Alike

Both of my parents were born and raised on Long Island, where I currently live, to parents who themselves never left New York. (My grandparents are all first-generation Americans, the children of immigrants.) My mom's side of the family is as much of a New York Italian stereotype as you can be--big, loud, close-knit, everyone still lives close by and is in each other's business all the fucking time. Every member of that family, save my mother and one of her cousins, stayed in New York. They didn't even leave the state for college. Most of them don't even leave the island except to go into the City.

In contrast, my dad's family fractured almost as soon as they possibly could. My grandmother on that side was an only child and my grandfather had only one brother, whose two daughters never had children. So, despite being so Italian they all bleed marinara, it's actually a very small family. My dad's parents divorced years ago and never had anything to do with one another again; my dad and his two brothers moved to other states and scarcely looked back. My great-uncle lives upstate, but his daughters settled elsewhere. Only my grandpa remained on the Island, which is where he is currently spending eternity after losing a short battle with pancreatic cancer in 2004. He never lived to see a grandchild graduate high school.

It's a very different dynamic in the two branches of my immediate family, obviously. My mom's side tries to be affectionate--the degree to which they succeed in this endeavor naturally depends on who they're trying to be nice to and exactly how obnoxious they are also being at the same time. Since I didn't grow up around them like all the other cousins did, I'm kind of like the odd man out. They're nice enough, and they do try, but in the end I don't really want too terribly much to do with them. But those are the closest extended familial relationships I have. My relationship with my dad's brothers and their families is basically non-existent.

My dad's mother lived near her middle son for about ten years and then moved to live near the youngest; my mom, with whom she does not get along, fears she might move again sometime soon to be near my dad. I expect she probably will. My dad makes many trips to Georgia a year to check up on her and manages her finances and bills and stuff because she's getting to a point where she almost can't manage them herself anymore. They haven't yet managed to get her to stop driving her own car, but this will probably happen soon enough--you can only drive the wrong way on the road so many times before they take your license away, after all. For this reason, we think she's starting to get a little demented or senile.

This grandmother is probably one of the only people in my family who genuinely likes me. Which is a shame because I don't really like her very much. She's a decent enough person, I just don't enjoy her company. Even so, she wanted to be a part of my life a great deal when I was a child, primarily because I was the first grandchild and I was a girl--Oma always wanted a daughter and was presumably a bit perturbed when all three of her children were born with penises.

I have the standard-issue number of traits in common with my various family members--my hair colour and eyes come from my dad's side, my stature and facial features from my mom's. I don't really have very many personality traits in common, except that I swear a lot and argue like I'm getting paid for it. But I did inherit a very specific, somewhat unusual feature from my paternal grandmother--I of course have no proof that it is a heritable trait, but it does rather seem that way.

Oma and I are both crazy about miniatures.

I have always loved really good quality miniatures. Have you ever seen--in a museum or stately home or something--one of those really big, elaborate Victorian dollhouses? The kind with tiny fixtures and wood floors and window shutters and full of beautiful furniture, all of it meticulously detailed and looking just like a perfect itty-bitty version of stuff you see full-sized every day.

Those miniatures. I love them. I don't know why I do, I just do. I'm not taken in by everything and anything in miniature just because it's small--I was never terribly fond of Barbie furniture or Polly Pockets, though I did have quite an extensive collection of 'Littlest Pet Shop' toys in the 90s when the toys were actually really tiny. I like them when they're small and detailed. I guess I appreciate the art and effort that go into making them.

Or else I just think they're really, really fucking cute like kittens and puppies.

It's really a very bizarrely specific trait to have in common with someone. Growing up in England I didn't have very much time to spend with any of my relatives so I tended to see Oma at most once a year. Sometimes we didn't make it to her house when we were making our yearly trips to New York to visit family, and after she moved to Minnesota visits were pretty much out of the question. So I'm pretty confident that I wasn't just 'taught' to love them because I saw the adults in my life loving miniatures. My mom isn't really into them, though she does appreciate the really good ones. I just like miniatures because... I do.

Maybe it's something I got from my grandmother.

Who knows.

Oma doesn't call much anymore. I haven't spoken to her in ages and the last time I saw her was about five years ago. Again, she might be going a bit senile, because she almost never remembers Giftmas presents for anyone and certainly doesn't remember birthdays or anything. She doesn't give anything to anyone, not really--not because she's mean, just because she doesn't really know how to go about doing it. The world has changed and it left her behind, seemingly stuck forever in the 60s.

But, every now and then I will randomly find a package from her. They come at odd times without any real reason, but they're usually the result of some rare moment of steady memories and clarity. She's given me a few rings of her own before, but mostly what she sends me are... miniatures. I didn;t bring them with me when I moved (I had to downsize), but over the years she's given me a rather sizable collection of tiny furniture and little animal figures.

Yesterday a small packing envelope came to my apartment. I hadn't ordered anything lately and wasn't expecting anything (the boything and I don't do Valentine's Day and my birthday is in August), so I was a bit surprised.

It was from Oma.

The envelope contained two tiny, tiny little red-bound books. Each is no bigger than one of those square plastic containers of dental floss. But they're fully functional--one is a Spanis-English dictionary, the other an English-Spanish dictionary. An eensy version of an item I see every day.

I actually like these sporadic, largely pointless, completely random gifts from her a lot more than I like it when my other relatives finally decide to acknowledge me on gift-giving occasions. Other relatives, all of whom are healthy, financially stable, mentally sound people, give me half-assed gifts that obviously require no real thought or indicate any level of affection. Gift cards are a staple. I'm not ungrateful, but it's disheartening that people who are supposed to be 'there for' me care so little.

I much prefer the occasional tiny gifts from a woman I haven't seen in years who probably doesn't even remember what I look like.