Stepping Outside the Box

I find that I don't fit a 'mold'.  Neither, apparently, does my sister. It's strange how we people subconsciously categorize others, trying to put them in this box or that, when the truth is, I don't think anyone really fits into any box.

I'll give you a little background on the two Clements sisters. We had a normal childhood, with a normal upbringing. Well, as normal as two children from a divorce family can have. We grew up in the Southern United States. You know, the place that a lot of people in the rest of the country consider a little backwards. The truth is, we where anything but backwards. See, we had opportunities that pushed us beyond our cultural and socioeconomic boundaries.

Mom has a deep love of music. She had come from a musical family. Her brother was a part of a professional Gospel group. She also loved soul and jazz music. The voices of Aretha and Dinah Washington often filled our home. In fact, I am named after Dinah Washington. My mom would dance and sing around the house regularly. This trait has carried on in her daughters and subsequently, her grandsons.

She loved to travel and, although she didn't get to travel as much as she wished, she did get to explore a few exotic spots. She jumped at the opportunity to travel, sometimes going to the Bahamas, Atlanta, or San Francisco. After we were grown, she eventually realized her dream of traveling abroad. She has traveled to Europe numerous times and visited Jerusalem more times than I can count. Through her, we have developed this wanderlust, a strong desire to travel. In the next few years we will be exploring many countries, several Asian. Plans are being finalized and money is being saved.

Being raised Pentecostal, our mother had this deep seated response against to going to the movies. It's not that she still believed it was wrong to go, but she could not bring herself to go very often. Religious PTSD maybe?  When she did go, there were only two reasons,  Paul Newman and musicals. My mom loves musicals. The Sound of Music is probably her most favorite film of all time. Because of this , she has fostered a deep love of musicals into her daughters. Musicals and opera continues to be a huge part of my life today.

Our father is a pretty taciturn, straight forward, no frills man. He came from a modest family with modest means. I wouldn't have called him cultured, but he strove to make sure that his daughters were. Through my father, we gained a deep appreciation of books.  We went to the library often, sometimes almost every Saturday. He bought me Nancy Drew books on our weekend visits, after the divorce. He encouraged me in the reading of Shakespeare and Greek mythology, while still only in grade school. To this day, both my sister and I are a voracious readers. Bibliophiles if you will.

He didn't limit us to girlie type pastimes. For Christmas and birthdays, I received microscopes, chemistry and electronic sets. My sister asked for and was gifted a BB gun. There were many adventurous outings like hiking, spelunking, and sailing.

He also loved music, classical, rock and country. It seems if most of my childhood memories are accompanied by music of some sort. He took us to concerts, art centers, museums, ballets, plays, and the movies. Not just the popular films either, sometimes art films, that we didn't understand really, but that he would encourage discussions about.

Both of our parents promoted creativity and the love of the arts. My sister played saxophone and the viola, but her primary love was drawing. She became a very accomplished artist. I played the clarinet, performed in plays, and was part of the newspaper and literary magazine staff throughout my Junior High and High school years.

Our stepfather taught us about gardening, hunting, cows and horses. Although I hated everything about growing, canning, and butchering our own food when I was growing up, I now have a strong regard for food that comes closer from the source to the table. I have developed a passion for organic gardening and clean eating.  He also taught me much about cooking, which has led me to become a more than passable, cook.

Through our maternal grandmother, we developed a love of old movies. Our first combined crush was on Errol Flynn. You've not seen funny, until you've seen two prepubescent girls fight over the right to marry a long dead, old time Hollywood star.

At my grandmother's we also spent a lot of time watching PBS. Mostly Shakespearean plays, which we both adored, but I also enjoyed the quirky Doctor Who, which annoyed my sister to no end.

We were often an audience to my father's and grandmother's political debates. Sunday dinners where inevitably followed by heated discussions about whatever was the topic on Meet the Press that week. Although our political leanings now stray far from those of our family (we have both established ourselves as independents, combining a mismatch of beliefs from radical, conservative, to liberal), they instilled the responsibility of researching and questioning the status quo. To compile information, ruminate and consider every angle, before making up our own minds.

Despite growing up in the rural south, we were exposed to many cultures. Most of the kids at our schools were Air Base kids.  Military brats, who were either multicultural or who had lived all over the country, sometimes all over the world. These kids brought back a myriad of experiences and values that made my teenage years far from the typical southern teenage experience. Racial, cultural, even sexual orientation lines were blurred. I won't go as far as saying that we saw no color in our relationships, but the defining lines that seemed to be present in many other communities, were often ignored in ours.

