The Family News Alert System Crashes

So my mom has this system by which she tracks which of her three children she’s told about major family news items. Basically, it’s a large dry-erase board with a column for each of the three kids and a row for major events or activities of note (babies born, pregnancies, deaths, etc.). When my mom tells anyone about a particular news item, she checks them off the list. This is sort of how it works during a phone conversation:

Mom: “Oh, did I tell you that Laura had her baby?”
Me: “No! Oh wow! Boy or girl?”
Mom, making an audible mental note to herself: “Okay, I can take that off the list.” Cupping a hand over the phone and shouting to my dad: “Peter, can you check Jess off the list for me? Yeah. I just told her about Laura’s baby. So you can check it off the list.”

But the system has experienced a major break down because MY DAD HAD SHOULDER SURGERY YESTERDAY AND NOBODY TOLD ME UNTIL TEN PM LAST NIGHT. Yet my mom called my brother on Monday to tell him that 24 was on at 7 pm.

Whaaaaaaa?!?!!?!

And when my cousin Laura had her baby? I actually found out at Thanksgiving weeks after it happened. Methinks this system could stand some improvement. Mom, I love you more than anything. You make delicious meals that accommodate the strange dietary needs of your children. You put up with my adolescent moodiness and forgave me for stealing the family minivan back in 1990. You are a lovely, fun, and generally wonderful person and lugged me around internally for over nine months and gave birth to me. I can’t even imagine that process, what with the twenty-seven hours of labor and my fat head and all. But I’m filing a formal complaint about this family news alert system of yours.

Now I feel like a horrible daughter for not paying attention to the upcoming surgery when it was mentioned to me weeks ago. Plus, when I was talking to my dad on the phone last night (FINALLY), he was still pretty groggy from the anesthesia and had to quick put the phone down to go throw up, which made me really sad.

But don’t feel too badly for him. Look how he tried to scare me during a family trip to Florida in 1979. Yes, that is a real, live alligator in the water just inches below me.

Luckily, the entire family made it through the trip intact. We also survived my dad’s blazing white tennis pro outfit, which almost blinded everyone within fifty feet whenever he stepped into the sunlight.

I’m going to see my parents this weekend because I miss them and want to see how Dad’s doing. I won’t be bringing them any grandchildren (sorry Mom!), but I will be bearing other gifts. Possibly baked goods.