Invite a black sheep to family gathering

We all have black sheep in our families. We all have so-called bad boys and bad girls, not to mention a skeleton or two in the closet.
I confess to a weakness for the black sheep. Recently I added one of our family’s bad boys to my list of favorites. I invited a cousin to join us for the February birthdays. I warned the rest of the family that he was coming.
The last time I invited a long-lost cousin to join us my mother thought he and his wife were a couple of Jehovah’s Witnesses coming up the walk. She warned me not to let them in and was upset because I opened the door to them. After she realized who it was we had a nice visit.
It was only the second time I had met this particular cousin. The rest of my family was more familiar with him. Even so, they hadn’t seen him for more than 20 years. Being a black sheep, he fit right in as my branch of the family is not, shall we say, the most socially acceptable members of the clan.
I sat back and listened to the stories he told. I have found that the misfits have the most interesting tales to tell. It seems that one of his neighbors is determined to make him move out of the neighborhood. The neighbor apparently installed a birdhouse that swiveled and followed him whenever he was outside. They also have taken him to court multiple times because his shrubs were the incorrect height. They had his house condemned because it was one short of the required nails holding up the gutter; a problem he rectified while the inspector was standing there holding the notice of condemnation. There are laws as to how many nails hold up your gutters? I never knew that before. This is someone who has way too much time on their hands.
I related bad neighbor stories of my own. We lived next to one guy who insisted on scalping our lawn in the name of helping. Another neighbor accidentally set the trees on fire but he put it out before it did any real harm.
My cousin lived up to his last name of Garner, which means to gather. He collects any number of things, including a tank. I asked how he managed to get a tank home with such a nosy neighbor next door and he confessed that he did it under cover of night. Really, now, how many people do you know who own a tank? I told you the bad boys were interesting.
Watching him and listening to his stories, I was struck by how much he resembles my brother, Michael. They have the same red hair, the same build, the same affinity for vehicles that I would ordinarily call junk. Like my other cousin, who is not a Jehovah’s Witness, he is a talker.
I wondered what he had done to earn the title of bad boy. I know how the rest of us have earned our places at the outcast table. It was by the usual means, although none of us ever broke the law we aren’t very adept at the social graces.
In school, I was the kid you weren’t supposed to play with. Even now, I have to fight the feeling that I don’t belong. My mom and brothers are who they are. A simple statement, but one that says they go their own ways, with little regard for the opinions of the rest of the world.
We are not the movers and shakers of the world. We are people who go to work every day and do our best then go home to our loved ones at night. We will never be important to anybody except each other. We are the ones nobody talks about aloud. And yet, I venture a guess that we have more interesting stories than most. And at least one of us owns a tank.
Next time you have a family occasion, invite a black sheep to join you. You might be surprised at the stories you hear. You might also be surprised to learn that he or she is not that different from you.[[In-content Ad]]