BARBELITH underground
 

Subcultural engagement for the 21st Century...
Barbelith is a new kind of community (find out more)...
You can login or register.


Things you wish your parents had given you

 
  

Page: (1)2

 
 
Tuna Ghost: Pratt knot hero
18:55 / 07.07.04
My dad travels a lot, and his job takes him to Brazil pretty often. Sadly, Brazil has a bit of a problem with american businessmen getting kidnapped. My father knows one or two people who have either been kidnapped themselves, or their wife/children have been kidnapped. So naturally I began to worry.

Until I realized that my dad has the amazing ability to look like a native of whatever country he is in. When in Mexico, people approach him speaking Spanish. In Germany, everyone automatically assumes he is German, and be it Italy or Spain or Columbia or Russia or wherever, it's the same case. Everyone assumes he is a native. Which is pretty cool. I mean, I can spot the american in a crowd of europeans. It's usually that easy. But my dad blends in like an assassin, or some other trained professional. So while in Brazil, he does not attract the attention of kidnappers because he doesn't look american (or so I hope. Maybe they go after whoever has the nicest suit and a briefcase).

I wish I could do this. I wish I had his jet black hair and brown eyes. Oh, and gimme his work ethic and his sense of discipline too, while we're at it. And that Audi has to go somewhere when he dies...
 
 
Madman in the ruins.
20:44 / 07.07.04
Intresting.

There are two types of body type in my family, Tall and thin about 20% or short and broad 80%. I fall into the short broad catergoory whie my Brother and Uncle are both tall and thin. Listening to sories about how there is no legroom on areoplanes only increases my envy.

So from the genepool a body over 5'8 would be nice as would a non receding hairnline.

And from the maritiel side of things I want my Dad's mini metalworking lathe.
 
 
Ganesh
20:49 / 07.07.04
My dad was quite athletic and had a lovely physique - and, according to my mother (in her alcoholically-unguarded moments), a monstrously-large cock. While I'm relatively happy with the size of my Fireman Sam, I'd have appreciated a less ectomorph-with-pot-belly body.

And, since he died in his early fifties of probable ischaemic heart disease, I'm hoping he's not passed that particular trait on to me. Angsting about it is one of the main reasons I've never smoked.

My mother? Hmmm. Sadly, I can't really think of anything genetic my mother's got that I want.
 
 
Less searchable M0rd4nt
21:01 / 07.07.04
I wish I looked a bit more like my Mum's side of the family. I have my Mum's features but my Dad's fair-ish colouring. Which is perfectly lovely as far as it goes, but all the time I've been in Spain people keep mistaking me for a German. Not a problem in and of itself, but then they speak to me in German, and then when I'm all "Que?" they then speak to me in French, and then English, and I realise that I am a one-and-a-half language having moron and want to dieee. Also, I get sunburn.

My Mum's lot have far darker colouring, tan wonderfully, and sport thick manes of wildly curly hair the colour of black coffee. Oh the envy.
 
 
w1rebaby
21:42 / 07.07.04
Both my father and mother have frightening work ethics and I am a whining layabout who can't even get stuff he wants to do done, so I would quite like to have got that.

In addition, my dad has a big dodgy nose (which caused his teachers to think he was Jewish - sensitive climate, apartheid South Africa) that I seem to have half of. I'd rather have avoided that particular piece of genetic heritage since it makes me snore terribly.

Both of them also drink too much and so do I. I'm not sure whether this is genetic but it would be great to be one of those people who are quite happy without booze.

The rest of it, though, I don't mind so much. Tall like my mum rather than short like my dad, and I seem to have a reasonable balance between his overly easygoing nature and her temper. (Alternatively, disfunctional - let people get away with things for ages and then suddenly explode at them leaving them baffled and hurt.)
 
 
Olulabelle
21:43 / 07.07.04
I wish my Dad had given me his ability to get out of bed the instant he woke up and maximise his day to the fullest potential. Whilst it was sometimes dull because he wouldn't sit on the sofa and just do nothing for more than five minutes, it was infinitely superior to sitting on the sofa for more than five hours wasting your life away by truly believing (for the time that you are sitting there) that you really are a character in a fictional book.

I would also love to have had his grammatical anal retentiveness, and my Mum's fabulous knoweldge of Latin, Greek and ability to work out Where All Words Come From.

