The Good Kind of Family Rivalry

For the first time in a long time, I attended my mom's family reunion.
My mother was the youngest of eleven children.  Each one of her siblings married and had about five children of their own.  Do the math, and you'll see that on my mother's side alone, I have twenty aunts and uncles, roughly fifty cousins, and more second cousins than I will ever meet. (My dad is one of nine children, all of whom married and had about five kids each, too.  But that's another reunion..)  So, you see, this is a large gathering.  I think nearly one hundred people showed up this year.

We had a potluck at the park where we had reserved the pavilion.  There were silly games to play like "Guess How Many Pennies in the Pickle Jar" and "How Heavy is the Ham?"

We had a short "meeting" where we voted on whether or not to have another reunion next year (the vote was yes), and we raised our hands to show if enough people would be interested in activities like baseball and volleyball to bother getting out the equipment.  Most everyone just wanted to sit and visit, but the family of my mom's brother all cheered and raised their hands for each activity that was announced.
Noticing the lack of enthusiasm from the rest of the reunion, one of the brother's sons shouted, "Come on!  You guys all like softball!"
I replied with equal volume, "No one wants to play against your family!"
Laughter all around.

Before we were dismissed to wander the grounds, the winners of the silly penny-guessing type games were announced.  As each winner was announced, the excitement grew because each winner was a member of that same brother's family.
As the last cousin carried her prize back to the table, I hollered, "And that's why no one wants to play against you guys!"

I brought the house down.
It was a good day.