties. They both had complicated retirement pensions and plans, both had complicated estates just from a young age (my uncle was fostering a niece and nephew and in order to marry her and keep the children, there hoops to jump with the state as well). The children were pretty unstable over what happened to them so until they were grown, he kept his relationship with her on the down low. She loved uncle very much and was quite happy with the situation. After the kids grew up, they had settled into a happy, content situation that met both of their needs. Neither one had a religious reason to marry, and they both really liked their own houses, neither wanted to give the other place up permanently. It was easy to continue the status quo. We all came to love her, and she was at his side when he passed away. My grandmother re-married after my grandfather died. The man was nice and everything, that wasn't the issue. The marriage complicated her survivor's benefits on my grandfather's pensions, messed up her new husband's benefits which he had been receiving based on his previous wife's pension, caused a six month mess at social security which admittedly was more incompetency in the department and not so much about the marriage but still would never have happened if they had remained single, stuck her with responsibility that she thought his kids would handle but their attitude was "you married him, he's your problem now", etc. She took a huge hit financially, the guy only lived two years, and then my aunt and father figure had to dive in and straighten it all out. Total mess! And especially where there are kids involved....just because the parent really loves someone else, it doesn't naturally equal their getting married as being a good move for the kids. I can think of a lot of scenarios that would make the legal entanglements of marriage undesirable for many, legitimate reasons, yet the relationship is beneficial to both parties. Maybe if we did it like France, it would be easier. They have the Pacs. (Not sure if I spelled that right.) Is a layer of marriage or civil union/civil solidarity that allows the couple involved to easily dissolve with a 50/50 split of marital assets. It has some of the responsibilities of marriage, but allows financial independence and easy separation while still having the tax benefits that France gives to married couples. Fully married is the next option, and it is a legally binding contract that is more involved than here in the USA. It is governed by matriomonial regimes. Here is a description of them. There are four matrimonial ‘regimes’ ( régime matrimonial😞 two communal regimes ( régime communautaire) and two ‘separatist’ regimes ( régime séparatiste). Under a communauté universelle, all assets and all debts are jointly owned; under a communauté réduite aux acquêts, each spouse retains ownership of assets acquired before marriage (and assets acquired after marriage in the form of inheritances and gifts), while all assets acquired jointly after marriage are jointly owned. Under a séparation de biens, nothing is jointly owned; and under a participation aux acquêts, nothing is jointly owned but if the marriage is dissolved, assets acquired during the marriage are divided equally. The above would kind of spell things out ahead of time, and make the financial arrangements standardized.

I am working as a community arts director. I enjoy the job, and would like to stick with it, but if college tuition hikes are too steep for 2019/20 then I will need to take an adjunct music instructor job cobbled with some paid accompanying at the university (better pay than just about anything else musically that I could get at this time just not enough hours) in order to cover it which means leaving a job that I am enjoying. Dh had the biggest adjustment. The boys are away at college so my going to work didn't affect them too much except when I am working while on their breaks, but dh has had to get used to me being gone, not always having all the meal planning and grocery shopping done, not always being able to run his mom to the doctor, etc. He's a trooper though, and things are going well now.

This is my motto for 2019. My goal is to take out one bag of donated items each week, and one bag of throw away. We have to be careful how much extra we put out for the garbage guys. Since Goodwill is near my job, and I am in town three to four days per week, taking it out one bag at a time works. This way it gets done, but isn't an overwhelming job because DH can't manage overwhelming right now, and instead of the boys and I getting some of this done in a big way over their holiday vacations from college, we went to Huntsville and helped dd and family move. So I lost a lot of manpower time there. But I'm okay doing it gradually. There are YEARS of 4H tri-fold project backboards in the balcony, and frankly, none of our four kids is ever going to need those again. Youngest actually had a couple of tubs of clothes that were too small in his room as well as a pile behind his door. They have saved so many toys, but the reality is there is no guarantee that they will ever get those out of here. I'm making one reasonably sized tub of special items for each kid, and everything else is going. I have had years of accumulation from the time when I was doing event planning. I have decided that all of that needs to go to. I had already thinned it some, but now is the time to get rid of all of it. There is one event this coming summer that someone wants help with, but they have money, serious money. There is no need for me to have a bank of supplies of vases, candle jars, you name it for renting out. They will buy whatever custom thing they want, and not bat an eyelash. I need to stop hording this kind of thing. We have to consider rocket storage. We are on year nine of rocketry with 4H - never did find another sponsor so ended up staying with the organization though we really wanted to leave. Something has to give. We are currently storing five high powered, monster rockets, 20 TARC rockets, and various other models. I am done with them taking up my entire project room space upstairs and having nowhere for my own hobbies. I think we will make a collection for the 4H office to display, and then give a bunch out to TARC alumni. Oh, and I found camp stuff in the unfinished part of the house. We have been wanting to get that area finished, but can't until we make room for supplies, and to simply be able to get around. (We don't have a garage here, so that part of the house has been used like a garage.) Our kids are grown, and I have a hard time camping now since the car accident because my hip and knee do not do well on air mattresses. It needs to go away. I found cross country skis too. The boys all adopted alpine and snowboarding so those need to go away. Crazy what accumulates when you stay in one place so long!

