Brunch with Grandma

This piece dives into a conversation surrounding Asian American racism

I am driving to brunch with Grandma and Grandpa today. I am determined to fulfill my role as the household scheduler and get to know them better. The wedding band on my left finger still feels foreign. It’s November which means that it’s cold and grey out, but the hope of the holidays fills the air. As the old time carol says, “even stop lights blink a bright red and green.” My husband is in the passenger seat changing the radio stations absentmindedly searching for anything other than holiday carols. I’m excited; we haven’t seen them in a while. The pandemic has cut down our time with our loved ones. Both my husband and I have tested negative in the last few days so we’re driving over on a Sunday. We knock and Grandma answers. I compliment her on her red sweatshirt dotted with maple leaves over the shoulder. She welcomes us in with a hug. My husband and Grandpa scurry to the basement. I follow Grandma into the warm kitchen. Anxiously, my eyes search the room for a good spot to place my jacket and I decide to hang it on the wooden back of one of the chairs. “Oh, Darling, that’s where I usually sit,” she says. I blush and whisper an apology, but she pinches a few pills between her polished fingernails. Grandma delicately places them on another plate with a smile. 

    After setting out orange juice and fruit salad, Grandma walks over to the banister and calls down the stairs for the boys to come up. The rain outside is transforming into a sleet. We all tuck into our meal very quickly and the usual topics of conversation come up: work, my side of the family, and hunting. Grandma asks the polite questions you ask the newest member of the family. I dig my heels in and politely decline their invitations to Thanksgiving and Christmas on my parents’ behalf. The fear that they have felt doesn’t seem to touch my grandparents in law. The conversation drifts into shark infested waters: politics. My husband is the one in our marriage who has kept up on the news and focused on all of the news from the pandemic. It’s been eight months since lockdown and quarantine, since we have settled into our new way of living. Grandma looks up, “Do you know what is just outrageous? They are saying that the orientals are experiencing racism in our country. Let me ask you, Amanda, have you ever faced any racism in our country?”

    She’s asking me because I am the Chinese wife of her White grandson. She’s asking me because I’m one of the three people of color in her family. She’s asking me because she made “slant eyes” while discussing her new neighbors. She’s asking me because she has spent the majority of her adult life nestled in “Vanilla Valley”. I look up and take a sip of juice. I ask her, very delicately, and in a voice softer than a mouse, “Well, do you really wanna know?” She nods furiously and my husband glances at me. I know she doesn’t. I know exactly what she wants me to say; she wants me to assure her that I haven’t. It’s much easier to assume the slant eyed men and women on the news are just being outrageous. My words are slow, measured, “Then, yes. Yes, I have experienced racism in this country.” She asks me to elaborate. The men cast uneasy glances at one another. 

    I start with a question, “Did you know that a moment after meeting me, everyone asks if I speak Chinese? If I’m in a good mood, I’ll tell them that I speak French, and if I’m in a bad mood, I demand to know if they were fluent in English at 13 months because that’s how old I was when I was adopted by my English only speaking parents.Then, they want to know if I have ever met my ‘real parents,’ because my adopted parents aren’t real, a fact the world kindly clues me in on.” Grandma doesn’t say anything and her husband is busy counting how many little black dots cover the Polish pottery plate. I hear the clatter of her metal fork on her plate. “Grandma,” I take a softer tone, “ In my junior year, I was close to failing out of math, but too embarrassed to ask for help, when my friend coaxed me into after school tutoring, ‘Just go to tutoring and I promise I will get to the classroom first. It’ll be just us working on your homework, I promise,’ he vowed. So I went, I went tutoring because I was practically failing math.” I take a breath. Her green eyes bore softly into mine. I wonder if she can see the pain that I have masked from her from the moment we met. In some sense, I am liberated. It’s as if she has finally removed the dam holding back my experience from their White, suburban existence. My husband squeezes my hand. 

    I continue, “So I get to the classroom and the first student who sees me asks if I am here to tutor. I shake my head and sit alone until my friend arrives. But the insults don’t end there because the kid running the tutoring wants to know why I’m there so I tell him, with as much courage as possible, ‘I am here to get tutored.’ And this kid gets this face like I’ve just told him I'm here for open heart surgery; he squints his eyes at me and goes, ‘But you’re Asian.’ And now I am humiliated. But the reality of the situation is I needed help badly.” 

    Grandma interrupts me, “But you’re a smart girl. I’m sure that’s what he meant.” She stabs a bite of egg. She’s comfortable again. The flood had diminished in her mind. But not in mine.

    “No, Grandma,” I swallow the lump in my throat, “He meant that Asians are supposed to be good at math and science and I. Was. Failing. The last three tests I got Ds on and I didn’t bother to turn in half my homework. The teacher barely acknowledged that I was having a hard time because I sat up front and I have dark hair.” I take a shaky breath and wonder if I should just shut up. My souffle is cold and my pancake has soaked up all the juice from the fruit. “I went home and I cried.”

    Grandma looks confused for a moment, “But that’s good racism,” she insists. “Being smart is a great stereotype. Why wouldn’t you want the world to see you as smart?”

    “Because,” I’m yelling now, “I was failing.” My husband looks at me, trying to calm me down from this soap box. She is just a little old woman with a hint of curiosity. “I was terrified to get help. I was terrified that I was failing and I needed someone to rescue me.” I take a bite of fruit. I am calmer now. “Asian racism is still racism. There was a guy at the office, just last week, who adjusted his mask and took a step back from me when I cleared my throat. He was afraid. He thinks my physical appearance means I am a danger to him. He had just heard the news of the ‘China virus,’ afterall.” I had bit my lip. I had bit my tongue. My trembling fingers found the correct buttons on the keyboard and I finished the admin side of the checkout process of his dental appointment. My husband clears his throat and takes another serving of hash brown casserole. The metal spoon rings like a church bell against the serving dish. 

    “Grandma,” my voice is breaking now, “I’ll have to explain to our daughters,” I pause and meet her gaze, a burst of courage fueled by anger, “Your great granddaughters that a boy might ask her on a date to fulfill a fantasy. Not because he loves her, but because he wants her in a school girl outfit…” I trail off. The breakfast table is silent. My heart is torn; I am relieved to not shove this part of my journey down, but I can tell my words have hurt them. She won’t ask if she has ever been racist to me and I know she may never understand nor want to understand. I finish my orange juice and excuse myself. In the bathroom, I wipe away tears and clear my throat. I hear my husband ask Grandpa what he’ll be hunting this season.