Parties....three kinds

There are three kinds of parties in my world. The first is the most common. It's for the straights, or no-funs. The people who frequent these parties generally hate their spouses, jobs, kids, kid's teachers, neighbors, and the list continues. By suburban law, we are obligated to attend these and succomb to the boring conversations revolving around homework, landscaping, business travel, and cleaning products. Fortunately, tension is often mediated by talk of a new restaurant or vacation destination.

So it sounds awful, right? Well, truth be told, it is and it isn't. Many of these people are deep-down good to the core. They are hospitable, intelligent and conflicted. Just like me (dare I say "us"?). They are so burdened by trying to keep up the facade they forget what their own personal idea of fun is. It's like one of my favorite movie's "Fight Club" -- they no longer own their possessions, their possessions own them. Not just tangible things either. A good friend recently nailed it. She said people treat their kids like sports cars -- things to display for others to covet.

In a nutshell, the parties are mandatory if you care about your kids. You can't just skip it all. If you have kids, you get it. If not, I think I need to create another blog to explain how it all works.

I'll have to get into the second kind of party tomorrow. These are the parties where many of the couples really want to dance in their panties but can only do it if they can blame it on the alcohol.