Self-Aggrandizement: Friends & Family Archives

Portrait of the Artist
Filed November 5, 2009 10:35 AM.

Apologies for the silence of late; things have been more 'exciting' than ideal on the work front, with multiple films all going (and, in standard form, running into series of disasters) at the same time.

This past Friday, however, I took the morning off to drive my sister-in-law Nina to a med school interview just outside of New York City. By way of thanks, she crafted this paper cutout portrait of me and Jess:

I'm impressed.

Father's Day
Filed June 21, 2009 10:54 AM.

My grandfather is in the hospital today, apparently not doing well. Please send Father's Day get well wishes his way. He's a kind and loving person, a talented painter, and an endless repository of Yiddish jokes.

When I last spoke with him a few weeks back, he shared this one:

A nice Jewish girl brings her fiance home to meet her parents. After dinner, her father invites the young man to the living room, for a glass of Schnapps.

"So, nu, what are your plans?" the father asks.

"I'm a Torah scholar," the fiance replies.

"A Torah scholar," the father says. "Admirable. But how will you provide a nice house for my daughter to live in, as she's accustomed to?"

"I will study," says the young man. "And God will provide for us."

"And how will you buy her a beautiful engagement ring?" asks the father.

"I will concentrate on my studies," the fiance replies, "and God will provide for us."

"And children?" asks the father. "How will you support children?"

"Don't worry, sir, God will provide," replies the fiance.

So, the daughter and the fiance head home, and the mother asks the father, "nu, how was he?"

The father says, "well, he has no job and no plans, but the good news is he thinks I'm God."

Get well, grandpa.

And, to my own father, best Father's Day wishes and all my love.

It's always worth being reminded that life is unpredictable, that we'd best appreciate, share time with, and love our friends and families while we can.

More Wishes
Filed July 19, 2008 12:15 AM.

One afternoon, when my brother and I were about 5 and 8, respectively, our mother picked us up from school in the family Volvo. She then drove down the road about five hundred feet before announcing that she wasn't our mother, but rather an alien, who had come to kidnap us.

Obviously, a debate about this ensued, with my brother and me insisting that she was, in fact, our mother, and her insisting, no, in fact, she was an alien, but that the other aliens had just done a remarkably good job in making her look precisely like our mother. The debate raged for nearly the entire ride home, with my mother holding out just long enough for my brother and I to start developing serious doubts.

To this day, I'm not entirely sure what possessed her to do that, but if she were to do it again, I also wouldn't be terribly surprised. Because, while she's logical and organized, my mother also jumps on beds and pushes people into swimming pools without warning.

Or, at least, without much warning; by now, my brother and I have both learned to recognize that certain gleam in her eyes which serves as the signal for both of us to run for our lives.

Apparently, my mother inherited this troublemaking streak from her own mother, who once, while measuring her for a skirt she was shortening, poked my mom in the posterior with a pin, "just to see what would happen."

So, on her birthday (and, yes, astute readers, her, my, and my father's birthdays do all fall within the span of a week), to any readers who have been following along with self-aggrandizement and wondering what the hell is wrong with me, I say: go ask my mom. Much as she'd deny it, her genes clearly account for at least half of the whack-job traits I possess today.

As left on her answering machine while they were apparently headed down to the Santa Cruz Beach Boardwalk for caramel apples:

Happy birthday to you,
Happy birthday to you,
Your husband's the one who looks like a monkey,
But you smell like one so you probably shouldn't laugh at him too much.

xoxo

Wishes
Filed July 14, 2008 6:30 PM.

I was six years old in 1986 when Haley's Comet passed over Palo Alto. It came overhead at about 4:00 in the morning, and I was there watching it, atop one of the Stanford hills near Highway 280, with my father.

My father had woken me, had driven us through the early morning March frost, and had climbed with me to the top of the tallest hill we could find, away from noise and light pollution, next to a single barren oak that I can still for some reason vividly remember.

We stood there, and we watched Haley's inch along overhead, and my father told me that Haley's wouldn't come around for another 75 years, that he wouldn't be alive to see it, but that he had brought me out that early morning so that I might, at age 81 or 82, be one of those few people lucky enough to see it twice in their lives.

I think of that morning sometimes, and it makes me think of all the selfless, wonderful, giving things my father did while my brother and I were growing up, and that he still does today.

