Yesterday I had to go top my boyfriend’s family picnic and Bocce ball tournament. He has a big family – there are so many of them that it is common to ask, at the reunion, “who is that” and be answered with “hell if I know.” I come from a small contingent of loners. These large family things frighten me. In the morning before we had to go, I fortified myself with a little fino sherry, just to cope.

Once we got there, it was OK. The family, being so huge and all, sets up in little clusters of family-who-know-each-other, in a park by Mission Bay. I almost ate a Krispy Kreme Donut off another cluster’s table. Mark quickly told me, “that is not our table.” (Meaning, those are not our donuts.) It was only two feet away, but whateves, at least I didn’t eat the donut, which is good because if I had eaten it I would have wanted more donuts. Almost every cluster table had a box of Krispy Kreme Donuts on it.

After a couple of hours, the Bocce tournament started. Names were drawn and teammates paired. I was ecstatic to be paired with Mark’s sister Chris, who is the same age as me, and plays well, and also, there would be no stress about meeting someone new, talking to someone new, or getting paired with some freak, like I did last year at the reunion.

Last year my teammate had never played Bocce, which is fine. The scary thing was, he was skittish and withdrawn, and after a couple of rounds he told me his “ol’ lady was pissed, that he was playing with another woman.” He would often leave and go console her, leaving me to throw his balls. It was annoying and also, bizarre.

Chris and I won our first game. That is when we stopped winning. On our second game, we had to play Pete and Rich. Word on the street (or in the park) was, they were unbeatable. Two guys who somehow got paired up at random that were both insanely good.

Well, after watching them all day yesterday, I can tell you that is complete bullshit. Rich was good. Pete was a load of crap riding on Good?s coattails.

At any rate, I immediately hated both of them, just because of the way they treated Chris and I. Sort of like looking us up and down and you could just tell, they were muttering under their breath, “no contest, here.” While we played, if they scored a point, they practically would butt chests and emit caveman sounds. It was pretty disgusting.

They won, but mostly because we wanted to get away from them so bad we lost on purpose.

They went on to beat Mark and his teammate, and Mark’s sister Lisa and her teammate. I wanted Pete and Rich to lose SO BAD. Everything about them totally bugged. I had told Mark if he beat them, I would buy him a pizza and also, perform a sexual act he is not use to anymore (one that sort of stops just shy of month eight.) Mark still lost, despite the promise of, well, pepperoni and pleasure.

No one reckoned on Mark’s little brother Paul though. Paul and his teammate, Denise, made it all the way to the uber finals. They had to play Pete and Rich and everyone thought Pete and Rich had it made. We all sat on the perimeter, drinking the dregs of the day and watching the last game. I have never wanted someone to win so bad as yesterday, when I was desperate for Paul and Denise to beat those guys ass and bring home the trophy.

It was close all the way, but the cool thing was, everyone was screaming for Paul and Denise. No one did anything when Pete or Rich scored. The crowd was clearly on the side of the underdog.

At the end, the teams were tied at 12, and Paul and Denise scored two points to win, with Paul winning the scoring point. Everyone got up and hugged and kissed him, everyone was totally freaking out. I’m not an into-sports kind of person, but that was pretty cool, let me tell you.

It’s another year until another one of these things, and who knows where I will be then. Maybe far away from the family, maybe not part of them any more. But for one day, I felt like I was part of this huge thing, even though I fought it. Maybe it was the wine, maybe it was the disgust, maybe it was the pride I felt for my sort of brother-in-law. Maybe it was too much sun. Maybe I’ll beat Pete and Rich next year. Who knows?

This entry was posted on Monday, August 2nd, 2004 at 9:05 pm and is filed under Tales from a Strange Land. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.