the family birthday
Mike Jankulak
some revision of which I'm hoping will strike me as suitable for
posting to soc.motss. Now would be a good time to bail out if you
don't care for that sort of thing.]
I love my family, I love them both collectively and individually.
We're ever-so-slightly fucked up, ever-so-slightly dysfunctional,
ever-so-slightly exasperating in completely non-dramatic ways that
*I* own, *we* own, nobody else does. My two sisters are 5 and 7
years older than I am; both of them had left home by the time I hit
my teens, so I've tasted the baby-of-the-family thing and the
only-child thing in about equal measures. Most of my family -- my
parents, my grandmother, my oldest sister and her two kids -- still
live in Toronto, which is a long ways away from me here. My older
(d'y'see?, oldER but not oldEST) sister is even further away, living
in the UK with her husband and two kids, one of whom I've not yet
met. I don't think I've seen her since the end of '01.
I'm thinking about my family now because of my birthday, yesterday.
Birthdays aren't a big deal for me anymore, well, at least not in
gift-giving ways. I've always had a weird aversion, not to giving
gifts so much but to receiving them, and I was thankful to grow up to
the point where I could arrange my life to avoid this. Xmas has no
relevance in my life, other than being a day I can stay home from
work and still get paid; Chanukah is happily more about setting
things on fire than about giving things; and birthday gifts were
dropped as soon as I could manage it.
[My favorite gift is the gift-for-no-reason gift, the
because-I-saw-it gift. Just as good are the doing-things-for-you
gifts, if you clean out the cat litter without me asking you (and
quite frankly, the litters could use some cleaning right about now)
or make me an all-out meal. This last gift is the only kind I'm
comfortable with as a birthday gift these days, and I look forward to
both a home-cooked birthday extravaganza and (later, sometimes weeks
later) a blow-out don't-care-what-we-spend meal at one of the top
local restaurants. A kind of Aberlak tradition, in fact.]
My family indifferently sends birthday cards (only mum is really good
at this) but our one remaining birthday tradition is the *phone*
*call*. You'll groan, you'll roll your eyes like so many little
bloodshot bowling balls, but for birthdays -- the members of my
family *phone* the birthday-ee. And we *sing*. We sing happy
birthday. We sing to the answering machine if need be, those of us
in the same country might even gather around the speaker phone (god
help us, this *is* the new millennium) in one place and sing
together. We sing badly. We sing out of duty, out of tradition, out
of a weird sense of guilt. Okay, I suppose that last bit is more
clearly why *I* sing, I won't speak for the others.
I've been in the wrong country for, omigod, eight birthdays! I had
to count that twice. On my fingers. Ninety-six, ninety-seven,
ninety-eight... yup, eight birthdays. Over the years, the tradition
has faltered somewhat but mostly we've kept up. In deference to
timezones and long-distance charges and widely varying schedules and,
oh, certain people whom I shan't name becoming *mothers*, we don't
always call on *the* day, we don't always talk to a real
flesh-and-blood human being, and even when we do we don't always talk
for long.
I'd been under the impression, for several years, that my sister in
the UK (oldER but not oldEST, pay attention) and I no longer do this.
It's hard to explain in light of the fact that she *did* call in '02
and again a few days ago, but I thought we'd abandoned each other to
circumstance a long time ago. She's always been my, how should I put
this?, my *rockier* sister. Family history set her against me
through our childhoods, beginning from when I was born just in time
to prevent my mum from taking her to her first day of school (like
all the other mothers did). She was my tormentress (and, okay, my
idol) when I was growing up, I was the dorky baby brother always
getting her in trouble with mum or just *being* there, unwanted.
I was astonished, upon reaching my twenties and beginning to attend
school at the university where she was pursuing her post-graduate
degrees, to find that we could relate to one another on a new level.
A friendship sprung up between us, a kind of intimacy that I valued
all the more for its having been unexpected. [I hate that I can only
see this time through the lens of everything that's happened since --
probably she has very different impressions of me, of our closeness
in that time -- but this is how I see it when I look back.]