So, each July 14th, on his birthday, I hope that at least some small measure of all that giving turns back his way, and that he gets exactly the day and the toys and the fun and the love and the adventure that he's hoping for.

So, to my father:

Happy birthday to you,
Happy birthday to you,
You look like a monkey,
No, seriously, you look like a monkey, especially given the ridiculous amount of body hair you have.

xoxo

Dear Mom,
Filed May 11, 2008 11:27 AM.

From childhood right through today, I couldn't have done it without your 'gentle' encouragement.

Happy Mother's Day, and all of my love,

xxx

joshua

Fraternite
Filed August 2, 2007 11:46 AM.

Today, my brother David turns twenty-five.

To him I say: enjoy it while you can, as this is the last 'good' birthday (reduced car rental prices!) until senior discounts kick in at sixty-five.

So, basically, nothing to look forward to now except for the long, slow slide into middle age.

Happy birthday, assmat!

Meet the Parents
Filed November 21, 2006 7:15 PM.

Far and away, Thanksgiving is the most important day of the year. Or so it would seem from the weight placed upon the holiday by my mother. Skip heading home to California for nearly any other event, and she won't bat an eye. But my brother or I miss Thanksgiving dinner? That's a hanging offense.

So, per usual, I'm off to San Francisco to eat turkey. This year, however, I'm dragging Jess in tow. Because while I've met her parents a few times (due to their proximity in nearer Boston), she's yet to meet mine.

I've gone back and forth between thinking that this week is a wonderful or a terrible time for that first meet-up, unsure whether the collective preparatory push of cooking and cleaning and table-setting will give us something to focus on other than the inherent weird awkwardness, or simply leave everyone even further on stressed-out edge, compounding the mess of it all.

Whichever it is, however, we land in SFO in about an hour; it seems I'll soon find out.

Not as Dumb as I Thought
Filed August 25, 2006 5:57 PM.

Congratulations to my brother, who this afternoon hooked a high-level position at a boutique real estate development company that will now be paying him far better than I pay myself.

I'm taking him out for a celebratory dinner. And then putting it on his tab.

To the Pain
Filed August 4, 2006 1:30 PM.

One big disadvantage of having my younger brother here in New York is that we often work out together. Which, in some ways, is an advantage - working out with someone else always being more fun than working out alone. The problems set in when we start competing with each other. Because, after twenty-some years of practice, the two of us have honed to an art the act of pushing far more than we sanely should, just to edge the other out.

This was made particularly clear yesterday, when the CrossFit Workout of the Day called for maximum weight deadlift attempts. [A deadlift, for those not familiar, essentially involves picking a weighted barbell up off the ground, then putting it back down again. Cf.]

So, we started with the bar and a 45 pound plate on either side, and proceeded to pile on additional weight after each attempt. There's a point somewhere after adding two such forty-five pound plates on each side that, as you stand up, the metal barbell visibly bends. And, it was about at that point that other people nearby began to stop their own workouts, gathering to watch us go back and forth, back and forth, each time adding more and more weight to the bar.

In the end, as he does about half the time these days, my brother edged me out, though not before we had well crossed the 300 pound mark. But, today, we're both the losers. I, for example, am typing this standing, because my legs are far too sore for me to lower myself into the chair.

They say love hurts; apparently, that's doubly true for the brotherly sort.

Public Service Announcement
Filed July 1, 2006 7:43 PM.

Warning! Warning! As of this weekend, my younger brother David now also lives in Manhattan, thus doubling the number of drunken young Newmans in New York that women would be well advised to stay away from.

Macaroni
Filed June 18, 2006 1:55 PM.

When I was growing up, I loved macaroni and cheese. But, for some reason, I believed the dish was best served for breakfast. The strange preference passed to my younger brother as well, and on most weekends, he and I would put in a request for macaroni brunch.

Complicating matters further, however, I liked Kraft's Deluxe, which featured a large packet of congealed Velveeta, while my brother remained partial to Kraft Dinner and its powdery (even once cooked) orange 'cheese'.

So, in an act of kindness and child-humoring that astounds me even to this day, my father (official school lunch and breakfast preparer of our family) would brew up two parallel pots, one of each, for my brother and me.

