Grandma said you can outgrow being Chinese.

I don't want to say my father's parents were ignorant but, upon meeting my aunt's adopted niece, Grandma Marie Rabasca said not to worry, that she would outgrow being Chinese.

I believe the girl is still Chinese and still waiting to outgrow it.

In the relatively recent past, my father, his brother, and the same aunt waiting for her adopted niece to outgrow Chineseness took a heritage trip to Calitri, Italy, to find our distant family. The trip was a success. They met first cousins, learned we are related to the man who hid the questionably mystical Shroud of Turin from the Nazis, and discovered that we are probably a billionth Albanian. Sometime during the height of the Ottoman Empire, a man named Rabasca emigrated from Albania, set up shop in the mountains outside Naples, and established a family that would eventually have a road named after the man who would eventually immigrate to America and eventually establish the family that would eventually lead to me.

The operative word here is "Albania." I'm pretty sure we cannot outgrow this. I'm also pretty sure that my grandparents are still turning in their graves over this one.

For the record, I don't personally have an issue with Albanians nor with anyone trying to outgrow their Albanianness.

My grandparents, however, would likely disapprove of our being anything other than fully Italian. It was a big step for them to accept that their youngest son would marry a Jewish girl. You can't outgrow that one, either...believe me when I say I've tried.

We do seem to be less and less "pure blooded"-sorry, Adolf. I recently read an article about Italian soccer star, Mario Balotelli, an adopted man of a Sicilian Jewish family.

Oh, by the way, he has been unsuccessful at outgrowing being black, specifically Ghananian.

Mr. Balotelli has endured a fervor of such ethnically hostile epithets that I'm surprised he didn't score against his own team in the Euro 2012 Cup. In Turin, the fans welcomed him by throwing bananas onto the field. I imagine the ones throwing bananas are also appalled at the idea that the Moors once invaded southern Italy, slept with Italian women, and shared genes that darkened their offsprings' complexion.

Come on, my fellow paisanos. Do we really have that much time on our hands that we need to hurl fruit at a man kicking a ball into a net because his skin's a reminder that "other" people are, in fact, out there?

At the center of this disproportionately reactive behavior lies the question we ask in America: who are we? Balotelli, an athletic hero, is redefining the meaning of "Italian," as we ask here, "What is an American?" We do seem to be less and less of who we think we are and it is threatening to a great many people. My own daughters are more Italian than anything else -that is to say that they are exactly one-quarter Italian. But, then again, they're one-quarter Jewish, which is to say that they would have been spared in the Holocaust, according to the Nuremberg citizenship laws. Their dad would have been out of luck. I haven't even yet mentioned that when you throw a dart at a map of Europe, chances are it'll land on a country from which they have blood. For some reason, in America, we place all of that ahead of being American.

Maybe Grandma's right...we're just outgrowing being Chinese.

Announcement

A short story of mine, entitled "The Lobster's Name Is Nick," will be available in print format in The Alarmist's inaugural issue on July 30, 2012.

Enjoy and thanks.

Henry Hill was a pusher.

 "As far back as I can remember, I always wanted to be a gangster."

                                           -Henry Hill, Goodfellas

Recently, Henry Hill, the infamous mobster who "ratted" out his crew to avoid incarceration and whose biography inspired Scorsese's Goodfellas, died, to which Twitter fans, including well-known comedians and actors, tweeted micro-eulogy after micro-eulogy after micro-eulogy. Many quoted the movie in homage. Some simply wrote, "RIP Henry Hill." Ray Liotta, the actor who portrayed Hill in Goodfellas, even wished his family well. I wouldn't say it was an outpouring of emotion and I wouldn't say I didn't briefly experience nostalgia -I spent many a day after school memorizing lines from Goodfellas and imitating Joe Pesce's f-word pronunciation- but let's have a little perspective, my good people.

Henry Hill was not what one might consider an upright citizen:  a) he was abusive to his wife, b) he was a drug dealer, c) he was an accomplice to murder, d) he was abusive to his wife, e) he was a drug dealer, f) he was thief, g) he was a philanderer, h) he was abusive to his wife, i) he was a drug dealer, and j) he probably didn't claim his earnings from the NCAA basketball scandal or the Lufthansa heist as profit.

I'm not saying we should rejoice. It's not like an Osama bin Laden type of death -I rejoiced at bin Laden's demise after living in the chaos and sorrow of New York City after the Towers collapsed- but we might not want to celebrate Mr. Hill. After all, how often does the Witness Protection Program actually de-protect their informants? Their character standards are pretty low. Hill was such an offender that, after reaching his law-breaking quota while under protection, the Department of Justice had decidedly had enough of the Hills and released them back into the wilds of everyday citizenry.