Not that anything *happened* since then, nothing happened except
distance. I moved to Ottawa for a few years, and later much further
to Florida. Shortly after I left Canada, she did too, moving to the
UK. Her personality figures in here, too. For one thing, she's
pretty passionately anti-American. You almost have to be Canadian to
understand what I mean by this -- the pervasive disdain,
exasperation, outrage that we all feel, I'm *sure* we all feel to
some degree, about the Americans. [Should I mention that I share
this sentiment, the one that I'm labeling anti-Americanism? Should I
point out that most Americans I call my friends also share this
feeling? These aren't people who want to fly airplanes into
buildings, they're people who want to collectively take the Americans
and just slap them silly. oh, but I *will* digress if I don't watch
myself.]
So anyway, oldER sister. One of her best features, I've always
thought, was her inability to suffer fools gladly. Lord knows, the
world is full of fools, and she's always had a refreshingly direct
(and not infrequently entertaining) way of saying so. I suppose this
is a quality that, when it goes against you, you might be tempted to
call arrogance, or want-of-sympathy. But I don't see it this way.
I've known her for 34 years now, I would no more want her to be
different than I'd want it to snow in the summertime or for rain to
fall upwards. She *is*, and always has been.
All of this by way of explaining to you all that, when she called me
last year on my birthday and left me rather upset, she wasn't being
awful in any way, she was being *her*, and I want to celebrate that.
No, this isn't making much sense. I didn't really want this to be
all about her, but I haven't figured out any way of indicting her for
what she said at the same time as I'm defending it. I won't stretch
it out: she called, not expecting me to answer, thinking I'd be at
work. We'd *obviously* fallen out of touch, for I'd been unemployed
for about five months at that point, and no longer doing too well
with it, emotionally or financially. Learning of my unemployment,
she made a few cracks about my being an American politician's worst
nightmare (you know, immigrant comes to the country, takes some
American's job long enough to qualify for residence, then becomes a
welfare drain and ceases to make any positive contribution to
society).
It crossed a line, and maybe she should have known that. Maybe she
should have been told much earlier what was going on in my life. It
was horrible, but if you *say* the horrible things in an ironic kind
of way, doesn't that serve to undermine their horribleness (eek, what
a word)? You know, subverting the obvious social commentary on my
situation by faux-proclaiming it. I dunno, I'm working too hard to
explain this; *I* understand it, or I think I do. But it did cross a
line. I was vulnerable, she had no real reason to know that this was
so, and her words hurt.
The only thing is, I've lacked the energy or the will to do anything
about it. Before the birth of her first child, my sister and I kept
in irregular contact by email. After my niece was born, the volume
of my sister's correspondence dropped to a trickle (though, I don't
know, maybe she has more time nowadays?). I've really only got the
telephone by way of means to get in touch with her now, and oh lord,
I hate the phone at the best of times. A few weeks following the
birthday call of '02 was *her* birthday which, still being
unemployed, still smarting from the ill-timed comments during my
call, I ignored. I still think we'd mostly abandoned the effort
years before this but, from what I hear through the grapevine, I take
it she was hurt that I skipped her call.
ah, families! Don't you just *hate* 'em? If my sister is forever
and always the girl who was *there* since before I existed, then I am
forever and always the dorky younger brother, just desperate for that
sign of approval that will never come. Classic. The understanding,
that closeness that I mentioned that developed from spending time
together as twentysomethings, it seems to have diminished with the
great separation in time and distance (and, well, lifestyle and
experience) that's grown between us.
Last week, if you'd asked me, I'd've told you that I'd finally gotten
over myself and was hoping to patch things up with a birthday phone
call or two in '03. At the very least, not to let things grow
*worse*. [I suppose it's also relevant that, in addition to that mix
of shame and anxiety that coloured my unemployment last year, I'd
been unpleasantly surprised when Sim had, at the last minute, been
pulled into important hurricane research flights, requiring him to
drive to Tampa the afternoon of my birthday instead of cooking me my
all-out birthday meal. I was already quite upset when she called, so
her social commentary just made wretched things wretcheder (hey, if I
can say "horribleness," I can say "wretcheder," so sue me).
