Velcro Part Three: Impenitence
During an older brother’s Bar Mitzvah in the early eighties, Aunt Striggy cleared the dance floor and had the band play something seventies sexy. Then, wearing a two-piece winter-white leather suit with shoulder pads, she danced, by herself, all over the designated space for free movement, including a lot of lying face down, prone to the ground, pretending to dry hump the floor, to an audience of mostly thirteen-year-old boys. I was single digits age at the time and it was so traumatic to witness my dad‘s sister doing a tacky mating dance with the brown linoleum tile, that to this day, any time I see a woman dance alone I have this fear they are going to take it a little too far. Chorus line, dance troupe, flash mob, totally fine. Solo number, I get anxious. This is the woman who's going to take an aspiring musician to the next level.
At Yom Kippur dinner Aunt Striggy asks me to help finish setting the table, requesting everyone else help out with the food. With the small group of guests now huddled in a small kitchen, Striggy comes to the table where I'm laying out flatware, alone and kind of lonely, with very little conversation leaking from the kitchen's pass-through, mostly just the sound of me placing a knife, clink, fork, clink, and then moving along the circumference of the table to the next place setting, clink. Striggy comes close and immediately starts berating me for showing up uninvited, speaking just low enough not to attract any attention, questioning me: did I think that was okay, then repeating the sentence, "You think it's okay to show up without asking?" I still remember her by my side and my tensing up, not knowing what to do. It felt horrible she didn't want me there, while I was helping out at the same time. The low voice yelling increased Strigga's anger rather than release it. I stayed quiet and that also increased her anger. Without getting the fight she wanted, perhaps frustratingly misinterpreting my silence as ignoring, Aunt Strigga changed tactics. She raised her right arm, pulled back, and punched me. On the day of atonement.
If you're not familiar with the tradition of Yom Kippur, there's no hitting involved. It is considered the holiest day that includes: fasting, prayer, and a big meal at the end. It's a time to reflect on your actions and the person you want to be, to ask forgiveness for any wrongs you may have made, and through this repentance receive a clean slate of sorts. It is also a time to be together with family and loved ones. It is not a day you want to commit an act of violence, though no day is good for that. I'd always wondered if her punch counted towards the prior year and would be absolved by sundown, or if she’d been spending for the future? The hit hurt and I made an "Owww" noise reaction. Everyone came out of the kitchen. My dad’s sister downplayed the punch and was even angrier at me for causing a scene rather than take the hit in stoic silence. I have not seen Aunt Strigga since.
I'm remembering this while standing at my kitchen counter, in my own small kitchen, in my own apartment in New York City, eating a salad, chewing and processing, while texting Sean and watching the segment. I keep having to pause the video at some of the worst attempts by Aunt Strigga to mislead the producer, feeling increasingly suffocated by having her as a family member. Each bite of food is packed with vital nutrients, anger, sadness, fiber, embarrassment, questions, and cringe. Sean is game for trying to suss out the situation, texting me, "This is so creepy now I really think it’s her. Do you think she’s trying to scam you? I’m just gonna say you’re not available but now I’m like if it’s the woman we think it is, I don’t really want to give her to [another teacher] either.??"
"Wait, did she like request me?" Sean is right, it is creepy, and convoluted. I send another note, "It’s strange to pick your studio, being so far away. It’s on my site where I teach and what I teach. And yeah, she needs money badly." If this woman was not Aunt Strigga and lived Midtown, why was she reaching out to a studio North of Central Park, some nearly hundred blocks away? If it was Strigga, I know she needed money from hearing bits and pieces of how her life wasn't going so well from my dad. I doubted the sincerity of wanting to book a private yoga lesson in either scenario, aunt or not. "God if she is the same person she’s good. Because she didn’t actually request you, but she sort of led the conversation that way." Sean texts back sounding amused and intrigued. She'd watched the whole scam segment I sent her. From what I was understanding through text, the woman who may be my dad’s sister didn't simply request to work with me, she fostered a conversation where my name would come up. "Like she was basically saying, she’s a beginner and needs really gentle classes. She had a lot of trauma and needs breathing exercises and I said we don’t have any breathing specific classes, but I recommended a few different options, including restorative. And then I was sort of touting your many years of experience, so it was totally natural that she said she wanted u."
"Thanks for touting me!" Now I felt badly for the time Sean was spending on this and for her efforts to promote me to this woman, who might be Aunt Strigga doing some sort of confidence trick. Sean said the woman mentioned recovering from a car accident and asked me if that was true. I said probably not. Nice touch though. But why the theatrics? Was Aunt Strigga trying to get in touch with me covertly? I keep going back and forth; it's a doppelgänger, no it's definitely Striggy. If it was Aunt Strigga, wouldn't it be easier to go through my dad, saying she'd like to reconnect, so that I could politely tell him to tell her no thank you? How did she find where I teach if not through my website? And if she found my site then there's a way to contact me from there. You don't need to go through anyone to stalk me. It's not a situation that requires recon. You just attend one of my classes and there I am. I texted Sean a couple of rounds, because there's some sort of rule in my head about separating thoughts into separate messages,
"You really need to get this woman to pay before any teacher works with her."
"Also, if this isn’t her, we’re being not great."
"But she lives across the street from Madison Square Garden. I mean… "
It was like a whodunit, except without the actionable item that usually inspires wanting to know the "who." There also was not yet a "done," though I'm guessing I was the "it" that it would be done to. Who is this person? Why would it be Strigga? Why is my family so clandestine regarding communicating with one another? Sean sends a text, "I’m really beginning to think it is. Because she’s also saying how she doesn’t have a credit card but she can get her cousin to pay and if it’s not her I’m gonna feel shitty." I gotta hand it to Sean, she wanted to figure this out as much as I did. I texted out a bunch of thoughts back,
"Doesn’t have a credit card?"
"I’m going to ask my Dads wife on the phone number, hang on."
"Good thing I actually called my Dad today and chatted."
Sometimes I call my dad and sometimes I forget to call. I have one of those parents who believes children call them. Period. I've spent a lot of time over the years calling my dad and saying I didn't agree with this theory, how his phone works equally. Then I gave up and try to remember to call without having a conversation explaining he can call me. It was one of those moments where you hear yourself talking and make an adult decision to be the change you want to see in the world, like Gandhi would have wanted. My dad also has a habit of remembering how long it's been since my last call and will remark to the sad wind, "Maybe you're busy." This whole side of my family avoids direct communication like highways. Everything's a local road. Luckily I called my dad earlier in the day and we spoke so the clock timer on my last call was currently set to zero. Sean had sent me a screenshot of the phone number earlier to see if I recognized it, but the last time I had my aunt’s phone number, well, I don't think I ever did. I send this image to my dad’s wife. I want to do this on the DL incase Aunt Striggy asked to get in touch with me and my dad did a polite refusal already. No need to upset him. Also he uses a flip phone and doesn't text anyways. Also also, I am born into a family of weird communication issues and carry the torch.
I text Sean, "I’m waiting on my Dads wife to respond!!"
(To Be Continued, Friday, March 8th, Velcro Part Four!)