MY family is still almost all local and because it's large we often invite "extras" to our table (35-40 is not unusual) including extended family of spouses and the like if they have small families. That's how we ended up setting the scene for the Most Awkward Thanksgiving Momenet ever:

Dramatis Personae:
MY Parents: Very devout Catholics, Very Republican, Very Irish when it comes to hospitality (even the kids table has small cordial-sized wine glasses on it) but overall decent people who taught us basic table manners such as don't chew with you mouth open and don't discuss politics or religion at the dinner table

MY eldest sister and her husband, both reasonable conservatives and decent folk. He's a Baptist and she converted so the kids wouldn't get confused

My Brother-in-Law's Sister: Even HE didn't like her. But as she had no friends of her own and their parents had both passed she was a "pity invite" A graduate of Washington Bible College, one of those institutions where they preach the evils of dancing and all form of drink, teach young earth Creationism, and hold that Catholics aren't really Christian and just associating with them puts you in danger of joining them in hell

My Next Eldest sister and Her Husband: Both very liberal and He, while not being outspoken about it, as a teacher had a need to challenge people that said stupid things. He too was raised Baptist but converted to Catholicism after marrying my sis.

This B-I-L's parents: Retired schoolteachers and he was also a baptist minister. Very elderly and VERY gracious in a way that only those raised in 1950's backwoods Virgina can be. Possesed of a dignity and gentility that is everything RIGHT about Southern culture.

My last Oldest sister: At the time in Her Extremely Liberal and Proud phase. A college professor, and the sponsor of her campus' GLBT Outreach club-which is saying something because this was the 90's and it was a Catholic College


So the family had been warned about "Carol" the bible-thumper and how Thanksgiving might be a tech awkward for her given her beliefs that we were all hell-bound pagans (it was the first time since the wedding 10 years ago that she'd ever shown up aat a gathering featuring our family). Given my parents views on the near-sacredness of hospitality and my family's unfortunate tendency towards irreverance and snark when together, we were warned to be on our best behavior and try to make her as comfortable as possible.

We were good, I swear we were. And the first two or three times "Carol" tried to bust out polarizing politcal talk someone deftly parried it into another topic or asked her to pass the stuffing.

But then, apropos of nothing, she busted out a rant about AIDS was obviously God's punishment for homosexuals and how the nation deserved the epidemic because of its sinfulness.

She's couldn't have messed up worse if she dropped a turd in the punchbowl.

You need to understand, my mom is a nurse, and in the early days of the AIDS epidemic one of the few who took care of AIDS patients without hesitation, even though that terrified her because at the time we had no idea how it was spread. I remember her coming home from work, changing clothes in the toolshed and hand-washing her nurses' whites with bleach because while SHE was willing to contract a fatal disease to do her job, she wasn't going to put her family at risk.(oldest and older sis were also a PA and a Nurse respectively and had mom's attitudes towards professionalism)

My Professor sister tired, for a few seconds, but she just could NOT let that go unchallenged, and gave, for her a faily mild rebuke of that opinion (because I'm psychic, I heard her mentally bite off her preferred reply of "So does that mean God REALLY likes lesbians becuase they have an even lower rate of HIV than even straight couples? "-something she later confirmed to me she was DYING to say)

But mild as it was it only spurred "Carol" on to making even more nasty and outrageous statements about dirty gays and God's deserved wrath. At his point my utterly conservative father's bald head was turning red at his efforts not to snap at her for her horrible manners, My mom's eyes revealed a war going on inside her between her commitment to making all her guests happy How angry she was getting. Her brother was glaring daggers at her, which she was willfully ignorning.

It was then that my teacher BIL, who strongly believed in that "The only thing evil require to triumph is for good men to do nothing" quote, butwho was trying to be good, especially in front of his parents, finally couldn't take it anymore and began saying something MUCH more unkind to "carol". But he never got the chance because when his father unexpectedly cut in. Carol had been fawning over him after she found out he was a co-religionist and a Minister to boot, and I suspect her little diatribe might have been to curry favor with him.

If so it didn't work,

In a soft, utterly genteel voice he turned to her and said "Young lady, I supect that college of yours may have neglected to teach you the true meaning of Christian Charity" and then proceeded to deliver a two or three minute lecture on tha nature of a loving God, his belief that god wants no man to suffer and how Jesus rather explicitly destroyed the argument that bodily illness' were somehow a sign of God's displeasure (and argument made all the more powerful since he was nearly blind and confined to a wheelchair). We all wanted to hug him or burst into appluase, but the would have been bad manners as Carol had already been thouroughly humiliated and had the Smack laid down on her from the most unexpected of places.

He later sent us a thank you note thanking us for having him at the meal and including us at our "Lively" table


He's been a welcome guest at our Thanksgiving table ever since. Carol, oddly enough is always travelling on business that week and can never come.