Family Feud

By Al Horn

"I can't help you if you don't tell me what you did wrong," said one uncle to another at dinner recently.

"If I knew what I did wrong, I could fix it myself," replied the other uncle.

My mother and aunts were paying attention to the conversation. Not because they were interested in the problem as much as they wanted to see which direction it would go from that point.

Recently, my son and I went to Arkansas to help rewire my mom's home. She lives in central Arkansas just north of Little Rock. She and my father retired to her hometown twelve years ago. Shortly thereafter, so did some of my aunts and uncles. They fight and argue one week and are all at my mom's house playing cards the next. They used our coming to town as an excuse to go out and eat at one of the local restaurants. For them, it's fresh scenery to use for entertaining conversation.

For the most part, we arrived in separate vehicles and everybody greeted each other in a civil manner. An outsider might have wondered if there was some friction at work. Light banter was passed around while everyone looked at their menus and continued into ordering their meals. The next few minutes were used to ask my son what he had been doing for the past two years, the last time any of them had seen him. During this exchange my uncle L commented to my uncle J about an event that had left him rather puzzled.

My uncle J rose to the challenge, offering to help L solve the mystery. J sometimes considers himself a master of logic. I'm not saying he isn't, it's just that I am sometimes baffled at his methods of detection. Within seconds the whole table was listening to what the two were talking about.

As near as I could tell, something had been misplaced and L couldn't figure out how. J suggested backtracking to discover the whereabouts of the missing item. L told him there was a short period of time he couldn't account for. L didn't seem to be that concerned about the disappearance but it was a nice bone to throw out and see if my other uncle would bite. Much to everybody's delight, the bait was taken.

To the casual observer this would have looked like a dialog between two people. To an insider it was a group discussion. J would probe for details and L would be evasive while trying to appear earnest. When it looked like one was actually making headway, my mother or one of my aunts would throw in a comment to bring things back to even keel. They feigned interest in bringing things to a conclusion while muddying the waters even more. About the time J was beginning to get irked over L's lack of helpfulness, our dinner arrived. All thoughts of the missing item were dismissed and the conversation turned to the food before us.

Such is life in this small lakeside town. The locals have their own way of dealing with everyday events. One of which was brought up after dinner. This time it was the three aunts going at it. Of course, no real conclusions were drawn. As soon as the check arrived the subject was dropped like a hot potato. They had bigger fish to fry. Like who was paying the bill and who would leave the tip. Lord help the man that gets between them!