Yes, we built. Years ago. It was the best house we've ever had! But, we only had it two years before his job changed, and we moved cross country. The pros are that you get the lay out, the storage, the kitchen design, everything the way you want it provided you have enough money that you can be pretty flexible. For us we didn't have a lot of extra to work with but got lucky in that our contractor had a house design he had built before and after we described what we liked, brought forth that plan, and it was perfect. We made one small change in the laundry room which didn't require an architect. His framing crew easily managed it, Another pro is that everything is new. You simply don't worry about the house maintenance stuff that is such a downer when you get a fixer upper or older home. You just move in. The colors, the carpet, you chose it. I was so content in that home. The cons are that for may couples building can be quite stressful. Rule 1. NOTHING will go on schedule. Nothing. you will not be in that house when you think you will, and at least one sub contractor is likely to screw something up and have to re-do it. You can practically count on this coming somewhere towards the end of the process and a delay passing the permit that allows you to move in. The whole process if VERY likely to take much longer than the original estimate. We were building in a new sub division in which thirteen houses were under construction at the same time as ours - all different contractors. Not a single one was done within even 30 days of the original estimate. Our issue was when our lease on the apartment was up, we couldn't get them to rent to us month to month. We ended up in a camper on a friend's lawn in 100 degree weather with no air conditioning. NOT FUN! So you have to think about that interim living situation. Another con for some is that the contractor might try to talk you into an upgrade that you'd dearly love, but in the end can't afford, and that can leave some rather dissatisfied with their new home. And mistakes will happen. They just do. You are working with humans. So you have to be pretty easy going and rational about it or stress levels skyrocket. We had a lot of fun with it. But, dh and I liked the same things, and aren't prone to arguing. The people next door ended up finishing the house, and then promptly fighting over it in the divorce because apparently the process caused them to fight a LOT. Our contractor was pretty funny, he wanted to know up front just how strong our marriage was, and if we thought we could manage it without putting him in the middle of a personal mess. So I think he'd encountered his fair share of marriages that were not on the best of terms prior to construction. I would do it all over again with dh IF I felt he had the energy. The home we are in will not end up being our forever home even though that was the original intent. There will be another move ahead of us. But, I sense that dh is mentally tired from the rat race, and physically really not wanting to spend time on a job site getting after subs (The guy hired to lay the carpet at our build spent two whole days doing nothing; he brought tv to the job site, siphoned off cable from the finished house next door, and watched sports all day. We caught him, and he got fired. But it delayed our move-in by three days while they found someone else who could come do it.) So I don't think building will be in our future.

I think that it is hard for you emotionally because of the horrific relationships with your mom and grandmother. It is hard to then admit there is one more that probably needs to be cut off or kept at a very great distance. There is no easy way to admit to having such a dysfunctional family. Believe me, I know. It took me a long time to figure out that I simply had to accept that my relatives were NEVER going to get any better. They had zero internal motivation. So I finally weaned myself off contact with the worst offenders, and put serious boundaries in place for the others. You have tried A LOT with your brother. Don't feel guilty if this time you say enough is enough.

Tomorrow we are having a big lunch and a light supper. No guests. I have a Christmas Eve program to direct tomorrow night. In the morning, I'll pop a roasting chicken with potatoes, carrots, and onions into the oven. We'll have quick sandwiches before the program. Christmas Day my mom and MIL are cooking a brown sugar, spiral sliced ham. There will be mashed potatoes with cream cheese, green beans, mandarin oranges and kiwi, salad, and rolls. Chocolate pudding with whipped cream for dessert. Day after - the grandmothers will have leftovers but we hit the road for Huntsville so the boys and I will be eating on the road. We are taking a picnic lunch to eat in the car or if warm enough in Mid-Ohio, at a rest stop picnic table. We'll have a snack for supper on the road, and DD will have nachos ready when we arrive. The next day we are unloading their moving cube and unpacking boxes. We are just putting out trays of good lunch meat, fresh veggies, fruits, cheese, and crackers to eat on all day so people can munch whenever they like, and we don't have to worry about cooking.

