Memory: Dance

When I was about 11, my grandmother took me to this summer cottage, where all the other grannies brought their kids as well. So basically, no organized activities for the kids, so all we did was go crazy, and the grannies sat around.

That’s not what I really remember from that time right now. 

What I remember is that the place decided to have a discotheque (it was a Russian place, of course) for everyone. But first before anyone really got there, they allowed the kids to dance. We chose the music and we all just went at it. There was less than 20 of us. 

I was a shy kid…but I loved dancing.

You Reminded Me

While waiting for the bus, a little elderly lady turned to speak to me. She seemed very excited to chat with Melissa and I. Turns out she was from NYC, but has been living in San Fran since the 70’s. Good year to move, I said and she laughed. She would grab my elbow with excitement while the three of us chatted. It wasn’t creepy, just affectionate. This city is just so friendly. After asking what our majors were, she told me that she initially came over to tell me that I reminded her of Amy Goodman, with a Jewish-Buddhist monk air. I took the comparison as a huge compliment.

My Father

My father has no idea how to love. He can only love, as he says, but its more of an appreciation for success. When you make something of yourself. When you prove yourself to him. He cannot love just because, you’re you, and he’s he, and he’s your father, and you’re his child. He said he has no idea how to love like that. Freely and without requirements.

My entire family is a little broken inside. What family isn’t? We survived the wreckage of not knowing how to love each other, and ourselves.

We survived but we all ended up as emotional amputees, struggling to hug each other with our phantom limbs.

I wonder if I have truly learned how to love, or if I have learned how to be such a good actor.

What good is a father if he cannot love? A father that is waiting for you to get old enough, good enough, and then only then, claim you as his own, while you watch helplessly as this biologically-related stranger hugs you. And you think, yes you start your sentence with an and, because your mind, and your heart are so desperately trying to amend the situation. You remember being young and wanting to play, wanting homework help, wanting to watch cartoons with your father…but instead he was too tired, too annoyed, too interested in porn. A father who didn’t notice the tiny figure slip on the couch next to him while he was watching bouncing breasts, the figure who knew to be close enough to feel his body’s warmth but never touch.

The makings of a masochist?

I am angry at my father. I blame him for ruining my mother and making her the emotionally cold and nuerotic indivdual she is now. I blame him for cheating on her and ruining the marriage. The family. I blame him for yelling at my brother and giving him problems. Where he cannot love himself. Enjoy himself. Where food has no taste. Where sanity is luxury. I blame him for not being there for me. For not being a daddy. For being some stranger in white underwear who sleeps with my mother and barks at me. I hate him. For all of it.

It’s kinda sad how desperately my brother and I are trying to sew together what we think a family is, because we never really knew.