I think of this each Fathers' Day, and of the countless other big and small wonderful things my father Andrew did (and still does) for us, and realize that, as far as dads go, my brother and I got it really, really, remarkably good.

A Matter of Degree
Filed June 11, 2006 9:12 AM.

I'm in Denver at the moment, having come in to town to watch my brother graduate from business school - an event that, officially, makes me the least educated member of my family.

The graduation ceremony itself, on top of the usual array of addresses and pontifications, involved every single graduating graduate student's name being announced, as they headed up to shake the Chancellor's hand and receive their diploma.

This was, in short, not a fast process. So, several hours in, to entertain myself, I scawled out a bit of poetry on the back of my program:

Commencement
[A triplet, in haiku verse]

I.
Pomp and circumstance
book-end a mind-numbing line
of young graduates

II.
A sea of black robes
undifferentiated
they flow across stage

III.
I sit in the crowd
ready to stab out my eye
with a dull pencil

Archived
Filed June 1, 2006 9:48 AM.

This weekend, my Great Aunt Gertrude passed away. I was fortunate enough to see her several times a year when I was growing up, and saw her even more frequently since I moved to New York.

Gertrude was the kind of woman who you'd bring a box of cookies, yet return home from still holding that box and ladened down with several more.

She was the kind of woman who would visit the Met, look at a Picasso or a Renoir for a few seconds, and, if it didn't strike her fancy, shrug and say, "it's nice enough, I guess, but I don't really care for it."

And, mostly, she was the kind of woman who told stories. Excellent stories. Especially with her younger sister, my grandmother, the two would regale my brother and I with tales of growing up in New York City, disagreeing with and correcting each other, talking over one another to add commentary and fill in the blanks.

I realized this weekend that, with her death, many of those stories have disappeared. So, this week, in partnership with my father, I've stocked up on condenser mics, mixing boards, and the array of other equipment needed for professional quality audio recording.

Armed with it all, I'm setting out to record the stories of my extended family - how they met their spouses and what holidays were like in their homes when they were growing up. Funny things their children did while they were young and bits of wisdom their parents passed along.

As of yet, I don't have a grand plan for what to do with all of those stories once they're recorded. At the moment, I'm simply collecting them, trying to lock them down, taking comfort in that permanence achieved in the shift from ephemeral sound waves to preservable backed-up bits.

Mamma Mia
Filed May 14, 2006 9:32 AM.

Obviously, a debate about this ensued, with my brother and me insisting that she was, in fact, our mother, and her insisting, no, in fact, she was an alien, but that the other aliens had just done a remarkably good job in making her look precisely like our mother. The debate raged for nearly the entire ride home, with my mother holding out just long enough for my brother and I to start developing serious doubts.

To this day, I'm not entirely sure what possessed her to do that, but if she were to do it again, I also wouldn't be terrribly surprised. Because, while she's smart and articulate and logical and organized and successful, my mother also jumps on beds and pushes people into swimming pools without warning.

Or, at least, without much warning; by now, my brother and I have both learned to recognize that certain gleam in her eyes which serves as the signal for both of us to run for our lives.

So, on this Mother's Day, to any readers who have been following along with self-aggrandizement and wondering what the hell is wrong with me, I say: go ask my mom. Much as she'd deny it, her genes clearly account for at least half of the whack-job traits I possess today.

Happy Mothers Day to moms everywhere, but especially to my own, because, frankly, she's better than yours.

Fraternal Love
Filed November 30, 2005 3:11 PM.

Dear David-

As my younger brother, you should know well that coming to New York for job interviews, staying with me, then taking naps in my bed while I'm working and thereby giving me your cold, is totally grounds for an ass-kicking.

Watch your back.

Love,

josh

Blogopera
Filed April 15, 2005 2:47 PM.

Though my Italian is fractured, it's just good enough to follow along this saga, as blogged by my former professor and current friend Nefeli Misuraca:

In short, finding most men so below her standards that they barely warranted 'even one raised eyebrow', Nefeli took matters into her own hands, found another Italian blogger who seemed a suitable match, and declared the two of them engaged.

Unfortunately, she didn't actually inform him of this fact. Perhaps inevitably so, as the two had never previously spoken, online or off.

The guy discovered as much today. Hilarity ensues.

