I live with my husband and two of our five children. Being all adults, we have drifted into being more like roommates. We live in the same place, but don’t spend much time together, not even for family meals.
Part of the issue is we all eat at different times. For dinner it is usually just me, him, and our daughter. Our son usually wakes up for the day an hour or two later. If he is awake, it isn’t unusual for him to dish up and go back to his room to continue whatever he is doing.
Recently, to counteract this separation, we’ve been attempting to have both family game night and family movie night.
Movie night is sort of easy. Me, my son and daughter discuss our options and choose what the three of us would like to watch. Then we decide on a time when we are all home and awake.
All home is the easy part since we are most often here. We do leave the house, but our schedule is rather routine, just work (husband), doctor’s appointments, shopping, and church. All awake is the big issue because our son is often awake while the rest of us are sleeping. He has to plan several days in advance to switch it up so that he is awake at an appropriate time for everyone else.
For movie night we’ve chosen after church on Sunday but before dinner. Which is early for my son but fits in everyone’s schedule. Picking what to watch is harder. Personally, I’d go older movies, the ones I watched growing up, but I also like some newer things too. And there is always the fact that I love Star Trek and Star Wars. My kids all have different tastes, and my son (the one still living here) does not like Star Wars. My daughter ( also the one still living here) does like Harry Potter but is not the huge fan her big sister is. That and my son and I aren’t really fans, though I will watch them.
All this is to say that there was some discussion before we manage to agree on anything. So far we’ve watched two of the newer versions of Star Trek.
My kids weren’t sure I’d watch them because they are remakes, and I generally hate remakes. They are never as good. But the newer movies are not technically remakes. They are a remake of an old story. The new Star Trek movies are set in an alternate timeline, much like the original series episode Mirror, Mirror. I rather enjoy watching the interactions of the “original” characters in this new timeline.
My kids have now chosen the original Star Trek moving and I think we well be working our way through them in order. I’m not exactly sure what we will move onto when we have finished them all but there are a lot of them, so it’ll take a while.
Though one drawback is that while my husband does watch, he simply cannot follow the story. So far he’s ended up disturbing out enjoyment by asking questions about what is happening in the movie. Last time we ended up pausing the movie and I chewed him out because I could not hear the movie if he was talking.
My children, being neurodiverse, are sound sensitive therefore the volume is keep barely audible for a normal person like me. My husband, who can’t follow it anyway, can barely hear it with his hearing aids on.
One would think game night would be easier, but it isn’t. The biggest issue is that my husband will not generally play games, which presents the issue of what board games are fun with just three people playing. (We do have several two people games, but that leaves out one person.) And that’s not getting into the issue of what we each like to play. That has been a bigger discussion than what to watch.
I want board games, but my kids are opposed the ones I have, as in the type of games I grew up with. Though my daughter’s biggest objection to Monopoly is that it’s time consuming.
Our first attempt was playing a couple of rounds of Clue. My son likes to keep his score card on tech and talked my daughter and I into it. I gave up halfway through the first round and went and found a pencil. Three is barely enough to make Clue fun.
This last time, we settled on Uno, partly because my husband has played that. Wouldn’t you know it, he ghosted us soon as we mentioned playing. (He hid in our bedroom.)
I’m not sure what we’ll do next time, but I’m holding out for Apples to Apples. My husband might be clueless, but he’ll play it.
Smile. Make the day a brighter day.
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