Today's grandparents are younger, hipper, and less inclined to rock (in a chair) than previous generations. The Baby Boomers ride Harleys, swear in front of the grandkids, wear leather, and do not always forsake their sinful youths in favor of growing stodgy.
They live longer and healthier lives than their parents. And roughly 40% of Boomers have been divorced at least once. The generation that bought wholeheartedly into the concept that kids prefer to live with happily divorced parents, rather than unhappily married ones, didn't realize the Pandora's box they were opening.
Which brings us to the current situation. Currently, there are 78.2 million Baby Boomers in the U.S., about 1 million of whom are my childrens' grandparents. My parents divorced in 1979 and each remarried. I married someone whose parents similarly divorced and remarried. So between the two of us, we have 8 parents. Since ours is a second marriage, my children also have 4 parents, each of whom have parents who have divorced and remarried.
You following so far?
My children have twelve grandparents. TWELVE. Imagine birthdays and holidays with this many loving grandparents (most of whom are within driving distance). Can you say 'too much of a good thing'? Clearly we set a new standard for 'blended' families here. A standard I'm not sure future generations will be able to make sense of without a computer, a roll of measuring tape, and a five-dimensional holographic family tree.
