Tip o’ the hat to family dynamics
The Irish, I’ve found, are either a very lovely or a very unlovely people. The loveliest specimens are born of poetry and language, humor and mirth. The not-so-lovely are the product of sweaty, late-night liaisons in some place of higher learning, usually a neighborhood pub. This is just a theory, of course, a fairy tale I tell myself in order to steer clear of the bottle that cursed generations before me. So far, I have four lovely children. Something must be working.
“You people are in the prehistoric age with technology,” the lovely and patient older daughter complains.
“Thanks,” I say.
“This computer is all messed up,” she says.
“Call the help line,” I say.
“I am the help line,” she says.
“Then thanks for helping,” I say and pat her on her very Irish head.
Yes, I’m glad she’s home from college for the weekend, even if she peppers us with ways to improve our lives, every one of which we consider, then ignore. Or even if she begins her sentences with “You people ... “ and finishes them with “I don’t believe this.”
In fact, “I don’t believe this” has become a form of punctuation for her, replacing the period at the end of her thoughts. When she gasps “I don’t believe this,” we know her ranting is mostly over and we can go back to our meals and our serious literature.
“You sure yell a lot,” her little sister says at one point.
“Somebody has to,” the older daughter says.
“OK, I’ll yell too,” her little sister says.
Each day lately, we seem to have a designated screamer, someone whose day is going not so well and whose head is about to explode and leave behind a cloud of invective and denunciation. It’s a very effective form of communication. A close cousin to aggravated assault.
“So, why do they always yell?” I ask their mother, one of three sisters herself.
“It helps them relieve tension,” she explains.
“So it’s a stress reliever?” I ask.
“Absolutely,” she answers.
“Now I understand,” I lie.
The maddest, loudest moments of all are when a visitor comes to the house. The doorbell rings, setting off a July 4th explosion of barking and hoofbeats. The dogs’ rabies tags jangle and their nails tap the wood floor at a million beats per second, as if they are auditioning for “Annie Get Your Gun.”
Then someone from a distant bedroom yells, “I’LL GET IT!” and darts for the door, adding to the hoofbeats and the festive air. Without fail, the phone rings just then, evidently wired to the doorbell in some odd way. As the front door finally opens, the dogs lunge for the visitor, and the person answering the door screams “Get Back! Get Back!” and begins swatting at the dogs.
This, of course, startles the baby, who begins to cry, at which point someone notices that he needs a diaper change. This, in turn, leads to the sort of healthy and constructive debates every American family needs.
“I’m not changing him,” one kid says.
“You people ... !”
“I changed him the last time.”
“Last week, I changed two.”
Well, if someone’s keeping score, I’ve changed about 10,000 diapers, and before long will probably be changing my own. I don’t mind. I can change a diaper one-handed in the dark, like an assassin giggin’ a guy with a stiletto. Snap- thrust-whoosh, it’s over. Problem solved.
“There was a little Army man in his diaper,” I say after the change.
“That’s what makes him a boy,” his sister explains.
“No, I mean a little plastic soldier,” I say.
“Sure, Dad,” she says.
“Whatever you say,” says her mother.
“Somebody needs to have a talk with Dad about sex,” says the boy.
There are times -- OK, it’s all the time -- when I am certain that I am raising a pack of Irish uncles. They are much like my own Irish uncles, who had a form of communication that married stand-up comedy with political outrage and occasional folk songs.
They made fun of everything. They laughed at funerals and mine accidents. At football coaches and millionaires.
They could get drunk off a kiss and stoned on the smell of boiled meat. Their health club was the 20 snowy steps between taverns.
“Your cousin,” a typical conversation would begin, and the rest of the sentence would most likely end with:
... is tighter than a coat of paint.
... is dumber than a piece of veal.
... is crazier than a house of monkeys.
Ah, the Irish. Now I have a monkey house full of them as we pause to honor old St. Patrick. On this day, I will acknowledge that I’ve helped heap their kind upon the planet, and for that I will pay a small, soulful price: Peace. Solitude. Sanity.
You people ....
Chris Erskine can be reached at chris.erskine@latimes.com.