I want to be able to say, "Well, ... is Greek for ... and ... is derived from the Latin ..., so the word ... must mean ..."

And at the risk of sounding morbid and ruining this (really rather excellent) thread what I would have really liked my Dad to have given me, but sadly was completely out of his hands, was just a weeny, weeny bit more time with him before he died.
 
 
STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK
22:20 / 07.07.04
My mum's patience and my dad's faith.
 
 
Ganesh
22:49 / 07.07.04
And at the risk of sounding morbid and ruining this (really rather excellent thread) what I would have really liked my Dad to have given me, but sadly was completely out of his hands, was just a weeny, weeny bit more time with him before he died.

Without (I hope) sounding all 'Mike and the Mechanics', I totally empathise with this - and I suspect that, no matter when my father had died, I'd probably feel the same.
 
 
lekvar
06:19 / 08.07.04
All I can hope is that I am as indestructable as my dad's side of the family. Smokers and die-hard drinkers that don't die until they're in their 90's. What I don't want is the alcoholism that runs on both sides of my family.
 
 
foot long subbacultcha
07:48 / 08.07.04
My mum's beauty and my dad's confidence.
 
 
Mazarine
08:39 / 08.07.04
I really wouldn't've minded swapping body types entirely with my sister or my mother- both are a little bit shorter than me and has a faster metabolism, and thus slender and willowy, almost pixieish, which I imagine would let me feel less awkward and clumsy, just to have less mass to keep track of. I could've coped without the psychological disorders I inherited, but then, it does make it much easier to understand the other members of my family who have them.
 
 
illmatic
09:20 / 08.07.04
I would have love to have my Dad's knowledge of playing cards, dice and gambling. Then again,circumstances complelled him to work hard at these, and I wouldn't want to have to put up with those circumstances.

I would've liked to have spent more time with him as well, but without that crippling emotional distance that seems to characterise father-son relationships.
 
 
illmatic
09:22 / 08.07.04
Obviously that's a bit generalising, but I think it will apply to a fair few posters here.
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
09:32 / 08.07.04
I would also love to have had his grammatical anal retentiveness, and my Mum's fabulous knoweldge of Latin, Greek and ability to work out Where All Words Come From.

I want to be able to say, "Well, ... is Greek for ... and ... is derived from the Latin ..., so the word ... must mean ..."


Dude, start. It's not easy, but it's also not impossible, and it doesn't have to be a single project. there was talk in the past of a Barbelith Latin/Greek school, which never really got off the ground, but there are enough people here to do, say, a sentence a day, explaining what it means, why it means it, sticking in some etymologies and shit...

Sorry, back on topic..

I pretty much *have* my father's phenotype anyway, except my hair is redder and my nose bigger (cheers, mum), so it's not much of an issue. He does have homes on the mouth of the Dyfi and the salt marshes of the Blackwater, both of which sound hideously romantic and are in fact top-quality gorgeous places, once you get away from the people. I like the idea of having boltholes in the far east and the far west... but since I can use them without the awkwardness of mortality, I'm quite happy not to inherit them, cheers.
 
 
Regrettable Juvenilia
09:37 / 08.07.04
Worryingly, I can't think of any qualities or attributes my parents have that I wish they'd passed on to me, but I can think of lots of ones we share that I could do without...
 
 
rizla mission
10:27 / 08.07.04
Me too actually. Although the ability to obtain and keep money would be quite nice I suppose.
 
 
Warewullf
11:11 / 08.07.04
I wish I'd gotten my Mother's patience and temper instead of my Dad's...
 
 
Ganesh
11:35 / 08.07.04
Oh yeah, and the house would be nice.
 
 
Nobody's girl
12:41 / 08.07.04
Erm. Well, I wish my mum had never read that 70's bullshit study that said bilingual children have a harder time at school because then she would've taught me her mother tongue- French. It is deeply irritating that I have a family I can only communicate with in emphatic gestures and pidgin French. These days my French accent makes me cringe. I know it's my responsibility to learn the language now but it would've been much less hassle to have been bilingual from the start.

Thankfully all my Grandparents have made it past the 80 year old mark, so I really hope I inherit their longevity.

I think I did OK in the genetic lottery- inheriting my dad's height and good memory, my mum's webbed toes, curviness and tenacity. Could've done without the bushy eyebrows, short-sightedness and podge though.

