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Dec. 18th, 2012 12:58 pm
A house divided
So far, the chief lesson from the problems spawned by the change in how my Mom's family is handling their annual Christmas dinner is that we have a digital gap between the generations and it's only getting wider.
Over the years, it's gone from a big gathering a my grandparents' house to a travelling party hosted by each of their children in turn. Many years ago now, it made the leap from private residences to public halls and, as the guest list grew longer, Mom's siblings began pairing up in order to spread the expense. Now this year they're introducing a pay-as-you-go model. To secure a spot, you were supposed to mail a cheque to my eldest aunt last week.
I don't actually have any personal cheques any more.![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
monshu pays most of the bills from a joint account and then I reimburse him via account transfer. My own bills, I pay online; on the rare occasions when I can't, the creditor will generally take a credit card over the phone. The last time I can remember needing to pay a private individual a sum that was inconvenient to carry around was when I had to reimburse Nuphy for my portion of the opera subscription. For that, I took advantage of a feature recently added to my chequing account which allows me to disburse funds to anyone with a valid e-mail address.
There were no e-mail addresses listed on the (paper) invitation, but I have one for one of the two contacts given. However, as she wasn't the aunt whose job it was to collect the cheques, I e-mailed first to ask if she had an address for her older sister. She got back to me (three days later) to let me know that our eldest aunt doesn't have a computer. Instead I'm literally using Dark Ages technology to pay her: My mother will go over there today, cash in hand[*], and I will repay her in cash when I see her next.
This comes on the heels of an ugly blowup shortly after the financial changes were announced. As far as I can tell, no one in my generation was consulted. Rather than inform us of what was being discussed, our mother's plan was to intercept the invitations and pay for us. But they got through[**] and my sister, surprised and dismayed, did what she reflexively does in these situations: She turned to her peer group for a dose of perspective. And, naturally, she did so online, via a Facebook post.
Before long, this got back to one of the organisers (obviously one who has a computer, as well as a Facebook account) and she basically blew a gasket. How dare my sister (who she all but called an ungrateful brat[***]) talk about a family matter in front of outsiders. Nevermind that my sister wasn't directly criticising the change, just pointing out that she was uncomfortable with the expense and wondering what others had done in similar circumstances. If she'd had concerns, she should've taken them to "someone within the family".
[There will be a brief pause for everyone to appreciate the irony of that.]
At some point during the exchange, our aunt had to consult with one of her daughters to determine that, yes, the whole conversation was publicly visible to any of my sister's Friends. In response to her concerns, Sis deleted the conversation and resigned herself to being "talked about at Thanksgiving". It's going to be interesting to see what the fallout from this is like at the party itself.
* She doesn't have any personal cheques either, but not because she doesn't use them. Rather she put off reordering until she'd already run out of them.
** Or at least some did. Despite the fact that I've been at the same address for over four years and my aunt asked for it again only a year ago when a wedding invite bounced, mine was once again misdirected and had to be resent.
*** She went on to point out that she was paying her offsprings' way, and that perhaps our Mom would do the same. And to mention that there was a "silent benefactor" willing to subsidise those who would be otherwise unable to come--as if there were any member of our extended family who wouldn't rather swallow hot coals than hit up a relative for the money to go to a festive dinner.
Over the years, it's gone from a big gathering a my grandparents' house to a travelling party hosted by each of their children in turn. Many years ago now, it made the leap from private residences to public halls and, as the guest list grew longer, Mom's siblings began pairing up in order to spread the expense. Now this year they're introducing a pay-as-you-go model. To secure a spot, you were supposed to mail a cheque to my eldest aunt last week.
I don't actually have any personal cheques any more.
monshu pays most of the bills from a joint account and then I reimburse him via account transfer. My own bills, I pay online; on the rare occasions when I can't, the creditor will generally take a credit card over the phone. The last time I can remember needing to pay a private individual a sum that was inconvenient to carry around was when I had to reimburse Nuphy for my portion of the opera subscription. For that, I took advantage of a feature recently added to my chequing account which allows me to disburse funds to anyone with a valid e-mail address.There were no e-mail addresses listed on the (paper) invitation, but I have one for one of the two contacts given. However, as she wasn't the aunt whose job it was to collect the cheques, I e-mailed first to ask if she had an address for her older sister. She got back to me (three days later) to let me know that our eldest aunt doesn't have a computer. Instead I'm literally using Dark Ages technology to pay her: My mother will go over there today, cash in hand[*], and I will repay her in cash when I see her next.
This comes on the heels of an ugly blowup shortly after the financial changes were announced. As far as I can tell, no one in my generation was consulted. Rather than inform us of what was being discussed, our mother's plan was to intercept the invitations and pay for us. But they got through[**] and my sister, surprised and dismayed, did what she reflexively does in these situations: She turned to her peer group for a dose of perspective. And, naturally, she did so online, via a Facebook post.
Before long, this got back to one of the organisers (obviously one who has a computer, as well as a Facebook account) and she basically blew a gasket. How dare my sister (who she all but called an ungrateful brat[***]) talk about a family matter in front of outsiders. Nevermind that my sister wasn't directly criticising the change, just pointing out that she was uncomfortable with the expense and wondering what others had done in similar circumstances. If she'd had concerns, she should've taken them to "someone within the family".
[There will be a brief pause for everyone to appreciate the irony of that.]
At some point during the exchange, our aunt had to consult with one of her daughters to determine that, yes, the whole conversation was publicly visible to any of my sister's Friends. In response to her concerns, Sis deleted the conversation and resigned herself to being "talked about at Thanksgiving". It's going to be interesting to see what the fallout from this is like at the party itself.
* She doesn't have any personal cheques either, but not because she doesn't use them. Rather she put off reordering until she'd already run out of them.
** Or at least some did. Despite the fact that I've been at the same address for over four years and my aunt asked for it again only a year ago when a wedding invite bounced, mine was once again misdirected and had to be resent.
*** She went on to point out that she was paying her offsprings' way, and that perhaps our Mom would do the same. And to mention that there was a "silent benefactor" willing to subsidise those who would be otherwise unable to come--as if there were any member of our extended family who wouldn't rather swallow hot coals than hit up a relative for the money to go to a festive dinner.