Wishbone Wars

My current favorite—or rather, my least unfavorite—of the extended lineup of reality TV shows is probably right now the WWE Tough Enough 3, which is a few episodes in on MTV. What I love about the competition reality shows—the ones that have an elimination process—it’s BRUTAL. With all the shows where someone is voted off only a few of them will do that wonderful, sort of sick “Who will it be? Will it be you, or will it be you?” type maneuver. They kind of do it with some large beauty pageants, and I don’t know if they still do but they totally used to do it with the televised Rose Festival queen selection. They go by and hold the crown over one person’s head: “Will it be this one?” And then the parents of that girl in the audience go “Deeee! Oh, joyful night, our dreams have come to pass!” But then they move the crown along—“No! It’s THIS one! Yeeeaaaah!!” And the audience goes wild, and claps and cheers, except maybe the parents of those one or two girls who almost got the crown and then didn’t, who I’m sure are giving each other “That was a bunch of b.s.” looks over their tight-toothed smiles and clapping their palms together a tad aggressively.

They do the same thing on Tough Enough, in reverse—rather than winning, rather eliminating. First they’ll announce, “Somebody’s gonna be eliminated,” and then the camera focuses in on two or three different people, and then they edit in the other contestants or the coaches and trainers say mean or negative things about them. Then they usually cut to commercials and draw it out for a while and then everybody’s sitting together, and to find out who’s eliminated, everyone stands and one of the coach/judges will go by and say, “You. Sit. You. … Sit. You (pause for like 30 seconds) … Sit.” And then there are maybe two or three people left standing and the coach will go up to one and say “So. Do you think you’re gonna go, or do you think you’re gonna stay? Do you think it should be you that gets cut? Give me one good reason why you should stay.” Or something. And then the poor person has to say “Uuuhh, I’m good, I try hard and I wanna fulfill my dreams and be the best I can be, and—and I wanna use this as a learning experience, and be a better person…” and then usually they’re told to sit and they’re all shaking and emotionally drained, but sometimes, they get cut anyway after they had to just humiliatingly plead their case to stay! It’s FANTASTIC!

I really, really think Rose Queen should work this way. Make that everything with a pageant format. Also—all talent portion competitions should include fire. These shows are so lusciously, sadistically appealing in that it’s not just about who wins. It’s about the degree of humiliation of who doesn’t win.

Thanksgiving was always the holiday where we traditionally had to get together with the maximum amount of relatives. There were a few Christmases and Easters where we might squeak by with just the immediate family, but come mid-November, no matter where people had moved in the country or how old everyone was, everyone met up at my mom’s parents in Iowa City, IA for as many days as they could stand, and basically spent every hour there anticipating that one meal. I guess there were a few other minor things to anticipate, like: guessing when my dad would have that one beer that instigated his yearly diatribe on the plight of the American Indian; or figuring out at which moment Great-Grandmother Bobbi would loudly point out that Thanksgiving wasn’t in the Bible so it shouldn’t count as a holiday; or the nightly custom of all the young cousins and grandkids, stealing the bourbon-soaked maraschino cherries out of the adults’ Manhattans and acting drunk.

But mainly it was all about that one turkey dinner. That’s a lot of symbolism and significance to place on one poor bird. Which could have been why, when all the assembled cousins became old enough to comprehend what a wishbone was, when dinner was over, competition for it became a heated, ego-driven, bloodthirsty process of elimination. We weren’t left to our own devices to pick which two would get the magic, wish-granting bone, as that would have resulted in hours of screaming and object-throwing, and plus my disproportionately huge second-cousin Genevieve would have gotten it every year. The process of selecting those wishbone-worthy fell, in an unspoken agreement, every year to my grandmother, who has been previously referred to in guides as “the Duchess,” though none of us ever called her that growing up, really, or ever.

“Why do you call her the Duchess when none of you ever called her that growing up, really, or ever?” pointed out my mom, back when you could hear the station online.

“So, uh, I dunno, it creates a mental image that fits her persona,” I explained.

“Just call her Bunga,” my mom said.

“Aaack! No! Mom, god, I can’t!” I told her.

“Everybody in the family calls her Bunga,” my mom said. “Everyone’s called her Bunga for the past three decades. I mean I guess your granddad probably calls her Katia in private but, I mean, even their mailman knows she’s Bunga. Haven’t you kids written ‘Bunga’ on your cards all over the years? Your brother’s girlfriend’s family all calls her Bunga. She introduced herself to all your cousin Raquel’s college friends at Raquel’s wedding as Bunga.”

