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Write a story about a family dinner from the perspective of an in-law who's married into the family.

Posted in Thanksgiving on Oct 26, 2022

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✍️ 33 stories

First Family Dinner

Submitted to Contest #17

I looked around nervously. People of all ages were talking and laughing, and I had no idea where I fit in, since I was the ‘in-law.’ Although I had met most of them before, it was pretty overwhelming being in one room with all of Catie’s family. I counted twelve, though I could be wrong. Catie nudged me.  “Chilax! Everyone’s cool.” she said, smiling reassuringly. I took a deep breath. Catie was right, I was fine. No one would laugh. Still, I hung out towards the back of the room, trying to avoid attention. I glanced around. I wasn’t the...

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Unrelatable

Submitted to Contest #17

A sudden noise from the kitchen awoke me with a start. I hoped against all hope that the noise was our girls getting breakfast ready for themselves and miraculously their brother too. I rolled toward my husband’s side of our king sized bed with my sole purpose the simple art of snuggling. Saturday was family time when we rose earlier than the kids to make the breakfast and they got to sleep in. Sunday was husband and wife time, our chance for some extra sleep. It was an opportunity for me to experience some much needed snuggling and, sometim...

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Beta Casseopeiae

Submitted to Contest #17

Kept within the bounds of time and space, Ezra could not escape the impending doom of Shabbat Dinner. His hands clenched tightly to Tziviah’s arm, his gentle, hazel eyes gazing towards the family home. His sandals scuffled across the field, his wife leading him towards his worst nightmare.  “Zussya and Mordechai have been keeping Abba busy,” muttered Tziviah, opening the front gates, “After the wedding, Mordechai hasn’t stopped looking for a wife. But it’s Levi that Abba should worry about… He’s nearly twenty-two!”  A gentle wind b...

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Journal

Submitted to Contest #17

I don’t keep a diary or a journal or anything like that except for a basic planner at the office. That planner, now that I think about it, is probably the reason I don’t keep a diary. When you’re required to meticulously note what you’re doing for every minute of the day coming home and writing about your day seems a little repetitive. I’m going to label this file “Journal,” however. Maybe it will have more than one entry, it’s hard to tell, but I doubt I’ll have another experience that will fit with the one I’m about to write. Not to disapp...

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CRYING OVER SPILT WATER

Submitted to Contest #17

So I’m here. At the Donovan family dinner table. Which is set beautifully, of course, in that cosy, casual way that takes far longer to do than formal and fancy. Oh, I was tempted to develop a case of “strategic flu” but I know that the sod’s law that dictates my life would have dictated I instantly went down with a massive case of the real thing even though there isn’t currently a flu bug doing the rounds. I still can’t quite get used to this name business. Not that I have any objections on principle, and they were ...

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The Day I Became Family

Submitted to Contest #17

“Hi, Mom!” Jenny shouted, tossing her bag in an empty chair. “Put your backpack away and get dressed in something nice,” I called from the kitchen. Jenny came in, her usual jeans-and-T-shirt-with-a-sweatshirt-tied-around-the-waist outfit on. “Why?” she asked. “Because I said so, and we are going to have supper at your dad’s parent’s place tonight. Your cousins Tina and Andrew will be there,” I replied, sipping my not-so-hot coffee. “In jeans and T-shirts, I bet,” Jenny snorted, wiping a juicy green apple against her shirt. “Now Jenny, their...

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The Law and the In-Law

Submitted to Contest #17

 “So, this is the ring he gave you. I don’t like it.”“Dad, please. And don't talk so loud, he'll come back in a minute. He can listen!"“Come on. Maybe he can listen, but he can’t understand. This is not his language.”“But dad, of course he understands! He speaks like us. He is one of us, now.”“Ah-a.”His father-in-law's sarcastic expression explained what he thought about the "one of us" part. He could see him and his newly-married wife in the lunchroom: he stopped just before entering when he understood they spoke about him. He wanted t...

