One of the things I always say I'm going to do, but never actually do, is have a Day of the Dead party. I am not Mexican, nor do I have any Aztec heritage (that I know of), so this would be just another example of a rapacious American haphazardly co-opting elements of another culture, infatuated with the aesthetics and novelty of it, without a thorough understanding of the tradition; plus, I like all the skeletons (calaveras). I even live near a couple of cemeteries, although I don't know anybody in either to visit. Also: sugar skulls. It just seems like a neato holiday, is what I'm saying.
The Internet tells me that among the Día de los Muertos traditions is honoring your deceased ancestors by telling anecdotes about them and providing their favorite foods. Since it is much easier to do things on the Internet than it is to do them in real life, I invite you to join me in doing just that right now:
Paternal Grandfather. Died before I was born, but my brother and sister remember him well. I wish I could remember some of the stories I used to hear about him when I was little. I have no idea what he was actually like in life, but in my family's reminiscences he became beatific, gentle and wise. I know he was a respected businessman in the community; a pharmacist with a chain of drugstores, his customers would call him "Doc Surname" (with my actual surname substituting for "Surname" in this case). I sometimes tell people that he was one of the thinly-veiled characters in Look Homeward, Angel. I'm pretty sure that this is a complete lie, but I've never been able to finish the fucking thing, so who knows? I do know that he would not have approved of me saying "fucking" just now. I have no idea what his favorite food was, so how about a nice grilled cheese? Everybody likes grilled cheese.
Paternal Grandmother. I get the feeling that she would have been a difficult mother to have. Most of my memories of her are set in the nursing homes where she lived -- grim, antiseptic places, back before the golden age of "Assisted Living Communities." We would visit her on Sundays, after church, and these nursing homes tended to serve broccoli for lunch on Sundays, leading to a lifetime of the smell of broccoli evoking despair, loneliness and decay. She was the saddest woman I ever knew (up to that point), but she would always let me eat her dessert. These anecdotes aren't turning out so well so far, are they? Maybe it's just as well I never had that party. Anyway, obviously, she should have some of the dessert she so graciously let me have. But not pudding; too cliche. Maybe a cobbler.
Maternal Grandfather. The big, tough, crusty, salty old guy against whom all other big, tough, crusty, salty old guys must forevermore be measured. And, of course, like most BTCSOGs, he was actually also very wise, loving and tender. I used to love going on long walks with him around our neighborhood. He could fix anything, it seemed like. One of the strongest men I ever knew; at age 38, I try, and fail, to keep up the exercise regimen he maintained into his 70s. When my parents got married, my dad thanked my grandfather for my mother's hand. "Just glad to get her off the payroll," he replied. Not sure he would fully approve of how effete I've become, but he'd never say so. For him, some of the potent licorice pellets he used to share with me, plus a couple of swigs from the bottle of liquor he kept in the garage.
Maternal Grandmother. Probably the only woman on Earth who could have successfully married my maternal grandfather; she was also roughly half his size. Did not approve of her husband's constant swearing, especially around me. As with many people who raised families during the Depression, she learned the hard way the necessity of hard work and thrift. These were qualities she tried valiantly to instill in me -- unsuccessfully, as anybody who knows me can confirm. She paid for most of my college education (not to mention a good deal of my layabout young adulthood), for which I never felt like I thanked her enough. She was way ahead of the curve on oat bran. She loved to read; one of her greatest sorrows was her eyesight failing past the point where she could read large-print books. When I started driving, her admonition to me was always, "Watch out for the other guy" -- pretty good advice. If I could find the recipe, I would make her some Congo Squares, a dessert she always used to make for us.
Dad. Ah. Here we go. The focus of most of my boneheaded, sullen high-school contempt; also, the person in my family that I'm most like, I think. A lawyer who always wanted to be an actor, he finally got to do it, then died before he got to do enough of it. At age 12, he saw the fire in which Zelda Fitzgerald died. As someone whose friendship was prized because of his ability to make others laugh, he was my earliest comedic role model. He always laughed at his own jokes, but he managed to make it not be annoying. There's a lot more I could say about him, and probably will, but the thing to remember is: he did the best he could. He was a man, take him for all in all; I shall never look upon his like again. I'd grill something out for him, imbued with the flavor of smoking hickory chips, but I never bothered to ask him to teach me how.
Okay. Your turn to remember some of your absent friends, blood relations or otherwise.
Of course, the results of the recent mid-term elections were good news for your knee-jerk effete Eastern intellectual bed-wetting liberal types like myself. But I was not aware, until this very day, of the very best news of all.
Also, it must be said: Congressman-Elect Jon Tester (D-MT) reminds me a little bit of Otho from Beetlejuice. Surely I'm not the first to have noticed this. At any rate, congratulations to all incoming legislators, including those who aren't somehow connected to mass popular entertainment!
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