I know, I know...it's bad juju to speak ill of the dead. Perhaps, though, we might use slightly more discretion when paying our respects. Not that we should be happy, just somewhat more selective.

"May you be safe in storm."

I "broke into" a local college graduation ceremony to see Robert Krulwich's commencement speech. Not really appropriate daddy behavior but they weren't exactly taking tickets.

Mr. Krulwich is, of course, known for accomplishments in journalism, television, radio, and, by his own accord, offering Arthur Miller financial advise while urinating into the neighboring urinal. But, what I love Mr. Krulwich for most is his co-hosting role on Radiolab, a National Public Radio program and podcast. I've drawn on this program for inspiration on several short stories and felt that I couldn't pass this opportunity to see the man behind the voice.

His speech was nothing short of compelling. He spoke of designing and redesigning who we are or who we think we are or who will think we'll be so that who we'll be becomes who we hope we'll be. He said that this endeavor of determining who we are as individuals, though we think it's a "singular" struggle, is really a pluralized effort. He spoke of the people who say, "Why not?" instead of, "Yes, but..." He told witty anecdotes and pithy universalities.

But, the comment that most stood out in this speech was rather tangental to his theme. He made mention of the families of the graduates, the parents who would say only of the graduates hopes and dreams, "May you be safe in storm."

In the interest of full disclosure, that I did too many things I shouldn't have done when I was fourteen may have caused me to confuse pronouns...the actual quote may have been "May they always be safe in storm." He was, after all, speaking in third person of multiple people.

Regardless, I prefer "you" for a specific reason: I am a father.

I love being a father. I love being a husband, too. I worry about them often, though my daughters are only one and three. I worry about the future my wife and I will lead them to. I worry that I will lead them to worry too much, themselves.

It is very Jewish of me, to always worry of the next calamity, suffering from what Sarah Silverman diagnoses (tweeted) as "nervous diarrhea." I suppose that is part of the condition of my heritage. I am definitely a "Yes, but..." person. I think plans. I think logistics. I think too much.

I think, "Yes, but they might get hurt." I think, "Yes, but they might get sick." I think, "Yes, but it might be cancer."

However, Mr. Krulwich, you are right. We must confront our individual design repeatedly, as we redesign our individual. We must face worry and threat. At times, when we say, "Yes, but..." we should remember that it's okay to say, "Why not?"

And, if change is the only storm they face, I wish for my girls, "May you be safe in storm."

A Eulogy

This is unedited...forgive me.

I know every blogger is going to be writing about the death of Beastie Boys' Adam Yauch. I'm no different.

I, perhaps, have less of a reason than others to write about him. I wasn't much of a fan until later in life and, the it was cool to like the lesser known tracks, I was a fan of their singles, my favorite, "Sabotage." I liked the bandwagon, I suppose.

So, of course, I loved "Fight for Your Right (to Party)," an undeniable classic of the Eighties that solidified their tenure the music world. I have a memory of this song at an eighth grade dance, the winter dance, I think. All the boys we sitting on a fold-out lunch table when the song came on and, immediately, we rocked the cafeteria. We were gods. I clutched the edge of the table, my body banging my head back and forth as if I we exorcising the Devil. Suddenly aware of myself, I looked up to see several friends laughing at me. And, because it was absurd, laughed, too, and went right back to head-banging with impunity.

Here's why: Adam Yauch and I were a little bit alike...both bass players, both named "Adam," and both from mixed Jewish-Catholic families passively ignoring religion. Adam later became a Buddhist. Being Jewish was never cool, at least not where I grew up. We were geeks, though I willfully assimilated. But, Adam and his bandmates, also Jewish to varying percentages, made it alright to be Jewish. The Beastie Boys were cool. They broke into a realm of music where, to many, they were strangers. What business did a bunch of Jewish kids from Brooklyn have rapping?

For that moment back at the dance, I didn't care about being an outsider; I liked it. What's more, as a self-hating, thirteen-year-old boy, I liked myself, even if only for a short while.

Thank you, MCA.

Pithy Moment

I had already eaten the last of a specific kind of candy that my daughter asked for today. Her Jewish grandmother gave them to her on Easter. She still has copious amounts of chocolate. I'm a monster.

Announcement

Two more forthcoming publications:  One in April, entitled Pedigree and also the first chapter of Matzoh and Meatballs, in AUDIO format at WordPlaySound and a short story entitled The Lobster's Name Is Nick in print form from a new journal,  The Alarmist. 

Keep reading....another post is...well...um...right below.