So when hurricane Fabian reared its scientifically intriguing head
this week, I was *all* *over* my man being away for my birthday. I
can pamper *myself* (no, not "pamper" like that, though I'm sure
there are websites for people like that if you're interested)
thankyouverymuch. A good meal, some schlocky buffy-the-vampire-
slayer episodes on tape (hey, I finally saw the musical one!!), a
glass of wine, and the answering machine *on*. [They bought me
birthday cake at the office. I don't think I've ever worked in an
office where they did that, before. I hated every minute of it, and
thoroughly enjoyed hating it, if you get what I mean.]
Sim called in the morning before I left for work (I, thinking he'd
already be airborne by that hour, was caught unawares and nearly
rendered our cats airborne as I leapt up at the last minute to grab
the receiver). The rest of my family called later before I got home
from work, which is only for the best anyhow. Mum, dad, oldEST sis
(who doesn't figure into this story much, because this is about me
complaining, and oldEST sis and I are hearteningly close, wish-we-
were-closer-but-it's-amazing-considering-the-distance close), niece
and nephew all sang happy birthday for me (well, for my machine)
together from oldEST sis' home. At least, I assume it was happy
birthday; the answering machine ate a big chunk of it but the end
sure sounded like happy birthday, and they sounded like they were
enjoying themselves, enjoying each other, which was the nicest bit;
that, and the fact that I didn't have to face talking to them that
evening.
OldER sis left a message too, surprising me but not really I guess,
pissing me off all over again along the lines of: I guess you're not
home, maybe you're *working* again now, remember last year I called
and you were unemployed?, but maybe you're just out with friends,
etc. Argh! I could taste the bile at the back of my throat just
listening to it, I felt my resolve for making *her* birthday call
(remember, just a few weeks away now) falter, I could feel all the
echoes of last year's hurt.
eh, screw it. Maybe it's just in the (kinda therapeutic!) writing of
this, I dunno, but I right now I feel just a little bit *over* myself
again; I can't quite access the trampled feelings I'm writing about.
I hate all things telephonelike but maybe my former resolve to do the
grownup thing will see me through and I'll make the damn call. If
nothing else, I really don't want to cause her the petty hurt of
slighting her on her birthday again this year. No, I don't like the
thought of that at all.
but *gawd*, family is a pain. Like my office birthday cake, I can
hate every minute while loving the hating of it. I hope I'm not
*too* blind to my good fortune. I hope they all remain safe and
happy. I hope none of them every find out how truly petty I can be.
--
"Your Uncle Albert and I had a whirlpool romance,"
Aunt Ruthie tells me. Then she pauses. "Is that
the word I mean?" -- Patricia Volk
Richard Jasper
> but *gawd*, family is a pain. Like my office birthday cake, I can
> hate every minute while loving the hating of it. I hope I'm not
> *too* blind to my good fortune. I hope they all remain safe and
> happy. I hope none of them every find out how truly petty I can be.
Send Older Sister an e-mail explaining (in short, concise) terms your
feelings about last year's birthday phone call.
rpj
Mike Jankulak
>Send Older Sister an e-mail explaining (in short, concise) terms your
>feelings about last year's birthday phone call.
Kewl! Should I opt for the c-section, or the vaginal delivery?
David W. Fenton
>For one thing, she's
>pretty passionately anti-American. You almost have to be Canadian
>to understand what I mean by this -- the pervasive disdain,
>exasperation, outrage that we all feel, I'm *sure* we all feel to
>some degree, about the Americans. [Should I mention that I share
>this sentiment, the one that I'm labeling anti-Americanism?
>Should I point out that most Americans I call my friends also
>share this feeling? These aren't people who want to fly airplanes
>into buildings, they're people who want to collectively take the
>Americans and just slap them silly. oh, but I *will* digress if I
>don't watch myself.]
Count me in on that one, too.
With a bull whip, mostly.
