It's All in the Family

            by Rebecca Hardin

 

                                                My Immediate family

   

     It all began in the nineteen eighties when my parents met.  They were both attending a

 

local community college, and caught the same bus to get to class.  My father saw my mother and

 

knew she was "the one".  She thought he was some crazy Italian guy and tried to avoid him

 

(He's actually half Russian Jew, half English, but my mother thinks all white people look the

 

same.)  When he approached her to ask her to dinner, she decided to go against her instinct,

 

which she'll never do again, and accept his invitation.  They ended up getting married and

 

having me. 

 

   

    Before the wedding occurred, she brought him home to meet her family.  Each and

 

every one of her relatives said the exact same thing: "Couldn't you find a nice Japanese boy to

 

marry?"  (However, my father didn't understand a word because all my mother's relatives speak

 

Japanese.)  My mother had to conceal my father's ethnicity because my grandfather hates

 

Russians.  (I've never understood this, but apparently one of his forefather's was in the Russo-

 

Japanese War and ever since then, he doesn't buy anything Russian and if he finds out someone

 

he knows is Russian, he breaks off all contact with them.  My grandfather thinks to this day that

 

my dad is Italian.)

   

   

    When my father introduced my mother to his paternal family they all said the same thing:

 

"Couldn't you find a nice Jewish girl to marry?"  This was a little worse because all of my dad's

 

family speaks English. (To this day, my mother hates most of my father's family because of that

 

comment.  She doesn't understand the concept of forgiveness.  My dad can't talk to any of my

 

mom's family, so he doesn't care).  The wedding went smoothly, and as soon as I was born both

 

sides seemed content in the match.

 

 

                               My Paternal Grandfather, Great Uncle, and Two Great Aunts

 

    My grandfather is one of the most amazing person I have the pleasure of knowing.  He is

 

eighty three years old, and has some great stories.  When W.W.II broke out, he joined the Navy

 

and ended up off the coast of the Philippines.  He saw no action, so to prevent boredom, he

 

printed out communist fliers which he distributed whenever he went offship.  After the war

 

ended, he returned to the America and moved to Berkeley.  (Big surprise.)

 

   

    When my great uncle was little, his parents found he was talented at playing the piano.  He

 

began studying seriously, and ended up at one of the foremost music conservatories in the United

 

States.  Instead of practicing hard for four years and becoming the next Horowitz, he was drafted

 

to fight in W.W.II.  He returned, got married, became a plastic surgeon in Los Angeles, and

 

accused his wife of cheating on him after his youngest son was born.  (His youngest son is a

 

spitting image of my great uncle.)  He is currently divorced, and advises everyone to go to the

 

doctor as little as possible.  (He thinks all doctors are crazy, especially surgeons.  When my

 

grandfather went in for spine surgery, my great uncle called the surgeon and began to interrogate

 

him about various procedures.  He then pronounced the surgeon a quack and told my grandfather

 

to find another one.) 

 

  

     My great aunts are the only ones who practice Judaism.  One of them is eighty something and

 

acts like it, and the other is in her late seventies and acts about forty.  They are both hell-bent on

 

converting me mostly so I can find a nice Jewish boy and settle down.  (I think they are still

 

disappointed that my father married an Asian.)  At my cousin's Bar Mitzvah, both of my great

 

aunts approached me at different intervals throughout the dinner party.  One of them came

 

straight out and asked me if I wanted a bat mitzvah party. 

 

    "Of course I do," I responded, "But I don't want to do the work it takes to get the party."

 

"It's not that bad.  All you have to do is memorize a tiny section of the Torah."

 

After hearing my cousin's three hour service, all of which was conducted in Hebrew, I politely

 

declined.  My aunt then headed straight for her sister, and a few minutes later my other great aunt

 

came over with a huge smile on her face.  I smiled and greeted her.

 

    "Honey, how are your music studies coming?"

 

    "Great,"  I said.

 

    "You know, it's not too late for you to start studying for you Bat Mitzvah.  You already know

 

how to read music.  And it would only take the summer for you to learn enough Hebrew to lead a

 

Reform mitzvah."

 

    "I don't really want to, I mean-"

 

    "You don't have to have a bat mitzvah when you turn thirteen, dear."

