We used to drop everything to fix everyone else's sudden panics. Not anymore. Here is a midlife reality check on the absolute necessity of returning other people's manufactured urgency to sender and protecting your peace at all costs.

Family gatherings inevitably bring unsolicited opinions and exhausting questions. Before you flip the folding table, it is time to deploy the signature Gen-X Deadpan Stare. Here is your midlife survival guide to protecting your peace, eating the potato salad, and leaving the barbecue without catching a charge.