Or some variety, was something I’ve always heard. I first remember the comparison to my grandfather when I was very young but evidently it went back as far as when I was an infant according to my grandma.
I was about 11. New Year’s Eve. The attendees were my parents, my grandparents, and aunts and uncles I hadn’t seen since I was “this big”. A lot of alcohol. I don’t remember fearing anything more than the big, gaudy bottle of liquor that always found its way to family gatherings. I’d always get an uneasy feeling, with my grandfather as well as any other adult in my life when they had too much to drink, like it was someone who was so unfamiliar and untrustworthy to me. The smell of their breath disgusted me, the way they talked was like it’s own language that I didn’t speak, and they moved as if performing a poorly choreographed ballet. I’d seek out my grandma for comfort, since she was, much to her dismay, the designated sober.
Then the family scrapbook would come out. Either my mom or one of my aunt’s would always bring it up. As though we didn’t just look through these at Christmas just a week before, everyone would always be surprised and find something that felt new. A picture from a birthday party, one from a vacation from years ago, or an old high school yearbook photo. My grandparents’ wedding photo came up from the unorganized mess. Everyone, almost in unison, looked at the picture, and then at me. They noticed the dark, long, wavy hair, the bushy eyebrows, and the long nose bridge.
“Look! It’s you!”
They gave me the picture, I held it in my hand like it was a fragile butterfly, appreciating the sentimentality everyone felt towards it. I tried to find myself in the photograph, but I couldn’t see any of the resemblance.
“Ehhh. I don’t see it.” I said in an unassuming childish way.
The next time I saw the picture was 8 years later, at the funeral. I sat in the funeral hall, looking at the monitor that showed a slideshow that looked like it was made 20 years ago. I looked at the screen only to avoid looking at his open casket. My grandmother took a break from sobbing, telling me how much that picture of him reminded her of me. I didn’t want to disagree so I nodded politely. Then I spent the rest of the service waiting for that picture to pop up again in the looping slideshow, searching for even the slightest resemblance. I couldn’t.
I talked to my grandma a lot that week, she gave me the picture I had held all those years ago. It felt even more fragile in my hands, presumably because of it’s now older age, and my hands being twice as big as they were when I was 11. I had spent so much time staring at it at the funeral service I barely even gave it a glance when she handed it to me.
I almost didn’t go to my grandma’s funeral. I didn’t think I had the courage to get in my car and make the 6 hour drive. But the service came and went. I hugged some relatives, but I didn’t say anything the whole day. Just thought about how I want the pain to stop. On the drive home I stopped at a liquor store and there it was. The bottle. The very same bottle that struck fear in me as a child. Just as tacky and unappealing as I remember. I had a staring contest with it. Eventually I found myself taking it to the front register and it being given to me in a brown, crumpled paper bag.
This was the first bottle I bought, and for months after it wouldn’t be the last. I had actually saved that particular bottle over the period of time. I had others. But one day I took it out of the cabinet to pour some of it. I had already been drinking that night and I lost my grip. The bottle shattered across my kitchen floor. I tried to pick up the shards of glass but got lost in my reflection on one of the bigger pieces. I stared at my reflection, but I didn’t perceive it as me. But, the face was familiar.
I ransacked my dresser looking for it. When I found the picture I took it to the bathroom mirror and looked at the picture, and then at me. I saw it.
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