The strange bedfellows of family politics
Yesterday I wound up discussing politics long-distance with my elderly mother, something I believe I’ve done only once before. (And that would be only if abortion is truly a political issue, and not a personal or moral one.)
Here’s how I think we got on this subject: I asked her if she had voted in the recent primary in New Jersey. This was my clever way of checking in on her health. It took my father’s death to keep him from voting (and if he had lived in Chicago, I guess he’d still be voting). It’s the same with me and with my mother. And lately things have gone so bad that even my 15-year-older brother Ray started to vote — but that was for Kerry, and it didn’t wind up helping. So if I heard that Mom didn’t go out to vote, I’d figure I should make some plane reservations pronto.
Me: So, Mom, did you go out and vote?
Mom: Yep.
Me: (Fishing for followup, after a suppressed sigh of relief.) Um… so… who’d you vote for?
Mom: Hey! I don’t have to tell you! That’s for me to know!
She was stern on this point, much as she’s been stern on most points the entire time I’ve known her. Stern, but somehow giving, like the Mormon mother in “Angels in America” who miraculously transforms into the personified haven for distressed gay people. But eventually after piecing together various contextual clues, I wheedled out of her this, to me, astonishing revelation:
Me: So you voted for Hillary Clinton?!?!
Mom: Yes I did! I want to see a woman president while I’m alive. Don’t think I’m gonna get to, but I want to.
Somehow I couldn’t imagine my mother voting for Hillary Clinton, the often snide and snotty attorney in the power suit who as First Lady had turned up her nose at baking cookies. On further thought, though, my mother represents the last crumbling bastion of Hillary support: the older white female. Mom continued.
Mom: Hey, I’m a Democrat. Your grandparents were Republicans.
Me: Dad’s parents?
Mom: (snapping at me because I seem stupid) Yes, Dad’s parents! My parents didn’t vote! They were German!
(I believe they were U.S. citizens, though, but I left that aside. I also left aside the point that Dad’s parents were German, or at least German-American.)
Mom: I’m a Democrat. Democrats side with the working man. They were Republicans. My vote always canceled out at least one of ’em!
My father, by the way, was a registered Democrat who always voted Republican. But then, he was also a guy who expressed a strong dislike for every possible group or subgroup of people, including the ones he belonged to. At the same time, he was probably the friendliest guy you ever met; any place you went, Dad would wind up making friends with strangers. He said he didn’t like “the negroes,” for example, but he’d make friends of every one he came across. In his personal habits he was always open and friendly with people of all types. When I would ask him about this, posing a variation of, “Dad, I thought you didn’t like black people,” or “Dad, I thought you didn’t like hippies,” or so on, he’d say, “Oh, yeah, but not that guy. He’s all right.” This is the sort of logic that kept my father, a man who loathed unions, in the union. In retrospect, I prefer the actions of a person who welcomes individuals who seem to belong to groups he rejects, over the hypocrisy of people who profess to love all mankind but can’t even be nice to a waiter.
I think my father would have liked John McCain. In fact, I’m sure of it. Part of me likes John McCain. I respect his service and I respect his (previous) stands on principle. But I won’t vote for McCain. I disagree with him on almost every issue, but more importantly, just seeing him in that photo where he’s groping George W. Bush conjures the expression about what happens when you lie down with swine. Once upon a time, McCain was a guy who wouldn’t have done that; that guy I would have taken a closer look at.
Of the candidates still remaining, I’m sure that Clinton and McCain and Obama all have supporters among my family back in New Jersey. (And that Huckabee has none.) Whatever happens, it’s looking less likely that Mom will get her wish to see a woman in the White House. Clinton lost at least one more primary today, and by a whopping margin. She could still turn that around, but she’d better hurry. Mom is 83.