 

    "Yes, but-"

 

    "There's no shame in holding one when you are thirteen and a half.  Better late than never." 

 

She then nodded approvingly and walked away to talk my father into sending me to Hebrew

 

School as soon as possible.  To this day, I still hear words of advice on preparing for the Bat

 

Mitzvah I am sure I will never perform.

 

 

                                           My Father and his Youngest Brother

  

 My father is slightly overprotective.  I must be the only seventeen year old who has a 4:30 p.m.

 

curfew, which I blame on my grandfather.  When my father and his brothers were growing up,

 

my grandfather was going through his hippie phase.  They would all sit in the backyard and

 

smoke weed together.  Once my grandfather and my dad went on a Yosemite and walked around

 

eating peyote.  My father could do anything and he didn't have a curfew.  Therefore, I can do

 

nothing, and I am perpetually grounded.  My father also constantly lectures me about the drug

 

addled homeless who will come after me and kidnap me, the rapists on every corner waiting to

 

lure me into their dens, and of course, the ax murderers who roam the streets of wherever and kill

 

people in broad daylight.  If I get into a car with one of my friends, the car will certainly crash. 

 

This is because my friend will either be drunk, drag racing, or both.  I point out that all my

 

friends who drive are still alive, and have never seriously crashed.  He just snorts and leaves the

 

room.

 

  

     My father's youngest brother has always been a strange one, according to my dad.  (The

 

accuracy of this description is questionable.)  He grew up an atheist, but turned to Scientology

 

soon after he entered Cal.  (My dad is convinced my uncle thought Scientology was a support

 

group for scientists.)  Confused, my grandfather tried to talk him off of that path, but my uncle

 

would have none of it.  A couple of months later, he left the Church of Scientology, much to

 

everyone's relief.  No sooner had he left, then he decided he was gay.  Most members of the

 

family were okay with this discovery, but didn't believe him.  A couple of weeks later, he

 

announced he wasn't gay, he was a converted Orthodox Jew.  He married a woman whom he met

 

through his chul, much to his immediate family's despair.  No one liked her, not even my

 

grandfather who likes everyone.  Soon after their first child was born, they divorced and now not

 

even my uncle likes her.

 

                                       My Mother and Her Sisters

 

    My mother and most of her siblings were born on a farm on the Okinawa, an island off of

 

Japan.  My mother spent the first years of her life happily killing spiders with handmade traps

 

and shooting at people's heads with her slingshot.  When she turned eight, her family uprooted

 

and moved to Hawaii.  Nothing really changed; she still reveled in other beings' discomfort.  She

 

graduated from killing spiders to collecting geckos from her garden and pulling off their tails at

 

once to see them wriggle around.  (She denies this, but I think she liked to see the geckos in pain

 

too.  If God is an animal, she's going straight to hell.) 

 

 

    My mother's older sister is like my dad's younger brother in that she thought she was a lesbian

 

for a year in high school.  Unlike my uncle, who was just talking, she actually had a girlfriend. 

 

My grandparents are rather traditional Japanese, and they weren't too pleased with their

 

daughter's experimenting.  She figured out she was straight, and got married.

 

   

    For a while, my mother's youngest sister lived with her grandmother who spoiled her. 

 

Eventually, my aunt rejoined her family.  On her first dinner back, she was sitting at the table

 

watching everyone eat.  My grandmother noticed she wasn't eating and inquired as to why.  My

 

aunt replied:  "No one put the chopsticks in my hand."  After that incident, she became

 

accustomed to having to compete for attention, and became more normal.  She ended up getting

 

married young.  Soon after her first child was born, her husband was convicted of rape and sent

 

to prison.  She divorced him, and proceeded to date a man she met at a seedy bar.  My aunt and

 

my mother are very close, and they would talk about this new guy a lot.  My mother strongly

 

advised against my aunt's new boyfriend.  My aunt didn't listen and got married again.  Soon after

 

her second child was born, her new husband was convicted of armed robbery and sent to prison. 

 

She hasn't gotten remarried since.

 

 

    In short, I have a weird family.  But I guess everyone does, so they can relate to this story.

 

(Hopefully.)  I hope people learn to appreciate their family more, because whether you like it or

 

not, you're stuck with them.  Whenever you're having a rough time with your family, just revel in

 

the fact your family isn't mine.