Update: Nefeli informs me that the fun is just beginning, as these blogagements are too be a weekly tradition, with some new unsuspecting mark on each pass.

self-knowledge
Filed January 11, 2005 9:11 AM.

An email from my good friend Lindsey:

will do my best to phone this evening. this paper-a-day thing is killing me.

oh, wait, wait. actually, it's the lack-of-will-power-not-to- watch-the-bachelorette-for-two-hours that's killing me.

'rents
Filed January 6, 2005 3:51 PM.

The Doctors Newman:

Aren't they the cutest thing?

tough guy
Filed October 21, 2004 6:52 PM.

The real secret to Thai kickboxing success is possessing an unusually high pain tolerance. Beyond a certain level, both opponents' skills are similar enough that, essentially, it comes down to a test of who can stand the pounding longer before crumpling.

Which, in short, is why I do it well. It's not that I'm a masochist - I don't like pain. I just don't register it much. In large part, that's due to the games my younger brother David and I played when growing up. Bloody knuckles until we'd both be literally bleeding. Or simply taking turns giving each other Indian burns until one of us threw in the towel.

Over the years of such needlessly rough play, I usually bested my brother - though just barely - giving me license to call him a wimp, a pansy, a sissy, and a whiny little girl on more occasions than I can count. Today, however, I officially retract all such charges. David called to say that, after two weeks of a minor sprained wrist still not healing up, he had gone in to see a doctor, who, after a handful of MRI's, deduced that David hadn't actually sprained his wrist after all, but shattered four different bones in his hand.

He's bound for reconstructive surgery early next week, replete with bionic-cool insertion of metal pins. So, sorry Dave; walking around for two weeks with a shattered hand, even toughing through it to hit the winning homerun in an cancer cure benefit softball game, makes it pretty clear you're not a wimp, a pansy, a sissy or a whiny little girl. It makes it clear you're actually an idiot instead.

Just kidding. Still, if any readers have healing psychic power to spare, please channel them Denver-ward, as my brother gets his hand put back together. Until it is, we can't play the game where we take turns punching each other in the shoulder as hard as we can until one of us gives up.

sending
Filed August 14, 2004 9:16 AM.

Psychic rays to:

Ariel & Andreas, in congratulations of their wedding last weekend.

Yoav, as he turns 26 and drinks the night away.

Helen Jane & James, in support of James' father duking it out with cancer.

Hilary, as she paints her way through Florence.

The recently engaged Caitlin, as she thinks about beating me up if I don't finally give her a shout-out on this site.

meeting up
Filed July 26, 2004 1:11 PM.

As post-graduation celebration, my parents are now en route to Ischia, Italy, the site of their engagement some thirty-three years back.

And, certainly, engagements are important - particularly now, when "how did he do it?" supercedes even "can I see the ring?" But meeting stories, I've always felt, are what really count.

My grandparents, for example, met at a baseball game - my grandfather, who played catcher, had forgotten his lunch. My grandmother, a cheerleader for the other team, offered to share hers. With that beginning, how could they have weathered less than their seventy years of happy marriage?

My parents, on the other hand, ended up in Ischia in a more round-about way. Both were students at New York City's Queens College. My mother ran the college newspaper, my father the radio station. He appeared on my mother's doorstep two hours early for a joint media meeting being held at her house. He was on his way back from Jones Beach, wearing a tank top and short cutoffs. Depending on whose version you rely upon, he may also have had some nameless girl in tow.

My father, apparently, was instantly smitten. My mother, on the other hand, was instantly convinced my father was a jackass. Still, with a bit of persistence, he managed to drag her out on a date, and then another. He was serious. She continued to see other guys. But they dated, on-again, off-again, from that point.

Towards the end of their senior year (during, I believe, an 'off' rather than an 'on'), my father asked my mother if she had any post-graduation plans. Actually, she did: having never traveled abroad, she was setting off for the summer to tour Europe and Israel. My father, with absolutely no summer plans, jumped on the chance: he was intending to do exactly the same thing - perhaps they could go together?

Somewhere in the extensive pre-trip planning, off became on, and when their flight left JFK, my father's mother famously turned to my mother's mother to ask if she had renewed her passport. Renewed her passport? Yes, just in case their children decided to hold the marriage abroad. After all, my father had decided that they were getting engaged, and he was particularly good at getting what he wanted.

