There are times when you look at your family and think "Oh my god these are the most dysfunctional, rude, embarassing people on the face of the earth. How did I end up related to them?" They fart really loud while conversing about life insurance your late grandmother may have had without blinking an eye. They make off color comments referring to other family members sexual or criminal misadventures in the police station. While sorting out the marbles all the grandkids used to play with, they ask one of the mothers in the room how long it's been since they've held a pair of balls in their hand, in front of their children. They are the kind of family that you may be excommunicated from church if you attended with them, and always the first to drink too much at the reception, or act like they have. They remember any embarassing thing you have ever done and love to tell anyone who will listen, as long as you are standing right there. You think "Who the hell are these people?"

But then there are times when that assinine sense of humor saves your day like a fucking ray of sunshine. Those times when you know it is inappropriate to laugh but if you don't, your just going to crack. Lose it. Fly over the cuckoo's nest. Call it whatever you want, but there are times in everyones life where you laugh because it's all that is left to do. It may be a sign you are absolutely nuts, or that there is just enough sanity left inside of you to keep hanging on a little bit longer. One minute there are tears in your eyes because life without the recently deceased seems unbearable, and there is that family, picking their butts with that face that indicates they are mimicking the lousy service you are receiving in the restaurant, or recounting your parents awful teenage selves in a way that makes Dazed and Confused become icing on the rebllious and experimental coming of age cake, and you are stiffling laughter so hard that it makes your side ache. They are sticking their finger up your nose and you are biting your lip so hard you taste blood so that you don't snort boogers all over their hand. You look at them and think "Oh shit, I love these people. I wish they were here every damn day." A few minutes later they ask you a question and you are throwing salty assinise remarks back at them as your finger heads up their nostril.

And as you wipe the snot off your finger, onto their shirt that stuck after you removed your finger from their hairy nose it dawns on you.

"Oh shit. I am one of them."

But it's ok, because you kind of love them despite and because of their lesser qualities. And hope to god they do the same for you.