American culture. There is very little linguistic, history of language, teaching in our English classes. Whole generations have grown up with absolutely no idea about language groups. They receive only one year of World History out of 13 years in the system, and the way in which it is taught is very poor so little retention. It has left much of our culture without much base on which to think on these things. Additionally, when it comes to religion, within Evangelical Christianity there are groups that do not study the languages in which the Bible was written, discourage teaching pastors from discussing this, all in favor of a pro-King James only translation dogma. I have actually met people who believe the Bible was written in English. It literally has not ever occurred to them to think about this critically.

I always buy a beautiful picture frame. You'd be surprised how many couples get wedding photos and then never get around to having any of them framed. We always do 8 x 10 which is a standard size to order. We've received many thanks that it was a great idea. LOL, I went into my nephew's house one time and five years post wedding, their photos were still on the mantle with sticky tack! That was my inspiration for buying frames as gifts.

Op, we would never do 11 hours. We have a dog that would be quite anxiety riddled if we did that and didn't have a house sitter. So don't feel bad about calling your mom and saying, "We can do 2 p.m. to 5 p.m." This way you can have Christmas at home and still get home at a reasonable time.

My husband's uncle was like this. He was so nuts with his camera that he'd follow people around just constantly snapping photos. It felt like stalking. We hated it. Finally, dh told him that he could snap exactly ONE posed photo of our family around the tree and that would be it. He told him if he didn't abide by our wishes, he'd yank the camera out of his hands and pop the film out. (Back in the day. Now I suppose one would have to threaten to take the Sim card.) It was not a comfortable conversation, but the kids were getting upset because that camera was constantly hovering around them, sometimes in their faces. It was like having personal paparazzi. I doubt you need to be that forthright, but since many people do not respect teens enough to back off when they ask, you'll probably have to go be firm with him and kind of make a big deal of it if you catch him not respecting them. I do think it would help if you gave him the option to get a posed shot with an admonishment that it better never show up on social media.

We do know Egyptians though that can speak Coptic, and a few that can read it as they have felt it was important to study it to prevent it dying out. The number of people who use it is very small, but one set of friends is now using it in their home daily in order to help their children learn the language. I would hate to see it become an dead language so hope that they are successful and others as well. The main difficulty is that Coptic has not evolved through modern times so it lacks the vocabulary necessary to use it in so many instances. It appears that friends kind of tend to blend Arabic and Coptic when speaking because if you say to the children, "You may use the computer for another ten minutes", they have no Coptic word for computer. It can be very limiting. If there is ever a revival of the language, it will be some sort of blended language. Since worship has not changed through the ages within the Coptic Orthodox Community, it never evolved in the ecclesiastical sense. There has also been some back and forth about its use as a written language in modern times. The last adopted alphabet was a combination of glyphs based on Ancient Greek and Demotic Egyptian letters. The argument among linguists is that adopting the use of the Arabic alphabet would make it easier for Egyptians since that is the language they read. However, there has been push back from ecclesiastical scholars who do not like the association with the Islamic faith and instead want to Romanize Coptic by adopting the Latin alphabet. This was the subject of scholarly debate for quite a while, but I can't remember which method was adopted. I'm too lazy right now, LOL, to go look it up! I doubt it will ever come back as any kind of common daily language. But I do hope enough families revive it as much as possible just to keep it alive.

As a music director, I don't use that carol because it is so misleading. This is usually well supported by the pastors that I have worked with, and in some denominations, it is missing from their hymnbooks. The pastor I currently work with from the church that sponsors the community arts program is fluent in Aramaic, Arabic, Koine Greek, Ecclesiastical Latin, and fluently reads Sumarian, Akkadian ( I think that's the one...hard to remember them all), and Egyptian Hieroglyphs. He's on a linguistics board, and has translated some dead sea scrolls in the past. I should ask him about Syriac. It has been a very interesting six months. I love picking his brain.

