The unofficial millennial’s guide for a Southern family reunion

By the time my auntie-cousin Sylvia’s 70th birthday rolled around this summer, my family hadn’t gathered together in nearly three years, maybe even four. Her birthday party, at her son’s and daughter-in-law’s sprawling Conyers, Georgia, home was going to be a fête. It had been a long time coming.

My mother started bringing us to Atlanta to hang with her paternal cousins when I was a pre-teen and my sister in her early twenties. Our trips together to Georgia or Florida to visit our family became an annual tradition but was interrupted at the advent of COVID-19. So, we waited, and finally we were reunited. My mother’s first cousin’s celebration became a family reunion bringing relatives from several states to hang out for a long weekend.

We’re all cousins

• Dawn was rolling breadcrumbs in a plastic bag under a wooden rolling pin.
• Two of my other cousins seasoned the fish.
• Lynn was preparing the propane deep fryer out on the deck.
• My cousin’s husband’s sister was on spaghetti.
• And my mother, Inez, was making coleslaw.

We all gathered informally before her party on a Friday, ostensibly to eat, drink and fellowship, so someone had to prepare for that. I sat on the sectional sofa in the living room, nursing a beer, nuzzled in between my two younger cousins Nova and Hunter. My older sister alternated between sitting on the other side of the sofa and flitting about the many other rooms on a lower level of the home.

With our simple gestures, my sister and I disrupted a tradition that usually falls on the women in the family. Sitting down, resting, despite expectations, is a radical act.

As the men gathered outside, smoking cigars, clutching dark liquor, with sweat dripping from the humid Georgia air and bubbling fish grease, the women cooked, cleaned and served. With about 30 people to feed, it was a large task, one I was not equipped for. The mood in the kitchen was festive and buzzing with conversation, laughter and the muted (then unmuted) music from the patio door opening and closing.

I wondered if my cousins would rather be doing something else at that moment. Or was working in the kitchen a labor of love? Maybe both, simultaneously. But what of the internalized patriarchal expectations of labor from women and young people? Whatever the cause, the effort involved to pull off a satisfying meal for dozens of people, then cleaning up after them, wasn’t evenly distributed or even discussed. It felt like a spontaneous event.

I worried if an elder would think I’m lazy or a cousin would believe I’m not doing my fair share. Still, those concerns weren’t enough. Most of my family live near one another, so these gatherings, though infrequent, happen more often for them than for us who live up north or out west. Reconnecting with the family I hadn’t seen in years was most important to me.

In the end, after I ate several times, I helped clean up a little bit.

The next night, after the party had ended and it was just family (all 30 of us) in the house, this spontaneous cooking, cleaning and serving started again, but this time with my three cousins all preparing the fish that wasn’t fried the night before. I wondered if this was normal. That night I had a sleepover with my cousins, Chasity and Ebonee, who live in Atlanta and are around my age. I brought up the dynamics I witnessed. Alongside their mother, they were the ones shouldering the exhausting task of feeding us and cleaning up. My cousins confirmed what I thought: Nobody really wants to do it, but it’s a consequence of youth and gender, especially when in a traditional familial context.

Taking a quiet stance against what is expected of me can be more subtle than I imagine it to be. When contemplating acts of feminist agency, I didn’t consider how some of the ways it informs my choices are oblique. Sitting on a sofa while many of the women assumed responsibility was an understated way of asserting my beliefs. I think many of us are now considering the ways in which we must prioritize ourselves, especially when we’re taking collective action. For some, transforming gendered expectations might be a huge act, but for others of us, it might be chilling during the Friday night fish fry.

This story was originally published September 29, 2022 at 9:00 AM.