Share creature comforts of country Christmas

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This article was published 19/12/2023 (971 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

DEAR MISS LONELYHEARTS: I’m an animal-lover and celebrate Christmas with my three dogs, two cats and happily squawking birds. Not to mention the outdoor creatures who show up to my daily feasts for them, just off my back porch. I live happily in the country!

My brother and sister, on the other hand, migrated to the city some years ago. Now they put pressure on me to come to their Christmas dinners every year. Last year, and again this year, I’ve said, “No, I’d rather be with my animal family and look after them.” They make fun of me and have recently started calling me “Dr. Doolittle” from the Hugh Lofting books about the guy who could communicate with animals. Do you think there’s something odd about my wanting to stay with my beloved animals?

— Not Budging at Christmas

Dear Not Budging: It’s understandable you want to stay with your closest family at Christmas — your birds and animals. You can easily prevail in this family power game if you’re willing to “play” instead of getting mad.

Use a smartphone to film your little gang on Christmas Eve, with a little tree and treats and wrapped gifts with some funny Christmas music in the background. Then film yourself wearing a Santa hat, wishing everyone in the family a Merry Christmas individually, with little messages for them. This way you can give your city family a taste of what they’re missing — without being snotty about it.

Send it off Christmas Eve, telling them there’ll be Part 2 on Christmas Day, just before the family dinner.

Late Christmas morning, you can film the second adventure with Christmas wrapping strewn about for comic effect. Show the pets having brekkie and playing with new balls and squeaker toys — and then sleeping off their meals. Fake some snoring for them!

Part of the family’s teasing comes about because they feel shunned by you. This way you include them in your fun. Then encourage them to share some smartphone footage and greetings from their camp!

Dear Miss Lonelyhearts: Until this month, I didn’t know I had a brother! My mother, who died recently, had held onto some of her old secrets and one of them was her teenage pregnancy. My mother felt that other baby was “none of my business” — even after her passing.

Her sisters, sworn to silence many years ago, didn’t share the same feeling. My aunties were sick and tired of keeping the old secret, so after Mom died, they opened up to me. They thought it was time to tell me where my mom’s baby went to live, and it was with some distant relatives. They were “distant” relations in every sense, because they lived far away and we never visited with them. They couldn’t have a baby for some reason and gladly took in my mother’s firstborn.

My mother had just one other baby in her lifetime — that was with my (deceased) father, and it was me! Do you think she had the right to keep the secret of my brother from me? I want to go see him. Should I?

— Angry Son

Dear Angry Son: Sometimes — particularly in years gone by — people would take on a baby from another part of the family with the promise they would never experience the birth mother trying to take the child back when she became old enough to raise it herself. Otherwise the “adoptive” parents would live their lives in fear she’d show up at their door one day, demanding her child.

Your best bet now is to go to meet your grown-up brother to get to know each other, and also the relatives who loved and raised him. Depending on how you and your brother get along, you might want to share your whole family, including the old aunties.

You can’t go back, so go forward with an open mind and enjoy your blood brother and the people who love him. In a best-case scenario, they will soon embrace you, too.

Please send your questions and comments to lovecoach@hotmail.com or Miss Lonelyhearts c/o the Winnipeg Free Press, 1355 Mountain Ave., Winnipeg, MB, R2X 3B6.

Maureen Scurfield
Advice columnist

Maureen Scurfield writes the Miss Lonelyhearts advice column.

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