--
David W. Fenton http://www.bway.net/~dfenton
dfenton at bway dot net http://www.bway.net/~dfassoc
David W. Fenton
>eh, screw it. Maybe it's just in the (kinda therapeutic!) writing
>of this, I dunno, but I right now I feel just a little bit *over*
>myself again; I can't quite access the trampled feelings I'm
>writing about.
Congrats -- glad you have used up the emotion in writing it out.
That happens to me a lot, actually, and I think it's a good thing.
If I were in your position, I'd probably call the sis on the
birthday and wish here well and all that and let her know why you
missed last year and why her message this year kinda hurt. But tell
her that it wasn't important enough to you to not call her on her
birthday this year, because you're over it. But you knew that she
wouldn't want to hurt you accidentally, etc., etc.
Too smarmy?
I dunno.
Don't you think she really doesn't want to hurt your feelings? And
if she knew how much it actually hurt you would be sorry about it?
. . .
On another note, oldER vs. oldEST.
With two sisters, you can't have an oldest sister, only an older
one.
Of course, I often speak of my oldER brother, even though I have
just the one brother, but it's shorthand for "my brother, who is
older than me."
Is that what you're doing here? Avoiding "my younger sister"
because it reads like "my sister, who is younger than me" as
opposed to "the younger of my two sisters, both of whom happen to
be older than I"?
Lee Rudolph
>On another note, oldER vs. oldEST.
>
>With two sisters, you can't have an oldest sister, only an older
>one.
Well, gosh, if we're going to be pedantic, he can't have (or
shouldn't be allowed to speak or write of having) either an
"older" or an "oldest" sister (or relative of any nature or
degree): just as people are _hanged_ though objects are _hung_
(yes, yes, idiomatic exception noted and dimissed), so people
are _elder_ and _eldest_ though objects are _older_ and _oldest_
(except for dealt hands at certain card games).
*All* the *best* prescriptivists agree on this.
Lee Rudolph
[Disclaimer: Valid only for North American English. No warranty
for the weird dialects of Australians, Great Britons, Gibraltreans,
Hong Kongese, Malvinians, South Africans, Sri Lankans and similar
subcontinentals, or other breeds without the law, is made or implied.]
Brian Kane
>Mike Jankulak [on his older sister, birthdays, and telephone calls]:
>>[...] but *gawd*, family is a pain. [...]
>
>Send Older Sister an e-mail explaining (in short, concise) terms your
>feelings about last year's birthday phone call.
Mike didn't explicitly ask for advice, but it got me thinking.
Things resonated with me because I, too, am in a family kept apart
by distance and by personality types. My other point of reference is
the family of my media naranja ("better half"), whose members are
separated by 11,000 km but yell at each other nightly over the phone.
I wish I could get to the point of being able to yell or snipe at my
parents or my brothers when I felt the occasion warranted it (since
airing gripes is a sure-fire way of keeping grudges from getting out
of control), but unfortunately I am a victim of a cultural
conditioning[1] which does not put much value in expressing hurt
feelings or confronting others about transgressions.
So here is yet more unsolicited advice:
If your relationship with your sister continues to bother you,
you might send her something which is inimitably in your own personal
style (card, poem, what have you) that brings the issue as you see it
to her attention. Confrontation can be indirect and moderated
by a sense of humor, after all.
[1] In my experience with Canajuns, they share as much culturally with
Amurricans as they have differences with them.
--
Brian Kane (Washington, DC) | Sad-eyed baby I'm not that kind of girl
astroplace.com/brian.asp | When the dice stop rolling, there's no
>bri...@SPAMastroplace.com<| more to the game :::: Stephin Merritt
Mike Jankulak
>So here is yet more unsolicited advice:
Sigh. Well, at least that's better than...
>[1] In my experience with Canajuns, they share as much culturally with
>Amurricans as they have differences with them.
...abuse.
Frank McQuarry
Brian Kane wrote:
> I wish I could get to the point of being able to yell or snipe at my
> parents or my brothers when I felt the occasion warranted it
I think that's largely a class thing. If you had been raised in a poor
white family like mine, you'd have no problem whatsoever telling your
closest rels where to get off. (They freak even more if you don't.)
