I would like to make the case for the removal of the prefix "dysfunctional" before the word "family." It's redundant. Every family is dysfunctional. There are degrees of dysfunction of course, but in the interests of authenticity, I think we should send "dysfunctional" back to the shameful, mixed-message cave from whence it came.

And while we're at it, what exactly is a functional family? It doesn't really sound like something to strive for, does it? If someone told me they came from a really functional family, I'd imagine some totalitarian cult breeding robotic kids, with Stepford moms and dads looking like Vladimir Putin in that picture with his top off, fishing. Now, tell me you're from a dysfunctional family, and I'm hooked.

I have just spent the best part of a week in an RV with, well, some of my dysfunctional family. And it was one of the most glorious weeks I can remember.

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I had invited my older brother Tom and his three children – the eldest boy, 25, from his second marriage, the younger boy, 22, and a girl, 20, from his third – on this trip as they had flown to Florida to join my husband Grant and me at our joint 50th birthday bash at Typhoon Lagoon in Disney World.

Yes, that's right, to celebrate our joint century alive on this planet, my husband and I closed down a water park and had 200 or so of our besties fly in from around the globe to make merry and get their photos taken with Mickey and Minnie, all whilst wearing bathing suits and very drunk.

Imagine emerging from an insanely fast water slide that precipitated the most intense wedgie you have ever experienced, and being drunkenly applauded for doing so by your manager, a couple of your co-workers, someone's very tall child and the husband of a pregnant friend of yours who was wisely floating along the lazy river. It was an epic evening.

And while we're on the subject of removing prefixes, I would also like to advocate the removal of the word "fake" from anything connected to a Disney theme park. Everything was fake. The waves at the beach were fake, the beach itself was fake. The sand was real, but when you walked in to the fake sea, it became fake, concrete sand. When I went down to Orlando last year to do a scout for the birthday bash, one of the Disney production people asked me if I had any ideas for the theme of our party.

"Ah, how about the theme of having it at a fake beach in a water park at Disney World?" I replied jauntily.

This was met with confused stares. And then I realized I was being a bit too meta. Fake cannot be a theme when the entire place is a paean to make-believe. Disney owns its fakeness. Fake is its currency. I admire that.

Anyway, back to the RV. In addition to me, my husband Grant and my brother and his brood, there were a couple of my friends, one a promoter who had arranged the concert I was giving in New Orleans that this trip had precipitated, and another, my musical director. We also had a driver – a little hairy, tattooed, pierced young man who joined us at the party and repeatedly came down the aforementioned waterslide naked to avoid the wedgie issue and would have been forced by Disney police to leave the park had we not intervened and pleaded clemency.

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The idea of being trapped for many, many hours in a bouncy RV (tattoo man was an aggressive driver) might fill the more faint of heart with justifiable horror, especially when driving the entire length of Florida (we renamed the state "Ikea" as it felt like we'd never find our way out of it). But I always think a road trip not only sorts the men from the boys, it also bonds them – and that is exactly what happened on this one. Seeing my nephews trade barbs then chat earnestly about their aspirations with my friends was a beautiful thing to behold, as was sitting in the hot tub of some Floridian seaside hotel after another long day in said RV, watching my brother and his kids have a much needed heart-to-heart, and feeling the palpable bond between them grow even stronger because of it.

For that week, the weird bunch of misfits that we were became a family – initially reaching out tentatively to those we didn't know, luxuriating in the familiar with those we did, and, by the end, having all shared something different and unexpected and unforgettable. We looked out for each other, worried about each other, annoyed each other, lied to each other and loved each other. Our dysfunction made us a functioning, beautiful whole.

Special to The Globe and Mail