Awkward Family Photos - Mike Bender [12]
Shannon
Calgary, Canada
It was my mom’s idea for everyone to dress up. We all protested, which is why it looks like we’ve thrown back a few.
Oscar
San Pedro, California
My grandma is notorious for giving bad gifts.
Courtney
Superior, Wisconsin
My dad thought it would be fun to collect giant nutcrackers. So, for three years in a row, he bought a six-foot nutcracker from Costco.
The Daniels Family
Bloomfield Hills, Michigan
Give the re-gift of family.
When Bethany woke up, she didn’t expect to see a full moon.
Eat your heart out, Christmas tree.
As a kid, I took Halloween very seriously. Every year, I would return from a long night of trick-or-treating and immediately begin itemizing my loot by putting them into different shoeboxes labeled with the name of the candy. And every year, my father would find the box labeled “Milky Way” and clean me out when I wasn’t standing guard. One Halloween, I decided to get smart and I labeled the Milky Way box “Mike and Ike,” knowing that he hated Mike and Ikes. I came home from school the next day to find Dad with his hand in the Mike and Ike box and caramel and nougat all over his face. So much for my genius plan.
Garrett
Florham Park, New Jersey
My family has a tradition of everyone going around the Thanksgiving dinner table and saying what we’re thankful for. Usually, we talk about being thankful for our good health or something positive that might have happened that year, etc. But when it got to my precocious seven-year-old cousin, he stood up and announced that he wanted to thank the sperm he was conceived with for “coming in first.”
Gabe
Madison, Wisconsin
Thanksgiving 1996 was unusual, as my grandparents had both of their sons, both of their daughters-in-law, and all three of their granddaughters there. I was there with my husband. And my great-aunt Clara, my grandfather’s sister, was also attending. Clara, aged eighty-four, was the oldest of seven siblings. My uncle leaned over and said, “So, Clara. Do you have any memories of seven kids around the Thanksgiving table?” Aunt Clara replied, “Well, I’ll tell you about one Thanksgiving. I’d invited our brother Bob to come eat at my house. He didn’t come over, so I told my son to go over to his trailer because I knew something was wrong. And when he got there, Bob was sitting on the couch, dead.”
Amanda
Austin, Texas
About two years ago at Christmas, my aunt brought her new albino boyfriend home to meet the family. We decided to take a family photo with my little cousin’s Polaroid camera. Usually in the family of dark-skinned Italians, I’m the one who tends to stand out, since I have a lighter complexion. When the picture developed, we all hovered over to look and I said, “Let’s try to find the white face this year!” My mother then elbowed me and, realizing what I just said, I hung my head in shame.
Stephanie
Trenton, New Jersey
My family has learned not to expect much from my grandparents in terms of presents. One year, our family got an expired “gourmet” beefstick-and-cheese assortment. Another year, I unwrapped one gift to receive a keychain that my siblings and I instantly recognized as a McDonald’s Happy Meal toy; it was one that I had previously gotten during a visit to my grandparents and left at their house. Thanks for the regift.
Caroline
Greenwich, Connecticut
My dad’s mother, whom we called Meemaw, was the kind of old lady who enjoyed being able to say whatever the hell she was thinking. When I was a sophomore in college, my roommates and I, while traveling on spring break from our tiny one-stoplight town to LA, decided to go to Glamour Shots. My mother was so enamored of the resulting shots that she framed the eleven-by-fifteen for Meemaw’s “big” Christmas gift. My mother had endured Meemaw’s salty opinions of every Christmas gift she’d ever received, even from my two sisters and me as children, for thirty years—but this year Mom knew she had a winner. Christmas Day, Meemaw opened the box, lifted the tissue