Small Pox
I wish I had something awesome to contribute to LJ.
You know, like really spiffy artwork or snazzy icons or something along the lines of that. However, I am such a noob in the awesome department so the only thing you will ever get out of me, my dear nonexistent readers, is simple and hopefully eloquent rambling.
I have my theories on why I am lacking in awesomeness. You see, I have the sad misfortune of being half Jewish and half Irish. Quite arguably the two most hated races in the entire world, if not the most hated, definitely the most unlucky. Now if you can see why the Jews are considered hated and unlucky but you are scratching your head as to why the Irish are. I suggest you stop what you are doing right now, hop in your car and head straight to your local library to check out the biggest book on Irish history you can find. There you can read and sympathize with the Irish plight and know that it is not all just shamrocks and Guinness and red headed people who spend most of their time sauced than not (ok, my mother’s side of the family kinda up holds that particular stereotype). In fact, after you’ve read an extensive history of Ireland I suggest you check out Frank McCourt’s wonderful book, Angela’s Ashes and its sequel ‘Tis. Then you can start to understand how difficult it is and was to be Irish. If you take that on top of being Jewish, I just may be the laughing stock of the gene pool. I tell you, there is nothing the KKK hates worse, a half and half who spends most of her time in mass and the other attending Bar Mitzvah’s. I’m not implying that my nationality alone has faced horrible times and downright cruel prejudices. Oh no, however, I am just relating what I know and what I’ve heard from my relatives.
Of course, my upbringing made for an interesting childhood. Some of my fondest memories were of celebrating Christmas with my Irish family. These festive get-togethers would usually end in family arguments and on the occasion, family brawls. In fact, I don’t considered it Christmas unless my uncle downs an entire bottle of whiskey in one go, strips down to his skivvies, dances out to the garden and leads the neighborhood dog’s in a rousing rendition of 'O Danny Boy.'
Typical Irish stereotype’s aside, my Irish family has taught me a lot. My mother grew up in a poor working class Irish-Catholic family; she was the youngest of 12 children. My grandfather was more often out of work and drunk, so my grandmother was forced to work three jobs to support her large family. The importance of sticking with your family no matter what was impressed upon me ever since I can remember, and I love having a big family of over 42 first cousins alone.
My father’s family was the exact opposite of my mothers. He was the son of a wealthy Polish immigrant; he and his two older brothers never had to worry about money. However, it appeared that alcoholism isn’t picky about who it infects whether they be poor out of work Irishmen or wealthy Jewish lawyers. My grandfather was eventually forced to give up his firm do to his problem.
Of course the sins of the father are often to pass to the son, and my own father has struggled with the curse of alcoholism ever since I can remember.
But, in the end it doesn’t matter if they are socialists or assassins or members of the IRA or even ax murderers, they are still my family.
Sometimes I wonder if it has to do with my family or the name my parents chose for me, (for those of you are interested in etymology, my name literally translates to ‘unfortunate’ ‘ill-fated’ and ‘ill-omened’) in my parents defense, they didn’t research my name before saddling me with it. But bad luck has followed me throughout most of my life. From being hopelessly clumsy, and I am not talking like cute, Mary-Sue-ish clumsy behavior of Bella from the Twilight series (I apologize to any Twilight fans, but I’d rather have my eye balls removed with a rusty spork than read through that travesty of a novel ever again). I am talking about being a magnet for any and all breakable, flammable, and pointy objects of a fifty mile radius from myself. One of the more painful moments was when my finger got shut in the bathroom door resulting in a missing pinky tip and reconstructive digit surgery. It took forever to get the blood out of the door hinges *shivers*.
Ah well, I am running out of creative steam and should be working on my paper for my Women’s History class. Oh, which brings me to my title of this entry. My paper is a biography on Elizabeth I, who almost died of small pox once… hence the title of this entry. You wanted a connection? You got it!
So good-bye my nonexistent readers, I shall leave you with these last pearls of wisdom:
“Home life, as we understand it is no more natural to us than a cage is natural to a cockatoo.”
George Bernard Shaw
Yours in amity,
mTaichou aka ginxkira
Pissing off the men in white sheets since 1986