And, in fact, he did get what he wanted - though the wedding wasn't until the following fall, they sent back news of the engagement via telegram.

My brother and I, to this day, give my mother a hard time about their story. Growing up, nearly every pet we ever owned, we bought on the trip back from ski weekends up in Bear Valley. Take her out of her environment, we knew, and she'd come back with all kinds of housemates she'd never have agreed to back at home. My father, it seems, new exactly the same trick.

falling behind
Filed July 26, 2004 12:25 PM.

Despite cumulative travel time for the New York to DC and DC to New York trips passing the twenty hour mark, the trek was absolutely worthwhile - I'm exceedingly proud to say I'm now the child of two doctors, one of medicine, the other of education policy.

As my brother just sent me a copy of his biz-school application essay, it seems I'm well on my way to becoming the family underachiever.

familial congratulations
Filed June 21, 2004 1:52 PM.

To my father: For being upgraded to full professor at Stanford, despite not actually (at least as far as I can tell) doing any teaching or research.

To my mother: For, this past weekend, attaining her PhD, despite already having amassed so much experience in the area that other students in the same program were citing her papers as seminal work in the field.

To my brother: For, unexpectedly, getting a job here in New York for the summer (having gone in to speak with a prominent real estate developer in the city, just to pick his brain about the industry, and being told, "you're a cocky little bastard. Want to work here?"), and for very quickly putting a life (apartment, etc.) in place here in New York, even if, in the process, he lost his cell phone, and also got really drunk at Otis, the bar around my corner, culminating in him baring his ass cheeks on request of a bachelorette party also drinking heavily at the same bar.

To my self: For finally being able to climb the Elias route on Rat Rock in Central Park, even if I did get stuck partway up, and while pausing to regroup and chalk my hands, have a six year old wearing Spiderman face paint run up behind me yelling, "hey, mister, do you need help? I can save you, I'm Spiderman!"

the brothers newman
Filed June 17, 2004 3:34 PM.

Apropos the discussion of spending time with my younger brother:

playing hotel
Filed June 16, 2004 5:39 PM.

My brother, who seems to do very little these days except come to visit me in New York, is, once again, here visiting me in New York. Though he's on his way to a summer real estate development job in Chicago (which starts next Monday), he's taking advantage of the week of vacation before he starts mainly by sleeping exceedingly late on our couch, watching more TV than have my roommates and I, combined, since the start of the year, and generally causing drunken trouble.

Normally, I'd be happy to let him do his own thing while I do mine, but, unfortunately, we don't have a spare set of keys for our apartment. And though we've tried to get them duplicated, apparently our front door key is some super-high-tech deal that can only be etched by computer lathe, controlled by a credit card key carrying the right shaping information. Sadly, I'm not making that up.

As a result, my brother's and my schedules are hopelessly intertwined, pulled together by a series of elaborately choreographed key handoffs. They seem to be working well, in terms of actually allowing us both to get in and out and back in when we need, but they've also brought me a bit deeper into my brother's life then I suspect he or I would prefer. Last night, for example, heading to pick up the keys from him at a local bar in our neighborhood, I found him, not drinking, but standing outside the bar, making out with some girl he had apparently just met.

And, certainly, at some abstract, 'I taught him everything he knows' sort of level, I was exceedingly proud. But at a more practical 'listen, bitch, get your hands off my brothers ass, because I have a morning meeting and need to get home and go to sleep' level, it may be a touch more brotherly bonding that we really need.

boston bound
Filed March 4, 2004 3:33 PM.

While the next part of the 'shape up' series will be shortly forthcoming, I'm a bit harried today, as I leave early tomorrow morning to Boston. One of my closest friends, Bobby Den, gets married a week from Sunday, and I'll be serving as his best man (leaving him in the very dangerous position of handing me a microphone in front of his family and our mutual friends). Bobby has, over the past few years, become increasingly religious, and so this weekend I'm attending his aufruf, a Jewish tradition of having the groom come up to the Torah the Shabbat before his wedding.

The aufruf stems from a story about King Solomon, who supposedly had two special rooms added to the great Temple, one for mourners and the other for grooms, so the mourners could be consoled and the bridegrooms blessed. In the centuries since the Temple was destroyed, however, a custom evolved to instead have the groom come to synagogue before the wedding so people could bless him there. So I'm whipping out a yarmulke, dusting off my Hebrew, and heading up the coast to catch the action. A joyous occasion, an aufruf is celebrated with food and drink and more drink, so it could be a long night.

