kids are funny like that

My race and ethnicity have never come up on this blog, and in general are not abnormally major factors (benefitting or detracting) in my everyday life. I am who I am, and my background is a part of that. I've never felt the need to highlight it, nor to hide it, and can honestly (and luckily) say that I only recall one time in which I felt my race was addressed inappropriately, but that's another story for another day.

I am Asian, specifically Chinese. Having grown up almost entirely in the US in non-Asian-centered communities, I'm very much middle-class American, much more so than I am Asian or Chinese. Once in a while, though, my ethnic background creeps into my life in unexpected ways .

Over the last couple of months, Broadway and I got into a few arguments because I have a tendency to poke fun at him when we are hanging out with other couples, in nonchalant and careless/carefree ways.

"Yeah, Broadway wouldn't let me go get a drink with my friends the other day", I would say with a flicker of mischief in my eyes.

Or, "Broadway got mad at me last week because I closed his computer browser", and I would give him a flirty pout.

He didn't take the comments as lightheartedly and goodnaturedly as I intended them, accusing me instead of wanting to take revenge out of spite in front of his (our) friends, perhaps because I was still secretly holding a grudge. I knew for sure I wasn't doing it to be spiteful nor malicious, but I also had no answers when he continued grilling me:

"Just WHY do you do this? Why do you make it so uncomfortable for me and for our friends? They don't know how to deal with this!"

I didn't know why I did it. I just thought they were fun couple-y comments. In a way, I saw them as evidence of our having fun little domestic disputes like any ol' couple. That concept was completely unfathomable to Broadway. What would ever possess me to think that disputes are cute and fun, he asked.

I had no answers to that. But now I think those comments came from my innate Chinese upbringing.

Being home, I see my parents interact, and they're constantly poking fun at each other in similar ways in the company of others. They bicker and banter in front of other couples lovingly and easily, as it is a way of communication for them. Chinese soap operas I watch narrate similar couple dynamics between the characters.

I must have picked up the behavior from my parents and my culture while growing up and translated it in my own mind as evidence of a healthy, normal relationship.

I never realized that this form of couple communication is considered unnatural in the mainstream American culture, or so Broadway tells me. Ethnicity and upbringing can be funny like that. They are so innate to me and make all the sense in the world to the point that their influence on my actions are completely imperceivable to me. I think that everyone would understand and interpret my actions the way I would.

Only an outsider like Broadway could point out the disconnect, along with completely misunderstanding it.

On the other hand, while I recognize that this type of couple banter is probably not the American norm, I think my particular interactions with Broadway are further ill-received because of his innate sensitivities and particular preconditioned inclination to reject this type of humor.

As kids, whether we realized it or not, we all picked up ideas and standards of conduct that would subconsciously govern our entire adult lives.

Here's to hoping that most of us picked up the good ones.