I was the scapegoat with a passive aggressive mother, verbally and emotionally abusive father, and siblings who wanted their way but wouldn't take responsibility. I did too much, and nearly ruined my marriage. So here is my advice. You need to step back. The golden child either steps up to the plate or doesn't. You aren't going to make any of them happy because their "normal" is to dump on you, use you as the kicking post in the family. Your father has been an essentially abusive person to you so you owe him nothing. Really. Even if people tell you that you do, don't listen. The victim owes the abuser nothing, even if that abuser is his or her relative/parent. You need to protect your health and your marriage. Call the facility, tell them you are no longer available and will not be making decisions nor accepting phone calls from him. He can schedule his appointments around the transportation schedule of the facility or golden boy can do the running. You get your name off all legal documents pertaining to him. Seriously. I have seen how this works where the sibs go after the one that made all the decisions causing legal headaches on top of emotional heartaches. I am not kidding you. I've seen lawsuits. You do not want your name on a thing. I lived the nightmare of accusations from relatives even though I never wanted to be on that POA, and they guilted me into it. Never again. I learned my lesson. Father figure is now dead, and I got a lawyer to force my mother to take my name off everything. My brother is mad as snot, but too bloody bad. The stress of going through that with the one parent while being emotionally beaten up by the two sibs caused major marital problems, health problems, you name it. Not.doing.it.again. It is perfectly acceptable to not take phone calls from him or your sibs. Save your energy and health for your husband and kids. These kinds of wickedly, dysfunctional family situations only destroy people, they rarely ever resolve in any health manner.

We like Apples to Apples for an easy game, and there is a junior edition if you have younger children.

This is highly unusual and frankly I worry about the long term effects on the family. I know that in my case, I tanked my health taking care of my mother and her husband and due to that will consider a trip to Oregon or Switzerland when things get tough for me to spare my own kids ruining their health and well being by over doing elder care. That's how strongly I feel about it. Eldercare has ripped many,many years off my life and nearly destroyed my marriage. How do people remain employed? Does everyone have grown kids? I can tell you that if mom has another event, she will simply have to go to a nursing home and no, there won't be a rotation to make sure she is visited every day. I'd lose my job, my brother would lose his job, and well, my sister lives in France so she wouldn't be able to take part in it at all. There is only one grandchild who lives permanently close by, and she has three very young children and is now single parenting. She is a dedicated young lady, and she would very likely troop her kids to the home once per week, but shifts at a hospital or a nursing home would not be happening. My boys would be available on college breaks but that is it. The other grandkids live anywhere from 85 - 750 miles away. OP I think that what you have going is very unique, a fairly large family and all of them in close enough proximity with enough flexibility of scheduling to keep up this cycle. Most families do not have enough people or enough flexibility to even consider it. And frankly, one has to consider SHOULD it continue. At this point you are likely not the only one with a major health issue. If sibs are guilting each other and the in laws into doing this extreme level of care, it is entirely possible that others are hiding health information from others either for the sake of privacy or out of guilt/wanting to keep family peace. The stress this kind of thing takes is huge and not everyone can handle that so I would expect others are suffering but not saying anything.

Exactly.

I am just trying to think about the conversation. Had my high school boyfriend's mother asked me what my pj size was and then went shopping for said items and then wanted me to don them and sit for a formal family photo, I would have definitely went running into the night! Impromptu photos are one thing, professional photos made into the annual family momento and then sent to all of those relatives are quite a different thing. It does occur to me to that one reaction many be having to the pajamas is that this is the attire one normally wears to bed and wakes up in so it implies "spent the night". For many it would be unthinkable to allow minors, and especially 14/15/16 year old ones to have overnight boyfriend or girlfriend unless an emergency warranted it, and would not be thrilled with the imagery. The reality is that MIL bought Christmas jammies for the kids one year when they were young. They wore them to bed on Christmas Eve, and opened gifts in them on Christmas Morn. So that may be a sticking point especially if this is against the family religion.

This. The person we responded to should have taken the time to read the whole thread. The information that the OP is seeking is not innocent. .

Because the subject matter of the conversation would not be, "Are you my relative?" but actually an attempt to dig up a skeleton in the history on a topic that back then was often painful, and kept quiet, family privacy being paramount. Just because you might be related to someone doesn't give you the right to go nose diving for intimate details of a person's life and especially so when those details don't have a direct effect on your life. Beyond that, there are numerous scams out there calling the elderly and claiming one thing or another, attempting to get personal information on them. I have warned my mother and mother in law over and over and over again to hang up on phone calls from strangers asking personal questions, wanting information, claiming to know them or their relatives. It is a very dangerous thing to give out personal information over the phone.