Piipponen + Naples

dates: 11/24/19 – 11/30/19
total distance: 1,205 by plane, car and walks on the beach

people: the Piipponen's - pronounced exactly as spelled :)

Relatives, like hitchhikers, stand at your intersection of nature + nurture: ready to join you, in any direction you take, on the ride of your genetic life.  

Picking up the Piipponen’s for your DNA-laced-road-trip guarantees: grit, entrepreneurship, creativity, spirituality, generosity, low drama and high adventure (travel).

Modeling our team tees

While the Piipponen family is loving and kind:

• Blood runs cold when the competition begins
• Everything is competitive + participation is required – golf, Cornhole, Balderdash, Molkky… it really could be anything!
• According to Dr. Phil (Eason): scores are kept, even with the youngest children + there is one winner and the rest are losers

place:  Naples, Florida

Our shrinking family, from the loss of my father and recently-divorced-sister-in-law, has made travel less stressful and allowed us to reestablish family traditions, like holidays in Florida.

​My grandparents moved to Naples in the 1960’s, when it was a small, sleepy beach town… Naples always feels cozy and sentimental to me, even though “IRL”, it is overcrowded and way-overdeveloped.

We reserved a clean, modern AirBNB in North Naples, a neighborhood which used to be considered “edgy” and is now trendy and gentrifying.

The pool at our rental crib

our adventure begins:

My family attracts drama, so the fact that we were cleaning vomit off the AirBNB carpet and bedding at 10 p.m. on the night we arrived was disgusting… and not surprising. ​

​Our fishing trip with Andy, our second-cousin twice removed, was a great way to begin the vacation. Andy captains charters for Seas the Day and oozes fishing knowledge. It was great to witness his strong work ethic, navigation and fish finding talents, and have the chance to learn from his expertise.

​Andy remained calm as we:

• Arrived late - we were up late vomit-cleaning
• Constantly requested help to add bait/remove fish/untangle hooks
• Interrogated him about his post-college career and girlfriend plans

​Boating was incredible because it provided: no technology + family time, beautiful sunny 75 degree temps, ample fish catching + dolphins sighting!

Mom + kid dolphins near our boat = magic + awe

Visiting Naples at Thanksgiving meant we wouldn’t be back for Christmas, so we blended Thanksgiving + Christmas. So Thursday’s turkey dinner with Grandma’s famous pumpkin pie was followed by Friday’s Christmas meatballs + cheeseball.

Our family passion for balls isn’t reserved for meat and cheese. Tradition demands a balls-to-the-wall, best-ball Christmas Day golf tournament called the Piip-Open, 46th years (somewhat) strong!

The Piip-open is truly discriminating, by childhood hair color, pitting blondes against brunettes, in a battle of skill and will.

Families are divided onto genetically pre-destined teams - the good guys and the bad guys.

​In the spirit of Christmas, a golf tournament is played and the losing team is taunted and forced to serve the winners for the remainder of Christmas Day + bragging rights.

Just to be clear: “the good guys” (self-proclaimed and unproven) are blonde and "the bad guys" are brunette. ​

As a bad guy, I will say:

• We are more bad-ass than bad-guy
• Putting on a bad guy t-shirt can cause tears from young children who want to be “good”
• Being a bad guy is to be embraced, accepted and even celebrated

The combined holiday, Thanks-istmas-giving, was divine. Charie worked hard to care for us and recreate our favorite traditions. While Charie's cell coverage + wifi hardly worked, ensuring that no one was on their phone and everyone could participate in Balderdash and the all-age-all-day Cornhole competition.

Thanksgiving Day was a great warm up for the official faux-Christmas’-Friday competition.

​JP, Kelsey + kids arrived, bringing the Piip-Open game of choice, Mokkly - an overly complicated version of Finnish lawn bowling. The bad guys won – thanks to Kelsey.

A quick dip in the familial gene pool combined with a low tech day playing games created bonds between a new generation of cousins, Macy (10) and Lily (18) and Nora (6).

​Thanks-istmas-giving was about reconnecting with family and tradition.  While the passage of time has shape shifted our families, it is reassuring that their love and support remains unchanged.

Decades of Piip-Open pics

The best part of family is not about who you know… it is about who you are.

Relatives can be the perfect blend of nature + nurture, demonstrating the power of DNA + family traditions to literally hold you together.