Further, as I'll be staying the weekend, I'll also likely be joining Bobby at synagogue to celebrate Purim, a Jewish holiday based on the book of Esther. The holiday lauds Esther, the queen of Persia, for owning up to her Judaism and standing up to her husband, King Ahashueras, to save her people from massacre at the hands of Haman, Ahashueras' right-hand man. The celebration involves not only a reading of the book of Esther, but a Talmudic command to drink "ad d'lo yada", or "until one can't tell the difference" between the names of Haman and Esther's uncle Mordechai. (Side note: Exactly how undercover could Esther's Judaism have been considering she had an Uncle Mordechai?) In other words, the Talmud says I have to get blitzed. And who am I to forsake centuries of Jewish wisdom?

Steady, liver, this could be a long couple of days.

gloating
Filed February 13, 2004 1:17 PM.

My parents are better than yours, because not only did they send a care package assortment of Valentines' Day candies, they included a card with a pickle on the front that inside reads "You mean a great dill to us."

david newman: the interview
Filed November 26, 2003 12:32 PM.

It is Thanksgiving day, 3:42 pm. At 5:00, twenty-some guests will be arriving for dinner. My brother David, unshowered, in sweats and a pit-stained undershit, lies on the couch watching football, Green Bay versus Detroit. Detroit is winning, 13 to 7. In the other room, my mother is yelling for us both to come in and help set the table.

Me: Dave, mom's yelling for you.

David: [silence]

Me: Okay. In that case, let me interview you for my website.

David: Nope.

Me: You realize I'm going to write about this either way.

David: [silence]

Me: So, basically, I should just say that you spend all day lying here, watching TV with your hand in your pants?

David: [turns to look towards me for the first time since I've come in. Winks. Goes back to watching TV.]

Fin.

Figure 1. Subject in Natural Habitat

tying the knot
Filed September 21, 2003 5:27 PM.

Last night, Bobby Den, my roommate through college and one of my closest friends, got engaged. And while I'm absolutely thrilled for both him and his wonderful fiancé Galitte, I must admit to being slightly freaked out by the adulthood that incontrovertibly imparts upon our group of peers. I mean, getting married; that's some serious stuff. It seems I somehow missed the memo saying: "alright boys, fun's over; now we're playing for keeps."

Portrait of the Artist Filed November 5, 2009 10:35 AM.

Father's Day Filed June 21, 2009 10:54 AM.

More Wishes Filed July 19, 2008 12:15 AM.

Wishes Filed July 14, 2008 6:30 PM.

Dear Mom, Filed May 11, 2008 11:27 AM.

Fraternite Filed August 2, 2007 11:46 AM.

Meet the Parents Filed November 21, 2006 7:15 PM.

Not as Dumb as I Thought Filed August 25, 2006 5:57 PM.

To the Pain Filed August 4, 2006 1:30 PM.

Public Service Announcement Filed July 1, 2006 7:43 PM.

Macaroni Filed June 18, 2006 1:55 PM.

A Matter of Degree Filed June 11, 2006 9:12 AM.

Archived Filed June 1, 2006 9:48 AM.

Mamma Mia Filed May 14, 2006 9:32 AM.

Fraternal Love Filed November 30, 2005 3:11 PM.

Blogopera Filed April 15, 2005 2:47 PM.

self-knowledge Filed January 11, 2005 9:11 AM.

'rents Filed January 6, 2005 3:51 PM.

tough guy Filed October 21, 2004 6:52 PM.

sending Filed August 14, 2004 9:16 AM.

meeting up Filed July 26, 2004 1:11 PM.

falling behind Filed July 26, 2004 12:25 PM.

familial congratulations Filed June 21, 2004 1:52 PM.

the brothers newman Filed June 17, 2004 3:34 PM.

playing hotel Filed June 16, 2004 5:39 PM.

boston bound Filed March 4, 2004 3:33 PM.

gloating Filed February 13, 2004 1:17 PM.

david newman: the interview Filed November 26, 2003 12:32 PM.

tying the knot Filed September 21, 2003 5:27 PM.