Connecting "The Evolution of my Brother" to quarantine

When I read the Jenny Zhang short story "The Evolution of my Brother", I immediately made the connection to my own family life, as I'm sure a lot of us did, since we've been cooped up with them for the past 3 or 4 weeks. In particular, the theme of "realizing how your actions treat the people around you" has been sticking in my mind. When I'm at home (in general, not just during quarantine), I rarely spend any time around my parents. The combination of my own introversion and my perhaps suboptimal relationship with them leads me to spend pretty much all of my home-time alone in my room. The only times we really have extended conversations is when we need to discuss important things like college. And I never thought they really had a problem with that.

In the story, Zhang states: "I feel self-conscious and stupid crying for myself--for my shame, for my regrest, for how quickly a childhood happens. I wish I had acted better. I wish I had been the kind of sister who was patient enough to show my brother the proper spelling for 'Power Rangers'". Just how Jenny feels remorse for not being a responsible sister, I feel remorse for not being a responsible son. I really do need to be bonding more with my parents, since years of isolating myself from them has led to the current circumstances, where I prefer to not even be awake at the same time as them. The line "how quickly a childhood happens" reminded me of how I only have a few more months living in the same house as them, until I go off to college. I'm probably not the only one like this; I know a lot of my friends have similar habits. Perhaps we could use this time during which we have constant exposure to our parents to build a few more bridges?

Comments

  1. David SunApril 11, 2020 at 10:59 PM

    I have a similar relationship with my parents; most of my time is spent either at school, my room, or somewhere else. To be honest, there might've been some days where I didn't even speak to them. Recently, I've been trying my best to spend more time with them, either by playing table tennis with or helping cook dinner. I also greatly relate to the line "how quickly a childhood happens"; I actually remember my first day of subbie year in vivid detail, as if it happened yesterday. This phrase can apply to life in general, not just our childhood.

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