As for material stuff- I want mum's cool posters of japanese paintings, a good third of the books, the hall table and chest of drawers that smell of my childhood.

My dad nicked the nice bookshelves in the divorce and I want those plus his collection of ivory Bhudda's.
 
 
Saveloy
14:01 / 08.07.04
I wish I had inherited my dad's ability to look cool hanging about with the lads in 1930-something-or-other. Just look at the sod! (That's him in the middle).

I think living on a sepia-toned muddy slope must have done something for him cos he was a thousand times more beefy and energetic than I'll ever be. As well as all the pics my mum has of him doing speed skating and forming human pyramids with his chunky pals on rugged beaches, she's got a load of letters between himself and the Patent Office for an invention which got pretty close to going into production (it may even have done so) - a special clip that enabled the engine cowlings of aircraft to sit flush with the fuselage. Prototypes were made and tested on Spitfires during the war. Bastard. All my son is going to have to look at is a load of pics of some speccy idiot with bad hair slumped in an armchair, a hard drive full of unfinished, dimwit schemes and a couple of scrappy sketch books.
 
 
Smoothly
14:57 / 08.07.04
I hate to tempt the inevitable picture post, Saveloy, but your father bears a remarkable resemblance to a young Tom Baker.
 
 
rizla mission
18:05 / 08.07.04
..and the bloke with his arm round your dad's shoulder looks absolutely terrifying. I'd watch out for him if I was you.
 
 
8===>Q: alyn
18:12 / 08.07.04
My parents are complete strangers to me. I mean, I've known them my whole life, but still I suspect sometimes that I am an adopted clone. I have a habit of curling bits of paper, like receipts, into tiny little tubes, that apparently my father also has, and I look a bit like my mother. But I can't think of any traits they have that I don't have that I want. Seriously. They have no material possessions I'm interested in, either.

I'll tell you one thing I wish they hadn't given me: syphillis.
 
 
Cheap. Easy. Cruel.
19:57 / 08.07.04
The olive skin from my mother and the full head of hair late into life from my uncle. As it is, I am beginning to thin on top, and burn like anything if I get even the slightest hint of sun. Where I got the ability to not worry about anything and remain calm under all but the most extreme provocation, I have no idea. I would have liked to have had someone in my family who is tall, so I might have had a bit more height, but no such luck.
 
 
■
20:23 / 08.07.04
I kind of wish I hadn't inherited the strangely deviated septum that runs in my mum's family. However, it did put paid very quickly to those childhood worries about being adopted.
 
 
■
22:26 / 08.07.04
Very glad my brother got my dad's lack of hair rather than me, though.
 
 
Bed Head
23:49 / 08.07.04
I like all the physical characteristics I’ve inherited. I like my height, I like my build, I like where I am hairy and where I’m not, I like my big nose and my sanguine complexion. Nobody else does, but I do.

At least, when I look at my big brother and my little brother, at the lopsided jumbles of genes they got, I’m pretty certain I somehow nabbed the best deal. All in all, it’s a good mix, so I’m happy.

Oh, sorry. I’m in a ‘count your blessings’ mood today. Er.. my dad’s hair is much, much redder than mine. I’ve always thought that’d be a nice thing to have.
 
 
Goodness Gracious Meme
00:25 / 09.07.04
Wish my mum had given me her looks. I got dad's, he's lovely, but def in the 'nice personality' camp. Seen pics of mum in her 20s, and she was *stunning*, and my sister got 'em. Bitch.

I've got quite alot of my parents in me, good and bad, but I'd've liked my mum's brains. Not that mine are bad but hers were pretty spesh, by all accounts.

Brains and looks. Sickening, huh?

My dad's sporting talents - he was a great footballer and cricketer(cricket to under21 national level); that would *so* rock. And his kindness(though I suspect that would come parcelled with his extreme passive-aggression, and I'm pretty glad to have avoided that.)

Nothing to inherit, bastards, but the work ethic on both of them would be very useful.

Like several other people here, for my mum to have hung on for a bit longer, I'd like to have known her for a while as an adult/not a stroppy teenager. Like nesh, I doubt any time would have been good to lose her, but a few more years would have been great.

