Thou Shalt Converse with the Other Generation

HOROSCOPE: Remember to keep in touch with your grandparents. After all, time is precious.

After reading this, I decided to give each of my grandparents a phone call. This is a little tricky since both sets of my grandparents are divorced and remarried.

PHONE CALL #1: Dad's Stepmother

ME: Hi Grandma Elaine.
ELAINE: Kevin!
ME: How are you?
ELAINE: Oh, I miss your grandfather like a madwoman.
ME: Really? Even after ten years?
ELAINE: Every day I mourn for him.
ME: Well, I'm glad I called you then.
ELAINE: I'd love to talk, honey, but I'm heading out.
ME: Where to?
ELAINE: Oh, just out with a friend.
ME: To bingo or something?
ELAINE: No, a gentleman friend.
ME: A date? You're going on a date?
ELAINE: Just an outing.
ME: Where are you going?
ELAINE: Dinner and a movie, then maybe stop by the beach.
ME: That's a date!
ELAINE: I'm a grown woman. I can go where I want.
ME: Of course you can. I just thought you were mourning grandpa.
ELAINE: We all grieve in our own way. Don't judge me.
ME: Grandma, God rest his soul, but Grandpa was a miserable old man. Live it up.
ELAINE: That's my boy.

Sound of motorcycle.

ELAINE: Gotta run.

PHONE CALL #2: Mom's Dad and Stepmother

ME: Hi Grandma Sarah, how's Florida?
SARAH: Bruce! Kevin's on the phone!
BRUCE: Who?
SARAH: YOUR GRANDSON! HE'S ON THE PHONE!
ME: Did I call at a bad time?
BRUCE: WHO?
SARAH: Of course not! How are you, honey? You sound thin.
ME: Same weight as always.
SARAH: Thin, right. BRUCE!

The other line picks up.

BRUCE: Hello?
ME: Hi Grandpa.
SARAH: Are you doing any more shows?
BRUCE: Is this Kevin?
ME: Yup.
BRUCE: You son-of-a-bitch!
SARAH: Bruce!
BRUCE: When are you coming down here?
ME: You know I hate flying.
BRUCE: You little chickenshit! Hahaha...

My grandfather treats me like I'm one of his old buddies from the pub.

SARAH: You have to send me pictures from your last show!
ME: I'm working on it.
SARAH: I tell all my friends you do theater.
ME: What do they say?
SARAH: Well, usually they tell me about their grandsons who are doctors or lawyers.
ME: Oh...sorry.
SARAH: Oh, don't worry about it. I tell them you like boys and that shuts them up.
BRUCE: Old bitches.
SARAH: Everybody wants a gay grandson now. You should hear them down here. My grandson is marrying this shiksa, which I think is Latvian for whore.
ME: It's Yiddish.
BRUCE: Who?
ME: Never mind.
SARAH: So I say, Well I don't have to worry about that, because my grandson Kevin likes boys. The jealously that fills their eyes--
BRUCE: Priceless.
SARAH: Priceless.
BRUCE: Shuts those old bitches right up.

Now you know where I get my swearing from--

SARAH: You know whose a handsome man? What's-his-name from the gay cowboy movie. Not the dead one.
ME: Jake Gyllenhaal?
SARAH: Him!

Why does everyone in my family want to set me up with Jake Gyllenhaal?

ME: He likes girls, or so they say. He's with Reese Witherspoon.
SARAH: That shiksa?
BRUCE: She's stiffer than a corpse.
ME: You know shiksa--never mind.
BRUCE: You little asshole! We got to get you down here.
ME: Not a chance, geezer.
BRUCE: Hahaha! I love you, you little prick.

Sentiment like that they don't make at Hallmark.

PHONE CALL #3: Dad's Mom

NANCY: How's school, darlin?
ME: I'm out of school, Grandma.
NANCY: Is this Steve?
ME: No, this is Kevin.
NANCY: The one who married Igor?
ME: No, that's Steve, and I thought we all agreed we were going to stop calling Maria that?
NANCY: Are you the one with the weird eye?
ME: No, that's Mark.
NANCY: The bad teeth?
ME: That's my Dad.
NANCY: The one on the third marriage?
ME: That could be a few people.
NANCY: The one who got arrested for kiddie porn?
ME: I'm not even sure who that would be, but you just convinced me not to attend the Family Reunion.
NANCY: Well if you're not any of those wackos, then that's good.
ME: Have you quit smoking yet?
NANCY: Just like Bad Teeth. Always on me about the smoking.
ME: Dad's been telling you to quit smoking?
NANCY: Yeah.
ME: What did you say?
NANCY: I told him to quit marrying twelve-year olds.
ME: Well, there's really no arguing with that now is there?

Grandma Nancy isn't what I'd call...maternal.

PHONE CALL #4: Mom's Mom

I know I shouldn't play favorites but--

BIANCA: You were so good in your play!

--Grandma Bianca kind of kicks everyone else's ass.

BIANCA: But you should have had that other boy's part.
ME: Grandma, that 'boy' is forty-five.
BIANCA: He was so boring. It was like listening to paint dry.
ME: I'm not sure that makes a sound.
BIANCA: They could have put gray make-up on you, and you would have been fine.
ME: Eh, I liked my role.
BIANCA: You know who you should play? One of those cats.
ME: I'd rather kill myself.
BIANCA: What's wrong with being a cat?
ME: It's not really...Well, for one thing, I can't dance.
BIANCA: Since when can't you dance?
ME: Have you ever seen me dance?
BIANCA: You danced that one time at the wedding where you had that seizure.
ME: The dancing was the seizure.
BIANCA: Oh my...Well, I'm glad you don't seize.
ME: Thank you.
BIANCA: You know, you're my favorite, but don't tell your brothers.

She tells us all that.

All four phone calls took a total of three hours.

(My Thanksgivings usually last a total of three weeks.)

Next week I'm starting on the aunts and uncles...

Heaven help me.