“Because,” I said, “it sounds normal around her to call her Bunga because she is Bunga. It’s embarrassing to call her that to people removed from the family. It’s like junior high pictures or something.”

“Ridiculous,” said my mom. “You ask your friends what names they have for their grandparents and you’ll see. And speaking of sending cards, you need to send one to the grandparents for their anniversary, it was two weeks ago and then don’t forget Granddad’s 84th is in four months and twelve days.”

“I gotta go,” I said. And I did do some checking around, and some prying, and after finding a Gammy, a Goobah, a Nooney, a Gumper, Dappy, Pippy, Poobah, Goomer, Moo Moo, Lampah, Grumper and three separate Gummy’s, I felt somewhat comforted. So I’m out of the “Bunga closet,” so to speak, and that’s how she’ll be referred to from now on although that name doesn’t resonate with her demeanor unless you know her.

The “ass” connotation of the name, however, was appropriate come Thanksgiving because if you wanted that wishbone, you’d better believe you had to kiss it, and non-stop and shamelessly. Luckily, Bunga happily provided many opportunities for this throughout the holiday visit. Unluckily, there were about a million grandkids and great-nieces and nephews, more showing up every damn year. The families with two kids advantage in some ways, because the wishbone was of course a two-person object, ultimately so, dividing into teams increased your odds, then you could pull up the other person with you if you won.

My brother Damien and I had a slight disadvantage as I was the oldest grandkid and he was the third oldest. So we were expected to gracefully relinquish the coveting of the wishbone to one of the younger kids with fewer accumulated lifetime wishbone-wishing moments. This fact, of course, only made us want the damn thing more. And being older than the majority of the pack did give us one huge advantage; not the power of physical intimidation—that went to Genevieve, always. Our advantage was that we knew Bunga better, and we didn’t waste time trying to get on her good side via such tactics as sharing and playing nicely and being obedient. Bunga didn’t care about those things—those were the parents’ domain. What Bunga wanted was a rapt and attentive and appreciative audience for the “Bunga Shows.” The trick was to gauge exactly when a performance was about to begin, or instigate it yourself, and be the most enthusiastic cheering section for the duration.

It wasn’t as easy as it sounds. Most of the adults couldn’t handle it. But if you could tough it up convincingly, that tiny little cartilage-tipped poultry dousing rod covered in clinging bits of wish-granting baked flesh could be between your thumb and forefinger. And, more importantly, not between the thumb and forefinger of one of your damn cousins. I’d like to say I was the best at the “Bunga Game,” but that honor always was honestly divided up year after year between my brother Damien and my second cousin Allie. Damien was just too charming for any adult to resist and Allie had this diabolically sweet-faced, sweet-voiced way about her that made it impossible to ever believe she was lying.

While the rest of us kids would all be running around asking Bunga if she’d like us to set the table or telling her that she smelled nice, or asking if we could see the photo album where she was crowned Miss Foxtrot of Central Boston 1948, Allie would just be sitting at the grand piano in the living room, sweetly, just when Bunga came around the corner.

“Bunga,” she’d say, “will you sing?”

“Ohhh,” Bunga would say, waving her hand, “Oh, not now. I’m much too busy.”

“Oh, please, Bunga, will you sing that boomba-boomba-boomba song about walking down the street?”

The song was “A Guy is a Guy,” by Miss Doris Day, and Bunga could absolutely not resist. “Oh, alright,” she would inevitably say, modestly, and a piano-playing uncle would have to be rounded up and Granddad would be shuttled in to sing the boomba-boom parts, and all the rest of the masses of relatives would have to be brought in to watch and listen to Bunga while Allie sat smugly on the edge of the piano bench, smiling at all of us in her peer group as if to say, “I’m get-tin’ the wish-bone…”

“You better hope you do,” we all thought, as we tried to simultaneously glare at her and smile appreciatively at Bunga, “because if one of us gets it, we’re wishing something to happen to you.”

Too much glaring could result in missing the exact finale of the song, though, and then one of the other cousins would be the first to shout out, “Bunga! Bunga, now show us how you can form your body into all the letters of the alphabet!” Which was instant points for them, and the cue for half the aunts and uncles to try to quickly pour a reinforcement drink.

