Dead Or Alive
Morbid though it may be to post these back-to-back, I ought to explain Dead or Alive.
It’s a game I play with my equally morbid mother and sister, and I can’t recall where, when, or how it began. But at some point we developed a game wherein we name off celebrities past and semi-present, and then have to determine whether they are dead or alive. When it first started, it was just a game to test what we knew about who was still around. (“Isn’t he dead? Let’s play Dead or Alive!!!”) Over the years, it’s evolved into a way for us to tell each other (mostly for me to tell them) about celebrity deaths. Some memorable ones in recent history: Tony Randall, Robert Palmer (for goofy reasons a special one to us), and of course, poor darling Luther Vandross. That one was hard; I heard about it in the car and was able to keep my tears in check, right up until they played “Dance With My Father,” which never failed to induce uncontrollable weeping when Luther was alive, and so hit extra hard. Got me thinking a lot, too, about other things, but I digress…
My family handles death oddly sometimes. On my mom’s side, we pretend it didn’t happen. I suspect if there weren’t laws against it, Papa would still be sitting in his recliner in front of the TV. As it is, we’ve retaliated by holding the __th Annual Wilson Family Picnic Where Nobody Died for several years, ever since my mom and her siblings noticed that we usually only all gather when someone croaks. (You can’t even depend on weddings and childbirth to draw a crowd anymore – let’s face it, if we did that we’d be in each other’s faces 24/7. Big family.) On my dad’s side, we don’t have a lot of experience with death at all. Plus, it’s the Italian side... you know, the people who use any large gathering as an excuse to eat way too much, drink too much, and let the men stand out back smoking stinky cigars. Oh, and flirt. You can’t go to a family gathering without being flirted with, but that’s not as gross as it sounds. You see, on that side of the family, you’re family if you’re a close friend of the family… or if you’re family of a close friend of the family… or if you’re a close friend of a close friend. I’m apparently related by marriage to half the island nation of Guam.
When my great-grandmother died when I was 17, we discovered that my sister and I, and to some extent, our father, handle death by making fun of it. (Mom does too, but… well, long story there…) The first indication of my dad being this way was when my dear stepmother, still relatively new to our (lapsed) Catholic family, innocently asked for an explanation of the rosary. To be fair, Chelle and I tried to be serious. We began explaining the prayers for each “trip” around the beads… the Five Joyful Mysteries, Five Sorrowful Mysteries, (pardon me while I have a flashback… okay, fine now) and Five Glorious Mysteries. But then… oh, but then… she handed us a straight line, she really couldn’t help it, any of you who didn’t grow up Catholic would too… She asked us to explain exactly what these “mysteries were.” And so we told her.
The mystery of where the missing socks from the dryer go. The mystery of whether or not fish get the dry heaves. Now I know those sound obviously crazy, but again, she was new to the family, and she couldn’t imagine we would be joking at a time like that, when our precious Nonna had just passed. She looked to my father for confirmation, for surely he would not mislead her on something so serious and sad. He looked her straight in the eye, nodded solemnly, and added the mystery of why joggers wear shorts on the outside of their sweats. Needless to say, Chelle and I lost it. It was the first of many inappropriate jokes surrounding those solemnities. It was also soon followed by my grandmother’s nervousness regarding the one pallbearer we were waiting for. Looking around at the room full of menacing-looking Italian men in dark suits, I whispered to my sister, “How many pallbearers do we need, anyway?” Her response: “Six. And one to change the lightbulb.”
How we avoided the lightning that day, I will never know.
It’s a game I play with my equally morbid mother and sister, and I can’t recall where, when, or how it began. But at some point we developed a game wherein we name off celebrities past and semi-present, and then have to determine whether they are dead or alive. When it first started, it was just a game to test what we knew about who was still around. (“Isn’t he dead? Let’s play Dead or Alive!!!”) Over the years, it’s evolved into a way for us to tell each other (mostly for me to tell them) about celebrity deaths. Some memorable ones in recent history: Tony Randall, Robert Palmer (for goofy reasons a special one to us), and of course, poor darling Luther Vandross. That one was hard; I heard about it in the car and was able to keep my tears in check, right up until they played “Dance With My Father,” which never failed to induce uncontrollable weeping when Luther was alive, and so hit extra hard. Got me thinking a lot, too, about other things, but I digress…
My family handles death oddly sometimes. On my mom’s side, we pretend it didn’t happen. I suspect if there weren’t laws against it, Papa would still be sitting in his recliner in front of the TV. As it is, we’ve retaliated by holding the __th Annual Wilson Family Picnic Where Nobody Died for several years, ever since my mom and her siblings noticed that we usually only all gather when someone croaks. (You can’t even depend on weddings and childbirth to draw a crowd anymore – let’s face it, if we did that we’d be in each other’s faces 24/7. Big family.) On my dad’s side, we don’t have a lot of experience with death at all. Plus, it’s the Italian side... you know, the people who use any large gathering as an excuse to eat way too much, drink too much, and let the men stand out back smoking stinky cigars. Oh, and flirt. You can’t go to a family gathering without being flirted with, but that’s not as gross as it sounds. You see, on that side of the family, you’re family if you’re a close friend of the family… or if you’re family of a close friend of the family… or if you’re a close friend of a close friend. I’m apparently related by marriage to half the island nation of Guam.
When my great-grandmother died when I was 17, we discovered that my sister and I, and to some extent, our father, handle death by making fun of it. (Mom does too, but… well, long story there…) The first indication of my dad being this way was when my dear stepmother, still relatively new to our (lapsed) Catholic family, innocently asked for an explanation of the rosary. To be fair, Chelle and I tried to be serious. We began explaining the prayers for each “trip” around the beads… the Five Joyful Mysteries, Five Sorrowful Mysteries, (pardon me while I have a flashback… okay, fine now) and Five Glorious Mysteries. But then… oh, but then… she handed us a straight line, she really couldn’t help it, any of you who didn’t grow up Catholic would too… She asked us to explain exactly what these “mysteries were.” And so we told her.
The mystery of where the missing socks from the dryer go. The mystery of whether or not fish get the dry heaves. Now I know those sound obviously crazy, but again, she was new to the family, and she couldn’t imagine we would be joking at a time like that, when our precious Nonna had just passed. She looked to my father for confirmation, for surely he would not mislead her on something so serious and sad. He looked her straight in the eye, nodded solemnly, and added the mystery of why joggers wear shorts on the outside of their sweats. Needless to say, Chelle and I lost it. It was the first of many inappropriate jokes surrounding those solemnities. It was also soon followed by my grandmother’s nervousness regarding the one pallbearer we were waiting for. Looking around at the room full of menacing-looking Italian men in dark suits, I whispered to my sister, “How many pallbearers do we need, anyway?” Her response: “Six. And one to change the lightbulb.”
How we avoided the lightning that day, I will never know.
posted by SaraSmile | 1:42 PM
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