Of Emos, Octaroons and Jews

On Tuesday I get a call from Mrs. Malloway. I didn't answer the phone. I never answer the phone. What if it's Ashley from Monterey County Bank? Or Noreen from Capitol One? Or Ahmaad from HBSC?

Mrs. Malloway rhymes with Mrs. Dalloway but somehow I doubted she was calling me up to dish To The Lighthouse or speculate on how many of Vanessa Bell's children were really sired by Duncan Grant. No, Mrs. Malloway is the Assistant Vice Principal of Colton Middle School. The only thing she'd want to talk to me about is Robin.

"So Robin," I say. "A certain Mrs. Malloway. Ring any bells?"

Robin's face assumes an expression of crafty innocence. "Why do you ask?"

"She wants me to call her. What do you think she wants to talk to me about?"

Seems there's this kid. And he keeps a diary…

"Oh, Robin! You didn't steal his diary and read it out loud!"

"That wasn't me, Mom! That was JoJo!"

"Robin!"

"He's emo –"

"What's emo?"

Robin looked aghast. "You don't know what emo is?"

"Emo" apparently is the current middle school goat word. And it's been around forever which just goes to show how out of it I am. It describes someone who's weird and uncoordinated and lurks around the periphery and keeps journals and occasionally cuts themselves.

In other words – except for the cutting – it describes me at Robin's age.

I can't tell you how strange it is to recognize your own offspring as one of your childhood persecutors.

"He called me white so I called him Anne Frank," Robin continued.

"Anne Frank? Well, that's not an insult. And neither is white come to think of it."

"I'm one-sixteenth African American!" says Robin indignantly.

My great-grandmother on my father's side was Tunisian. In the only extant photograph I have of her she looks a little like Barack Obama except much darker and with a much broader nose. If I was living in pre-Civil War Louisiana, technically I'd be classified as an octaroon.

Robin would be something called a mulatto griffe.

I don't think either of us qualifies for affirmative action in the present tense.

"You have a rich genetic heretage," I allow. "You are filled with hybrid vigor. Marry Jessica Alba and the children who spring from your loins will inherit the earth."

Robin made a face. "Jessica Alba? She's old."

When Ben finally spoke with Mrs. Malloway, it turned out Robin had accurately reported most of the interaction. Robin and his posse had teased Diary Boy. Diary Boy had sneered, "You're so white." Robin had retaliated, "Well, you're so Jewish, you're Anne Frank!"

I laughed when I heard that.

"Did you tell Mrs. Malloway Robin's mother is Jewish?" I asked.

It's interesting that Robin relates so strongly to the Sicilian blood he gets from me (with its Tunisian dilution factor) but not at all to the Jewish blood.

Yet another reason why I don't officially join the local temple. It would be impossible to keep a Jewish home.