Frank McQuarry
Mike Jankulak wrote:
>
> Brian Kane <bri...@SPAMastroplace.com> wrote:
> >So here is yet more unsolicited advice:
>
> Sigh. Well, at least that's better than...
>
> >[1] In my experience with Canajuns, they share as much culturally with
> >Amurricans as they have differences with them.
>
> ...abuse.
Neener, neener, neener!
Timothy McDaniel
>>with Amurricans as they have differences with them.
>
>...abuse.
You think that's *abuse*?! Remind me not to flog you!
--
Tim McDaniel, tm...@panix.com; tm...@us.ibm.com is my work address
Brad Macdonald
> Richard Jasper <ric...@domani.net> wrote:
> >Send Older Sister an e-mail explaining (in short, concise) terms your
> >feelings about last year's birthday phone call.
>
> Kewl! Should I opt for the c-section, or the vaginal delivery?
Head-birth?
Brad
Mike Jankulak
>Mike Jankulak <jank...@panix.com> wrote:
>>Brian Kane <bri...@SPAMastroplace.com> wrote:
>>>[1] In my experience with Canajuns, they share as much culturally
>>>with Amurricans as they have differences with them.
>>
>>...abuse.
>
>You think that's *abuse*?!
Hey! Have you taken a long, hard look at an American lately?
It's not pretty.
>Remind me not to flog you!
Just so I'm clear -- I'm not getting any takers on the whole
cleaning-out-the-litter-boxes thing, then?
Mike Jankulak
>Is that what you're doing here? Avoiding "my younger sister"
>because it reads like "my sister, who is younger than me" as
>opposed to "the younger of my two sisters, both of whom happen to
>be older than I"?
Got it in one.
Robert S. Coren
Mike Jankulak <jank...@panix.com> wrote:
>David W. Fenton <dXXXf...@bway.net> wrote:
>>Is that what you're doing here? Avoiding "my younger sister"
>>because it reads like "my sister, who is younger than me" as
>>opposed to "the younger of my two sisters, both of whom happen to
>>be older than I"?
>
>Got it in one.
While we're at it, David, would you make up your mind between the
prescriptivist "older than I" and the idiomatic "younger than me"?
--
---Robert Coren (co...@panix.com)------------------------------------
"I am FAGGOT, Lord of the flames! Feel my wrath!" -- Kaz Underworld
Ellen Evans
Mike Jankulak <jank...@panix.com> wrote:
[]
>Just so I'm clear -- I'm not getting any takers on the whole
>cleaning-out-the-litter-boxes thing, then?
Piffle.
Amateur.
--
Ellen Evans 17 Across: The "her" of "Leave Her to Heaven"
je...@panix.com New York Times, 7/14/96
Get your Ellenwear at http://www.cafeshops.com/ellexia
All the cool kids are doing it.
Brian Kane
>Brian Kane:
>>In my experience with Canajuns, they share as much culturally with
>>Amurricans as they have differences with them.
>
>...abuse.
If it makes you feel better, I'm all for Canada taking over the US,
right about now. (Without exporting whatever atrocious thing you
folk do with french-fried potatoes.)
Anyhow, if I'm right, the first spies arrived to prepare for that
goal in, oh, about 1996.
Mike McKinley
>Timothy McDaniel <tm...@panix.com> wrote:
>
>
>>Mike Jankulak <jank...@panix.com> wrote:
>>
>>
>>>Brian Kane <bri...@SPAMastroplace.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>>[1] In my experience with Canajuns, they share as much culturally
>>>>with Amurricans as they have differences with them.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>...abuse.
>>>
>>>
>>You think that's *abuse*?!
>>
>>
>Hey! Have you taken a long, hard look at an American lately?
>It's not pretty.
>Remind me not to flog you!
>
>
>Just so I'm clear -- I'm not getting any takers on the whole
>cleaning-out-the-litter-boxes thing, then?
>
>
>
No, but if the Mexican painter and I ever make it to Dania by the
Sea, I'll cook dinner for you.
