My Radical Uncle

I knew my blog would eventually land me in hot water with the few relatives who visit this site. I got an email  from my Uncle Paul this morning who took exception to my comment in my post about Kendall’s conversion that “my family does not have a good history when it comes to intermarriage.” Paul has been married to his Catholic wife Anita for over twenty years but for some reason his successful marriage did not even enter my consciousness while I was writing that post. I was too focused on the anti-shiksa codicils in my great-grandparents’ wills and the family horror stories in which our relatives disowned and sat shiva for their miscegenating children.

Looking back I’m amazed that Paul’s marriage didn’t create more of a schism in the family. My grandparents, not known for their acceptance of their offspring’s goyishe flings, gave their seal of approval and attended their son’s wedding with enthusiasm. I don’t remember Anita ever not being accepted as part of the family. Of course by this point my grandparents had seen both of their daughters, married to nice Jewish boys, slog through very painful divorces, so that might have softened their stance, along with the fact that they were probably relieved that their counterculture son was finally settling down.

Paul was born in 1948 when my mother was 14 and my aunt was 10. The fact that my grandmother was 38 when she delivered him was a bit of family lore that was whispered about in hushed tones. Years later, about the time my 42-year-old sister was pregnant with her second child, we suddenly realized that my uncle’s birth was not on par with the bible story of Sarah begetting Isaac when she was over 90! Kendall is 38 and now that we’re trying to get pregnant it’s hard to reconcile her obvious youthfulness with the family stories of my elderly grandmother’s miracle baby.

But things were different back then. Paul was only 5 years old when my 19-year-old mother had my brother Bruce. Because they were so close in age, he was more like an older brother than an uncle. I love this picture of my Lucy Ricardo-like mother with her younger brother and her baby boy (click on any photo for a better view). And here is my uncle with his other sister, my Aunt Bobby, and her very hot wheels. (Why didn’t we have the foresight to keep these amazing vehicles locked up in a garage somewhere?)

At 45, I’ve been thinking a lot about what it will be like to have another child. I shudder when I think about where my parents and grandparents were at my age. Here you can see my grandmother (also named Anita) gazing at my just-born sister Sue with my young Uncle Paul at her side. My grandmother is only 47 in this photograph, the same age my sister is now and the age I'll probably be if Kendall and I have a child. And look at my parents, young enough here to be my children! What was it like for my mother, already a Sadie, Sadie, Married Lady with two kids, to be celebrating her brother’s ninth birthday in the photo on the right? They are of the same generation but light years apart. Is that how it will be for my daughter Leah and her future half-sibling?

My own memories of Uncle Paul are rooted in the mid-1960s. My sister and I always sat on his knees when we sang the Grace After Meals at the end of our Friday night dinners and we thought our uncle was very cool, especially compared to my other uncles, my father's brothers, who were a good 20 years older than Paul. I remember going to avant-garde plays at Paul’s ultra-hip Francis Parker High School and seeing girls wearing white lipstick for the first time. Then, all of a sudden, Paul disappeared from view. I heard about his activities only though the lens of my often disapproving grandparents. After college he worked on various underground radio stations and magazines, was friends with 60s icons Abe Peck and Bob Rudnick, picked apples in Washington State, and lived in San Francisco during its counterculture heyday. Forget Bob Dylan, to us Uncle Paul was the "original vagabond," our family’s only bona fide hippy. While my mother and aunt certainly went through their own rebellions, it was my uncle’s radical perspectives that truly confounded my conservative grandparents. After my grandfather died I found a copy of a letter he wrote to Paul during this time in which he begged my uncle to come to his senses, stop all the foolishness, and get a real job. I’m sure he wanted his son to dutifully work for the family business, a chain of men’s clothing stores called Karoll’s Red Hanger Shops. Why on earth, he must have wondered, would his son rather be traipsing all over the country picking apples, his hair long and unkempt, his jeans tattered, hanging out with God knows who, when he could be happily ensconced in a nice office job at State and Washington? I know I’m not doing this period justice, and I challenge Paul to create his own blog so we can hear more about these years, not as seen through the clueless filter of his 11-year-old nephew.

I remember Paul’s return to Chicago some time in the mid-1970s. Eventually, like many children of the 60s, he did try on his parents’ dreams and had a stint working for the family business. Realizing it wasn’t for him, he made the decision, later than most, to go to law school. We all thought it was the perfect profession for Paul. He so delighted in bringing up controversial topics at the dinner table and espousing his many conspiracy theories about our government which would often turn Friday night dinner conversations into a blood sport, ending with somebody's tears. As my grandfather once said during one of our heated family debates, “There are 12 opinions in this room and they’re all Paul’s!”

After my grandparents died, and then my mother, Paul kept the family dinners and Jewish celebrations going, fulfilling my grandmother’s dying wish that we continue getting together in that way. He became the new patriarch of the family, our own Ted Kennedy. Entering the Chicago bungalow he lives in with his wife Anita and their two young children, you wouldn't see many signs of my uncle's hippy past—unless you examined the overstuffed bookshelves very closely and spotted the random volumes by Timothy Leary or Allen Ginsberg. Today Paul is less Abbie Hoffman and more Jewish mama. His homemade chicken soup and matzoh balls rival my grandmother's and he even attends synagogue regularly.

And he still never hesitates to call it as he sees it. From this morning’s email:

Danny, love your blog—but I love it better when its full of angst than when it slips into smugness. The Greeks knew tragedy sells and vaudeville knew the value of a banana peel fall.

Classic Paul Karoll! But what does it mean? Doesn’t he know that any smugness he’s picking up is only an eggshell-thin veneer to the endless caverns of angst I’m too terrified to plumb?

Comments

[Tamar]

Danny,
What a beautiful story!

It makes me think about my own family. My sister Sue was 20 when my brother Josh was born. In fact, my mother was breastfeeding him at Sue's wedding. Sue's first daught, Batsheva, is only one year younger than her uncle Josh.

My nephew, Shimon is two years younger than me. His father, my brother, is twenty years older than me.

And then of course there's the complexity that Sue is from a different daddy to me and Harry (Shimon's father, my brother) is from a different mother to me...

Hmm... perhaps I should blog about all this one day, eh?

[david]

Danny: You should know that Annie and I are very close -- have gotten closer over the years -- and that she's -- well -- more than a decade older than me. You should also know that my son and stepdaughters have bonded in a really phenomenal way, even though they're 6 and almost 9 years older than him. In fact, he's kind of the glue of the family. I half-expect resentment and animosity over imagined favoritism to creep in in later years, but right now, he and his half-sisters are very tight indeed. As are Annie and I, though almost of different generations... But enough about me. Your Uncle Paul sounds cool as hell. Make sure Leah gets to spend some time with him.

Oh, and one other thing about me. My ex-wife, a pretty successful theatre actress for a couple of decades, who swore she never wanted to have kids, just had her second son -- at 45. Weird how things change, isn't it? You and Kendall probably have about a decade of fertility ahead of you.

[nappy40]

Second son at 45? I better get started.

[Alan Rudnick]

Danny,
Just came across your article and I believe the Bob Rudnick you mention was my brother. I believe I met Paul at my brothers funeral in Chicago, if it was him he was a great help in all the arrangements, my family appreciated it greatly. If it is him please say hello and forward my address to him. Thanks.
Alan Rudnick