Chels, wake up,” Mia calls. I’ve been taking my sleeping- and downtime seriously, and since all the drama happening at school, I feel like I’ve just needed a break—from everything. “What are you doing in here?” Mia asks, pulling the covers away from me. “It’s Christmas Eve—we have stuff to do. And dinner tonight. Grandma’s already on her way. Get up!”
I slowly roll out of bed. “I don’t just celebrate Christmas, you know? And I call it a holiday gathering—because I appreciate Hanukkah and Kwanzaa as well, to honor the Jewish and African American members of our community,” I say, smiling and proud of myself.
“What do you know about Hanukkah and Kwanzaa, Chelsea?”
“A lot, okay? I know that Hanukkah is also called the Festival of Lights, and that it’s observed for eight days and nights, and it commemorates the rededication of the Holy Temple. Boom.”
“Yeah,” Mia says, humoring me.
“Yeah, that’s right. And Kwanzaa is an African American celebration that honors cultural heritage and traditional values. There are seven guiding principles that we should hold up throughout the year and not just over the holidays. So, in your face,” I finish, and slip my pajama pants on.
“What are the seven guiding principles?” Mia asks.
“Umoja, which means unity, um, Nia—uh, purpose, that means purpose, and faith—Imani, of course.” I pause.
“That’s three.”
“I know that’s three, and I know the others, I just . . .”
“And now I know that you did a basic Google and Wikipedia search on both of those so you’d know what to say when people ask, right?”
“No, it’s more than that. I’m just . . . I’m just into celebrating as a community. I mean, even the lobby of our building is all-inclusive with a tree, a menorah, and a kinara—for Kwanzaa,” I add, showing off a little, “and so I feel like celebrating everything too. I’m for everyone. I also wrote a poem for Jasmine. Do you wanna hear it?”
“Not now . . . ,” Mia says.
I start to read it anyway.
Womanhood
for Jasmine
Old-fashioned beauty myth media breakdown
Pretty—a pathetic fiction sold to us
Stores that carry only size extra-small
Makeup meant to cover up and whitewash
Resolve to go natural, obliterate your machine
Bust boundaries wide open with our skills
Write ourselves into every future we imagine
“I realized that I was not being very intersectional, and so I revised my own thinking and ways of being in the world. I am a work in progress,” I finish.
“I know, Chelsea, I know. You are always very self-important. And I know it’s really important to you to be all-inclusive and all about diversity—I know that—we all know that, but can you please just be there for Mom and Grandma today? Can you just be all Catholic, and not be all weird about Christmas and God, and all the stuff you love to bring up that makes Mom lose it? Can you do that?”
“I can only be true to myself,” I say, grabbing my book and starting to walk out. I’ve been reading The Handmaid’s Tale and loving all the insane drama. “What would Margaret Atwood say, you ask?”
“I didn’t ask that,” Mia says.
“Well, she would say that as women, we have to fight for our bodies and minds, and that no one can silence us or shut us down, and people should value our opinions. That’s what she would say. And on top of that, Mom should really stand up for herself more, and she shouldn’t always be so quiet and subdued. If I’ve learned anything so far this school year, it’s that women need to raise their voices.”
“Fine, I won’t bring up the religion stuff. I’ll be a good little Catholic.” I smile.
“The turkey smells delightful,” my grandma calls into the kitchen at my dad, who’s doing all the cooking for Christmas Eve dinner. We’ve just come from afternoon mass, where I both listened to the sermon AND did some mindful Buddhist meditation.
“Steven, I can’t believe that Lydia allowed you to do all the work today.”
“Oh, Mom, you know that Steven loves to cook, so why can’t you believe that?” my mom asks, sitting down and pouring us all a little bit of wine. My parents are very progressive when they want to be, and, I’m beginning to think, when it’s convenient for them.
“Oh, honey, I just never thought I’d be alive to see a man do all the work in the kitchen. I mean, it’s fine if you want to work and leave your kids in daycare all day and choose different life paths, but, honey—I would imagine you would want to still do a bit of the domestic work around the house.” Grandma smiles at us and takes a sip of wine.
My mom’s smile is tight as she passes the rolls around the table.
“Not that it’s all bad,” my grandma continues, “but a woman’s work is with the children too, you know? A man can only do so much before he feels taken advantage of, and begins to resent his situation.” She whispers that last part so my dad can’t hear as he walks out with the turkey. I’ve always known my mom and grandma have a testy relationship. I mean, they love each other—calling and seeing each other all the time—but I can’t help but feel like some of their relationship feels kind of toxic.
“Mom, Steven and I share responsibilities around the house and with the kids. We always have, and I think Chelsea and Mia have appreciated and benefited from that,” my mom says, squeezing my leg under the table. What? Does no one trust me?
“I know you two have a very new wave thing going on. Well, let me tell you all that your grandfather and I valued tradition. We believed in a traditional marriage—and it was important to both of us that I took care of the home and the children. Your grandfather made sure all of us were comfortable and taken care of. That was important to him. It’s the way all of us did things. And we were perfectly happy that way,” my grandma finishes.
It was the “perfectly happy” that got me. I couldn’t stop myself.
“But, Grandma, you wanted to be a teacher, right?”
My mom glares at me. Not tonight, she mouths in my direction. That’s the main issue with me and my mom. It’s never the right time with her. She is always the cool and calm one, the woman who lets everyone tell her how to feel and never raises her voice for anything, so sometimes I feel like I need to be that voice for her—whether she likes it or not.
“Well, of course, but I taught your mother and your aunt, and that was enough for me. You know, you young girls, you think you can do everything, but you can’t. Something is always sacrificed. Something has to give, and usually it’s the marriage that suffers.”
“But not everyone wants to get married,” I say, completely ignoring the fact that I’ve imagined my fairy-tale wedding with James about a billion times, and they all feature me in a massive white dress walking down an aisle littered with rose petals. So weird. “I have a lot of friends who don’t want to get married. They want a career—they want a job—that’s where they want the focus to be.”
“And that’s what they’ll get, believe me. You focus on a career, you get a career. But don’t expect to get both. Young women today have no time to care about their homes, their families. All they care about is getting to the top—whatever that means, and then the rest of their lives just fall apart.” She makes a side-eye at my mom.
At this comment, my mom sits back. I know it has been an ongoing argument between them, since my grandma has always given her a hard time about sending us to daycare and preschool rather than staying home and being a good homemaker (whatever that means), the way she did.
“Grandma, sorry, but nobody thinks like that anymore. I mean, the system of gender norms was created so we would think that women are the ones who are more biologically capable of taking care of kids and the home, but that’s just not true at all.” I’m on a roll. “My friends and I aren’t in the world just to get the guy and keep the house and have the kids. That’s super dated, Grandma. And we’re finding ways to break down the myth of the gender role in general and the ways people think about women and the kinds of jobs women are capable of.” I take a gulp of my wine and wince when it goes down strong.
My grandma’s eyebrows couldn’t go much higher on her face, but I notice my mom smiling and giving me the go-ahead to be myself.
