Day 3: Family Barbecue

The main reason I went home this time was to celebrate my nephew’s graduation from high school and his admission to a high-level college. Justin, my oldest brother’s son is a great kid. He’s smart, kind, respectful, and the first my family’s “next generation” to not call Brooklyn home for a significant amount of time. My brother, Junior, and his wife, Rachelle, moved their family to South Jersey around 2004; Justin was maybe six at the time. His younger sisters have never lived a day in New York, and only know their suburban paradise as home.

At any rate, Justin is only the second member of the family to go away to school, having been accepted to the biomedical engineering program at the University of Pittsburgh. And because any excuse to hang out with my family is a good one, I was happy to revel in the good news.

When I arrived, my mother and grandmother (who came up from Florida for this event) were already in full-on preparation mode. I hadn’t seen either of these ladies in over a year, something that they both made me painfully aware of. My mom has had a few health issues of late, including a knee replacement, but was up and motoring at her top speed this day. My grandmother is in her late 90’s and doesn’t look it; she babysat Justin when he was little the same way she babysat most of the kids in our old neighborhood, and she couldn’t hide how proud she was of him. I hugged and kissed them both and went to the backyard, where Justin’s sisters—twins Isabella and Samara—were playing in the pool. They jumped out and gave me a big wet hug, and invited me into the pool. I normally avoid swimming pools, with my aquatic talents limited to showering and drowning. It was a party, though, and I pulled out swim trunks and jumped on in. I stayed in the shallow end and had a great time with the kids.

Justin’s friends from school came to the party and pool time turned into an impromptu game of touch football. Back in the day, my friends and I played touch football in the street, up and down our block and the two blocks adjacent, as well as in Prospect Park. A few of my friends will say that their finest athletic achievements came from those games. I haven’t played football since I hurt my knee in Prospect Park in a vain attempt to impress a beautiful girl, but I figured the game would come back to me. As Desmond line up next to me, with Akeem, Alicia, and one of Justin’s friends filling out our squad, I felt confident. The sun was out; the grass was green. I got this.

It took three plays at quarterback against a younger, faster, more athletic group of recent high-school graduates—all three plays going for pick-sixes—to make me remember that my injury was 18 years ago, which was more time than these kids have been alive. My age and stale skills played against me just as much as these kids did, and we got slaughtered. We did better when I stopped playing quarterback, but it was still ugly.

We ate, we drank, I napped. The family took time for a walk while I slept, and when the returned, we engaged in a spades tournament.

Spades is the Universal Black Family Barbecue event. Two teams sit down and host a master class in trash talking and card counting. It’s a game that breaks families. You pick up this game in one of three places: high school, college, or prison. For a solid eight or nine years—none of which spent in jail, thank you very much—I played the game virtually every day. I first learned the game in the hallways at Edward R. Murrow High School, and I helped teach some of my teachers the game. I honed my skills in the cafeteria at the Borough of Manhattan Community College. And at home in the neighborhood, my friends and I played the game almost daily. In recent years, I’ve been in something of a spades blood feud with Junior and David due to a significant loss that I fully blame on my teammate (primarily because I can’t remember who that person was). Since then, I’ve tried and failed to avenge said loss. This day, however, I felt good about my chances; Desmond was my partner, and he knew me—how I thought, how I count and arrange cards, how I process information, how I communicate—about as well as anyone. I thought we could get them this time. The cards, unfortunately, did not agree with me, and we lost. The beating was still unanswered.

Despite that, it was a great, chill night, and the next morning I congratulated Justin, kissed and hugged my mother and grandmother, and headed back to NYC for the last full day of my vacation.

#2017 #Brooklyn #NewYorkCity #Family #friends #Food #competition #writing #love