My friend Kelly's family hosted foreign exchange students, girls from Germany, Italy, and Spain. From these girls I learned awesome things, several that challenged my own culture beliefs. This exposure caused a willingness to befriend students from the Dominican Republic, Peru, Trinidad and Haiti, while in college.  These awesome people taught me many things, including the ability to become more adventurous in my dining. It was during this time that I first enjoyed, sushi, Jamaican jerk chicken, ceviche, and Indian food. They also shared their music, which I absorbed like a flower photosynthesising sunshine.

In my early 30's, I developed a close friendship with a lady from Nigeria who had migrated to the states 20 years before. She would prepare for me these wonderful meals, to which I learned never to question the contents, lest my inexperienced palate would object on the basis of foreignness. She shared magical stories about growing up by the sea. We talked endlessly about the food, her family, and the culture. She also shared stories of the hardships of daily life, as well the conflict within the family due to the opposing religions of Christianity and Muslim. Through her, I learned to better appreciate my country.

In our adult years, my sister and I have become educational and cultural sponges. We never stop learning new things and embrace food, customs, books, music and films of other countries around the world. My favorite writer is Haruki Murakami. We regularly watch Kdramas, Jdorams, and Taiwanese shows. If you were to peek at our musical playlists, you would see an eclectic mix that includes Bollywood, Kpop, Jpop, Irish folk, and Spanish tunes.

We regularly go see Bollywood films in Kirkland, or the newest Korean film showing in Lynnwood. Although our leanings are toward Asian cultures, we still love to dabble into other cultural experiences, never passing up the chance to enjoy a Greek Festival or taste a good German beer.

Our experiences and open mindedness, has led to, what seems to be a general consensus...We are odd ducks.

I wish to share with you two stories of events that occurred in the past few days.

My sister was traveling back from Houston, from a business trip. For the trip, I had downloaded two Korean dramas for her to watch on the plane and during down time. Although both downloads were labeled with English subtitles, unfortunately this was found not to be true. Still, because she had already watched both dramas numberous times, she watched them.  On the plane, one of her coworkers leaned over to see what she was watching and was surprise to see she was in fact watching an Asian drama. He asked her if she understood Korean, she said she did not, but she had seen this drama so many times that she new exactly what was going on. He chuckled and said "I bet you watch Bollywood too." To which she replied "I do! I love Bollywood!"  This man looked slack jawed at my sister for a second, then told her "You are an odd duck,  you know that?"  My sister readily agreed, for my sister and I embrace our 'oddness'.  In fact, we're a pretty damn proud of it.

Yesterday we did our biweekly shopping at Hmart, to get ingredients for all the yummy Asian dishes I will make for us in the next few weeks. As we were standing in the checkout line, the Korean lady behind me spied my soju. She asked us if we like soju and my sister told her, that although she didn't care for it, I, in fact, loved it. This seemed to delight the lady. She then continued to peruse my basket and was amused to see green Korean peppers, black bean paste, porkbelly, and bitter melon. This caused her to ask me how I had discovered soju and Korean food. I explained to her that my former boyfriend was Korean and I had to developed a deep love for soju and Korean cuisine. I let her know that it wasn't just Korean food I loved, pointing out the ingredients for katsu sandos, bahn mi sandwiches, and Hainanese chicken rice. She and the Korean checkout lady, excitedly discussed my purchases. Smiling, while seeming amused, that this Caucasian lady was not only familiar with, but enjoyed many of the same things they enjoyed.

You see, I stepped outside her expectations. I blew away her current perception of what a Caucasian would enjoy. Just as my Indian friend, Minesh, once blew away my preconceived notions about South Asians, by insisting on frequently eating copious amounts of Mexican food.

I revel in my ability to defy convention. It's not something I do consciously, but something that has become an integral part of me. The sum of me is more than the typical markers that construct a casual impression. I am not only a white, southern, middle aged, female from the United States, I am also a world resident, who loves to appreciate and explore what is beyond the 'norm'. As likely as you will find me enjoying fried chicken with mashed potatoes and gravy, you'll find me drinking soju, watching Kevin Smith films, dancing the bhangra, reading the Popol Vuh, or enjoying a steaming bowl of paella while watching hockey.

I continue to strive to learn about and experience the world at large. In this age of information, there is so much knowledge we can gain, just through our finger tips. While learning through books and the computer is readily available, I wish to jump in and also learn through the human experience. I plan to meet as many people, from diverse backgrounds as possible. I hope to travel and participate in the intimate exchange that can only come through face to face interaction with other human beings. I seriously hope I never give up this inclination to continue to learn, because other than writing, I think that is one of the few things that truly define me.

Stepping outside the box facilitated an exchange between us and those two women yesterday, that would have otherwise never occurred. We laughed, we smiled and we shared a moment with someone not like 'us'.  In that moment we weren't Asian or Caucasian, but four women expressing curiosity and finding common ground. It was a good moment. One that will stick with me for quite awhile.

Namste my friends.