If only we were a Filipino-Canadian Catholic/American Jewish couple

Holidays with divorced parents might be a bit easier.

Typing away furiously in the bedroom, my other half is finishing up his Master's project, to defend next weekend. This, I hope, will lead to his first graduation ceremony he's ever attended.

My husband has the most stubborn divorced set of parents I've ever heard of. Apart, they are charming. But any mention of the other's existence spells disaster. We're careful not to show them even pictures of the opposite parent, we don't mention when the other is coming for a visit, and we edit out any reference to them, such as "I forget who it was who told me ..."

On the positive side, ignoring the other prevents rude yelling matches. On the negative side, they go to extreme lengths to stay thousands of miles apart.

As a result, my husband bailed on his own high school graduation ceremony, opted to skip his college commencement, too, because both parents refused to go if the other was present. In a room full of thousands of people! To his credit, he rose above the strife and didn't choose between them.

At our wedding, I twisted his arm to have a ceremony at all. With much convincing on all sides, he finally invited one to the reception and the other to the rehearsal dinner & wedding ceremony. We literally had two sets of invitations made. The wedding was held in a "neutral" state (my home state) which sadly ensured that most of his extended family would find excuses not to be there. The parents stayed in unidentified hotels at the opposite ends of the town, grudgingly. At least his half-sister was permitted by her mom to stay for the reception, too. That was the first time in fifteen years that his mother and father had even been in the same state simultaneously.

God forbid that L should ever get married. We'd rather encourage her to elope than to go through another such ordeal with grandparents.