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When it comes to happiness, women have a common resistance: Happiness is selfish, they say. But our refusal to be happy doesn't make us compassionate. Our refusal to be happy just makes us mean.
My maternal grandmother was one of those people who made a conscious decision to be happy. Life had shown her privilege, but it had shown her fear and violence, too: War and abuse. She chose to focus on the privilege.
Her sister had a different way.
Growing up, I remember family members marveling at how different these two were, my grandmother and my great aunt. One a classic beauty, the other a wall flower. One a liberal Democrat, the other a staunch Republican. One basically happy and kind, even though she struggled with a mean streak. The other basically angry, even though she tried to keep it in check with inauthentic good manners.
Sometimes we wondered at their paternity. They had the same mother, surely. But fathers are harder to pin down. Perhaps some family secret could explain away their vast difference.
When my grandmother died last summer, our extended family did what families often do when someone beloved passes: It cracked right down the middle. There wasn't much money to argue over, so the rift came down to a couple of antique chairs we'd never been allowed to sit in. I didn't care much for the chairs, myself, but that didn't protect me.
Once the rage started to fly, it just flew.
First, my great aunt sent a letter to my mother cataloging all my mother's sins and missteps--beginning with her birth.
I took the bait: I responded saying, "that letter hurt my heart."
Maybe I shouldn't have. Any response at all, it turned out, was akin to drawing a target on my forehead.
I soon received a letter of my own. This one in the certified mail. Five pages, handwritten, detailing what a worthless mound of spider puke my great aunt thinks I am.
My great aunt had to wait until her sister was dead, I guess, to detail all the ways in which she'd always hated us.
So much for condolences.
It's funny. I spent my whole life trying to do the right things with that one, trying not to make her mad. I sent fruit baskets on the holidays. I sent thank you notes, even if belated. What time I wasted!
My grandmother was a writer of epic thank-you notes. Her last words to me were on a voicemail: "Call me back, darling," she said. "I want to tell you how marvelous you are."
My great aunt's final words to me were her sign-off on that long letter: "It is my distinct pleasure," she wrote. "to tell you that you are disgusting."
What did I ever do to my great aunt to engender such distain? She was already in her 50s when I was born. I remember playing in her little wading pool when I was a kid. I remember sipping the sugary sodas I was never allowed at home. I painted birthday cards for her as if love was inevitable. We were family, after all.
Some days now it makes me want to cry to think about how much my great aunt despises me. Then I feel like a wimp, giving the power of my feelings over to some senile Republican on a rampage. Precious time wasted thinking about her like so many fruit baskets.
Other days I realize that my great aunt is a great teacher. Her lesson to me is this: Don't let anger and jealousy and unhappiness grow in you the way I let it grow in me.
On these days when I am my great aunt's student, I pray that when I'm 88 years old, I'll be able to think of something better to do than send a handwritten diatribe to my dead sister's grandchild.
With grace, I'll remember: The anger will outlast the good manners we use to mask it.
My grandmother was a great teacher, too. Happiness isn't selfish, she taught me. Happiness can be a generous thing.
I wish I'd called her back and told her how marvelous she was.