Met mum's oldest friends recently, who seperately told me how much I'm like her; mannerims, interests etc. (she was a theorybitch!)

Which, as I hardly remember her, is an odd feeling. And apparently it spooked them just how strong the resemblance is. I'm hoping I haven't inherited the more destructive bits, though.
 
 
Persephone
00:49 / 09.07.04
I got:

* my mom's utter pragmatism
* my dad's utter inability to live in this world

This works better for me than it did for them, actually. But I suppose that eventually pragmatism's going to end up buried in a plastic bucket in somebody's yard.
 
 
XXII:X:II = XXX
07:06 / 09.07.04
Genetically, I think, I got just about equal portions of my parents. So did my sister, though different portions in many places. If there's one thing I'd like to have got from my mother genetically, it would have been the old trope about inheriting your maternal grandfather's hair: when he died a few years ago 3 weeks shy of his 95th birthday, he had, if not a full head of hair, as full a head of hair as a nearly 95 year old man can be expected to have. Me, I'm going bald in roughly the same manner as my dad did.

In terms of personality, yeesh, that's a minefield right there. There's really nothing about my mother's personality I wish to have inherited that I haven't already, and quite a bit of it I wish I hadn't. She's an intelligent, cultured woman who unfortunately is also of the mental stability of the proverbial outhouse rat. My dad, while also deranged, is, for the most part, entertainingly, benevolently so. It should come as a surprise to no one that my sister and I are both a bit whacked ourselves. We are fortunately self-aware enough that we celebrate those aspects of such that make us idiosynchratic and try to sand down those that are less flattering. Given the raw materials we had to work with our respective levels of adjustment are nearly heroic, especially my sister's.

As for material possessions, my dad, while comfortable, has nothing specific that I'm looking to inherit; if he enjoys many more decades of life that would be the greatest legacy. My mother, on the other hand, has acquired everything of value to her name by great personal compromise and isolation, to the extent that it all reeks of spiritual death. There is just about nothing physical I can think of that I would want that she could give me, and I think I'd be tempted to burn whatever she did.

/+,
 
 
grant
16:11 / 09.07.04
My father has an ease with people that I've never had. He's a charmer, and it serves him well in his profession -- sneaky tabloid journalist. He's very good at getting people to talk about things, about going into a strange bar and instantly making friends.

I do think I've gotten his eyes (the multicolored irises are their own thing, but the general look is from his family).

My mother is a formidable woman, and I am not formidable in the slightest. Where dad charms, she, well, imposes. She also had a title before she married dad, which I would have liked but probably would have made me (more) insufferable.

My face resembles most of her family, especially on her father's side.

Both of my parents are polyglots, and I'm not, really. I never picked up German from them, and they kind of had an interest in not teaching the kids Afrikaans (secret language). And Zulu or half-remembered Czech never really came into play. My sister was always the language one anyway.

The house I grew up in was once in a gorgeous spot, but is now being overdeveloped to hell. It was a bird sanctuary, now they're throwing up this zero-lot-line mansions and tearing down the trees. I no longer feel as strongly about inheriting it as I once did, although it's gotta be worth a lot. (Florida real estate has gone nuts recently, moreso than usual.)
 
 
Mourne Kransky
19:51 / 09.07.04
Mum and Dad are both so much nmore sociable than I am and both defiantly eccentric. I try but I'm not even coming close. Plus, my dad's taller and thinner than me. Bastard. With curly hair. I could have put those genes to better use.
 
 
Mourne Kransky
20:03 / 09.07.04
And, following on from Bengali's outpouring, my mother looked like Elizabeth Taylor in her youth. Wish to fuck I did. Rock Hudson, at leat. Mind you, Ganesh does fancy my dad.
 
 
NotBlue
21:35 / 09.07.04
pros = My dads ability to get back up and rejoin the fight after the whole world lands on you with both feet.

Cons = the apparent folky alcoholism, "neuroses to drown the world", and the inability to smile without looking like I'm about to bite somebody.
 
 
lekvar
21:53 / 09.07.04
addendum-
I got my father's, grandfather's, and great-grandfather's depression, which I could frankly do without.

I didn't get my family's myopia: I'm the only one in my family that doesn't need glasses, which is a shame. I look dead sexy in glasses. Damn my freakishly good eyesight!
 
  

Page: (1)2

 
  
Add Your Reply