--
¿...qué podemos saber las mujeres sino las filosofías de cocina? Bien dijo Lupercio Leonardo, que bien se puede filosofar y aderezar la cena. Y yo suelo decir viendo estas cosillas: Si Aristóteles hubiera guisado, mucho más hubiera escrito."
("...what can we women know, save philosophies of the kitchen? It was well put by Lupercio Leonardo that one can philosophize quite well while preparing supper. I often say, when I make these little observations, "Had Aristotle cooked, he would have written a great deal more.")
Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz, La Respuesta
Robert Feiertag
news:bj8u6c$947$1...@panix5.panix.com...
>
> Just so I'm clear -- I'm not getting any takers on the whole
> cleaning-out-the-litter-boxes thing, then?
>
Happy birthday to yooooou!
Bob
David W. Fenton
<bj90cs$as3$1...@panix5.panix.com>:
>In article <bj8u93$973$1...@panix5.panix.com>,
>Mike Jankulak <jank...@panix.com> wrote:
>>David W. Fenton <dXXXf...@bway.net> wrote:
>>>Is that what you're doing here? Avoiding "my younger sister"
>>>because it reads like "my sister, who is younger than me" as
>>>opposed to "the younger of my two sisters, both of whom happen
>>>to be older than I"?
>>
>>Got it in one.
>
>While we're at it, David, would you make up your mind between the
>prescriptivist "older than I" and the idiomatic "younger than me"?
Heh. I hadn't noticed that. I wish I could say I did it on purpose.
Jed Davis
> With two sisters, you can't have an oldest sister, only an older
> one.
I feel the obligation to share the earworm I've just been given, thusly:
There were two sisters side by side
The eldest for young Johnny cried,
"I'll be true unto my love
if he'll be true to me."
ObMOTSS: the rest of the song, which demonstrates the perils of heterosexuality
--
Jed Davis <jld...@cs.oberlin.edu> Selling of self: http://panix.com/~jdev/rs/
<jd...@panix.com> PGP<-finger A098:903E:9B9A:DEF4:168F:AA09:BF07:807E:F336:59F9
\ "But life wasn't yes-no, on-off. Life was shades of gray, and rainbows
/\ not in the order of the spectrum." -- L. E. Modesitt, Jr., _Adiamante_
Jed Davis
> Timothy McDaniel <tm...@panix.com> wrote:
>>Mike Jankulak <jank...@panix.com> wrote:
>>>Brian Kane <bri...@SPAMastroplace.com> wrote:
>>>>[1] In my experience with Canajuns, they share as much culturally
>>>>with Amurricans as they have differences with them.
>>>
>>>...abuse.
>>
>>You think that's *abuse*?!
>
> Hey! Have you taken a long, hard look at an American lately?
That was a con event, you know. Well, OK, it was really my shirt they
were looking at, much to AnnB's consternation. But still.
Chris Ambidge
>I feel the obligation to share the earworm I've just been given, thusly:
>
>There were two sisters side by side
>The eldest for young Johnny cried,
>"I'll be true unto my love
> if he'll be true to me."
>
>ObMOTSS: the rest of the song, which demonstrates the perils of heterosexuality
well, I don't know that one, but I do have this ditty, taught
to me by Rita McNeill (obMotss), on the unspeakable things those
heteros do, and the perils of their sexual orientation:
oh, billy be fair and billy be fine
he wants me for to wed
and I would marry billy but my father up and said
"I'm sad to tell you daughter what your mother never knew
but billy here is a son of mine, and so he's kin to you"
oh johnny be fair and johnny be fine
he wants me for to wed
and I would marry johnny, but my father up and said
"I'm sad to tell you daughter what your mother never knew,
but johnny too is a son of mine, and so he's kin to you"
well you never saw a girl so sad and sorry as I was
the boys in town are all my kin and my father is the cause
if life should thus continue I will die a single miss
I'm going to go to mother and complain to her a'this
"oh my daughter haven't I taught ya to forgive and to forget
and if your father's sown his oats, well still you needn't fret
he may be father to all the single boys in town and still
he's not the one who sired you, so marry who ya will."
ailuropoda melanoleuca torontonensis
humming along to the music