Showing Off in Front of the Family

I don’t know about you, but I don’t like my children or my mate showing off in front of people I know or don’t know for that matter.  Yet, sometimes while we are out on trips and around family over the years, there would be some showing off.  If the man isn’t making small talk that comes off as being flirtatious while checking out a female here and there (this has happened when most men in and out of my life) or the children aren’t crying as if someone beat them, folks are showing off.  When this sort of thing happens, I don’t always bite my tongue and I also have been known to show off myself.  “That guy looks handsome…hmm let me see what he has to say…well the children want to cry, I know how to disappear and pretend like I have no children,” I think.  But there has been a price to pay over the years for doing such things.  Two wrongs don’t make it right.

Those other personalities seem to come out of nowhere when in the public eye and I am left puzzled, angered, and ready to show off myself!  “What the…?  Who the?”  I don’t like when partners disrespect their spouses in front of people and I have had to exercise some self-control when I witness such behavior sometimes.  A bossy husband stands before me and tells his wife, “Oh honey…shut up!  She can be a real pain, you know!”  Meanwhile, the wife just looks at her husband as if to say, “Wait until we get home!”  Showing off will cost you your marriage.  I have seen women get smart mouth with their husbands in front of relatives as if someone is going to jump in and say, “Yea, tell him off!”  Save that drama for one’s home!  It’s not cute, funny, and it doesn’t make one look like you have your family under control.  Rather, it makes some look wicked (I could say something else here) when they are talking down to their husbands.

Children can be a real problem during their showing off times too.  They will start doing things that they never do or say at home.  I have seen a side to my children that I didn’t know existed at the wrong times.  It seems that family gatherings, church events, weddings, funerals, and other similar settings brings out the worse in some children.  From screaming to running around like fools, children pick up on their parents’ tension and anyone else around them who is a ball of energy. 

Most times I don’t like being around adult kid show off types because they know how to bring out the hyperactivity in children and then when they can’t keep up with all of the excitement, they disappear and leave the wild children to the parents to discipline.  I have learned over the years, keep the children away from certain settings and relatives—it’s just not worth the drive home, the preparation for bed, and everything else in between.

When a partner and children are showing off it is nothing more than a mere distraction to keep many mothers from doing what they have either set their minds to do or promised others they would do.  Everything is going as planned and then suddenly the partner wants to say something he has no business saying in front of the family.  I can’t tell you how many times over the course of my life that fiancees, and boyfriends have been guilty of this!  No one asked them for their opinion or a story about me, but those typically quiet guys are going to say something whether in front of you or behind your back.  What my former partners didn’t realize is that their silly statements, criticisms, or off-base sense of humor would just give my family just one more reason to call that one, “A loser…What’s up with him? Boring.  Why do you pick these guys?  That one is an idiot!”  All the showing off for what?  Only to be talked about in the end.

So for those of you who will be headed to a relative’s home this holiday season, give your family the pep talk and the consequences before leaving if you have seen a pattern of irresponsible and disrespectful sort of behavior in your presence.  And if you just don’t feel like putting up with the foolishness this year, sit this one out.  Most likely, someone in the family is hoping you don’t bring the show offs with you.   

Nicholl McGuire is author of When Mothers Cry and Know Your Enemy the Christian's Critic.