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My Big Fat Jewish Passover

Submitted to Contest #17

David reaches across the center console and pats my leg.“Don't worry,” he says with a reassuring smile. “Everything is going to be fine.” I return his smile but I’m incredibly nervous. David and I have been married for about six months now. “Really, you have nothing to worry about. They're going to love you.”“Okay,” I respond abruptly. We had a really small wedding, just our parents and a handful of close friends. But unlike me, David has a huge extended family, most of whom I have never met.I'm also nervous because this is our first Passove...

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On second thought, I don't...

Submitted to Contest #17

“Are you fucking kidding me? I don’t even wanna cook for me and you. Now you’ve invited your parents?”“And my sister….”“Your sister, too? Well, Happy Thanks-Goddamn-giving to me.”“Listen, they invited themselves, what was I supposed to say?”“How about, ‘since you clearly and flagrantly despise my wife, perhaps asking her to SERVE.YOU.FOOD. might not be in your best interest’.”“Would you seriously poison them?” Brett chuckled but stopped abruptly when Beth leaned in with gritted teeth and asked, “Would you seriously BLAME me?”* * * * ...

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WELCOME TO WEST PODVOLOSTOK

Submitted to Contest #17

The State Department got her booked on the Accela from Foggy Bottom to the City of Brotherly Love. Sybil was running late and wished that in the years she had been in the field, Amtrak would have had a little more bullet in their bullet train by now. At least the sandwiches were fresh and the booze wasn’t too watered down. She got off at 30th Street station earlier than she thought she would have arrived; maybe a tailwind, she thought, and wandered over to her old digs, walking down Canal Street, knocking on the doors of a few...

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Just Like Everyone Else

Submitted to Contest #17

“It’s high time you got out of the house,” Darrell said, taking his mother’s dark, lined hand in his own. She gave an affectionate squeeze.“You know I don’t like goin’ out without your daddy.”“Daddy’s been gone five months now. You’re sixty years young; you can’t just stop living.”“I’m perfectly content to stay here and crochet blankets for the kids you and that wife of yours better have.”“Her name is Hannah Beth, Mama.”“I’d know that if you’d had a proper wedding instead of eloping.”Darrell sighed. That was always going to be a sore spot wi...

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A Moment In Time

Submitted to Contest #17

The heat in the car is on too high.  The dry air burns my nose but I don’t turn it off.  In the driver's seat next to me Ashley has been talking since our car pulled out of our driveway and away from the comforting lights of our home.  She’s been talking about her family, the ones we are speeding towards, but I’ve drowned her out, opting instead for the quiet of my own mind preoccupied with details that are meaningless.  My overactive imagination brings me back to past Thanksgivings. I can see my childhood self lost...

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Pain

Submitted to Contest #17

       I have tried my best to fit in, but I still feel as though I am that proverbial outcast. Never have I felt so much isolation with as many people are around. I know I am alone in feeling this way, since this family is so large.              The matron of the family sits at the head of the table in a chair that resembles a throne, watching everything that happens, while I feel her heated glance of hatred occasionally shift ...

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Home for the Holidays

Submitted to Contest #17

"Stay in here and don't come out." My brother-in-law herded his wife, my son and I into the used-to-be garage. The door clicked shut and we locked the door behind him. My sister-in-law's light blue eyes met mine in wide awareness and disbelief. "What do we do now?" she whispered. I shrugged as best I could with my wiggly toddler on my hip. "Down," he said. "Not right now, Monkey. Stay with Mama." I nuzzled his soft shaggy blond hair with my cheek. What do we do now? I wondered. Face to face and the kid betw...

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Not a Mama's Boy

Submitted to Contest #17

I feel like Dorothy in the Oz movie and this isn't Kansas anymore. It's San Diego and one of the munchkins is under my mother-in-laws dinner table right now. She's talking in a feline language to a rambunctious cat that has a borderline personality disorder and the cat isn't going to budge."Sarah, get that cat away from the dinner table." Mrs. Jackson yells.The little munchkin is Sara, all of 6-years old, and she's talking the furry cat into her arms. I'm hyperventilating and politely sneezing at the table. I whisper in Daniel's ear and remi...

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