You have to understand, part of the challenge of all this was that no one in my family can sing. And Bunga’s like the queen of the family, and consequently the queen of not being able to sing. It’s never stopped her, but it’s like—I actually only got the perfect comparison of what it’s like a few short years ago. Bunga’s singing sounds exactly like the singing they have on some of those late-night “hi, if you’re over 18, pick up the phone and call me” commercials. Not often, but sometimes they’ll have one where the girls aren’t talking, they’re just posing, and occasionally lip-synching to some—I guess it’s deliberately terrible, tuneless song. I don’t know if you’re supposed to think it’s them singing to you, or if it’s less intimidating and therefore more sexy if it’s like really bad karaoke, but it’s always like that. It’ll go something like [sings slightly off-key] “Pick up the phone, you can pick up the pho-one, call tonight, if you’re all alo-one,” That’s what my grandmother did to Doris Day. If you think the juxtaposition of a “hits of the post-war era” grandmother and phone sex girls is unsettling and wrong, just wait, it gets worse.

It wasn’t the only time my brother Damien got the wishbone, but he did get the honor of winning what was, without question, the most glorious and horrible Bunga battle of them all, a day that will live in Thanksgiving infamy. Allie had once again coerced Bunga into singing “A Guy is a Guy,” Uncle Ivan was at the ivories and was in fighting form, the Doris Day songbook was there and open, all the adults were in Manhattan-accentuated jovial spirits, all us kids had probably had a few maraschino cherries too many, and Bunga launched right from “A Guy is a Guy,” into “Que Sera Sera,” which is probably Doris Day’s most famous song. The assembled relatives were almost all joining in defiantly off-key by the end, “Whatever will be, WILL be,” and it was more than some of the little, hyper kids could bear. They started tearing around like maniacs, completely taking themselves out of the wishbone running, and it was past everybody’s bedtime, and “Que Sera Sera” ended but there was plenty of Doris Day piano songbook left, and right as the applause and laughter from Sera Sera hit its crescendo, Damien shouted out, “Dance, Bunga! Dance! Dance!” And everyone roared their agreement and Uncle Alex started banging out the next song in the book which was a tune called “Why Did I Tell You I Was Going to Shanghai?”

Now—1951 was a fairly straight-laced, conservative year. Doris Day was a fairly straight-laced, conservative dame. But “Why Did I Tell You I Was Going to Shanghai,” nonetheless, was kind of a risqué little ditty. “Who’s gonna hold me, who’s gonna thrill me, who’s gonna kiss me,” it starts out. It wouldn’t be entirely out of place as the voice-over on a late-night “why don’t you call me” ad. Bunga began busting out the moves that helped earn her Miss Foxtrot of Central Boston 1948.

“Yaaaayyyy!” said everybody. Bunga started adding a little one-two of the old hootchie-kootchie hip shake. “Woooo!” said everybody. And then came the thing no grandkid should ever, ever have to see. The kind of thing that stamps something on their psyche that makes them wake up in a cold corner in the fetal position years and years later whispering, “The horror … the horror …” I don’t know of any incredibly tactful way to put it. Old Bunga went burlesque on us. I’m gonna spare you exactly how far, but let’s just say it was too far. It was FAR. It was, perhaps, three-quarters of the way to Shanghai. And somewhere between, let’s say, Pakistan and Nepal, Bunga’s sisters, my great-aunts Elena and Irene, joined her. By the last note of the song, nearly all the grandkids, including Allie, and a few of the adults, mainly those who had married into the family, had fled for their sanity. Damien, however, gave the ladies a standing ovation on the top of the back of one of the long sofas. And the next night, which was Thanksgiving, those same applauding hands held the almighty wishbone Bunga bestowed. He let me make the wish with him, which was our standing agreement, and he won the snap. I don’t know what he wished for, but I’m hoping it was the same thing that I wished for, and that was that we never, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever see anything like that happen again.

If you’d like to go work off some of your holiday dinner this season, in a manner slightly more provocative than the standard aerobics or treadmill, for fifteen dollars a class you can go to Maverick’s Sports Club in northwest Portland, 2025 NW Overton, for cardio-striptease. You can go tonight, actually, the classes are every Tuesday at 6 pm. Ashkan, the class instructor, is great at professionally enticing your more uninhibited nature. It’s not a raunchy kind of strip-down aerobics or even all that erotic—it’s not completely unsexy but it’s more silly and surprising and more than slightly liberating, and Ashkan leads you through the whole process with a hairdo rivaled in stylized perfection possibly only by Miss Doris Day herself, and that’s in her heyday. You can call Maverick’s for more information at 228-2626, and if you want to join the club, the classes are free. Who knows, you might love it so much you’ll make it a full-time hobby, or even a career in the future, though the future’s not ours to see, que sera sera. This was your local entertainment guide on 94.7 NRK, the new rock alternative. [Clip from “Why Did I Tell You I Was Going to Shanghai” plays]