Behind the other adults’ backs, my youngest aunt was fond of referring to us as the Compsons. She’s blind, the only one to achieve college, and the only one to marry outside of her race. I don’t entirely disagree with her. As my grandmother would put it, ours is an exceedingly old family, and like her accented ancestors before her, none of whom she knew personally, she would drag on the vowels a bit more than necessary. But I suppose ours is indeed worthy of exaggeration.

Once upon a time there was a man named Sven, or something else equally grating to the English-trained ear. He decided that the country he lived in was officially his, and became the first Nordic pre-WASP king. HE reproduced, along with his children, until eventually there was a whole line of people called Christianson. In 1900 the most recent editions of the kingship, tragically no longer in power (though with distant, distant cousins who were) left for the land of opportunity, each stocked with Roman noses, smiling German eyes, and classy little French smiles.

These were the last of the blonde Christiansons. Once the Americanization process began, they learned slowly and against any sort of free will that people of other races and social classes have some sort of value, and, blending blood with the Irish and the Italians and the Aussies (notably all still Europe-derived), a whole crop of towheaded children sprung up. My grandmother, somehow, ended up with a classic Canadian name and Native American cheekbones, yet insists on being included in the Anglo group of people she grew up with. But hers is another story.

Although before disregarding her entirely, it is important to note that the single thread holding her together at times was respect for her lineage. My grandfather, the drunken wife-beating bastard with a name dating back to Louis XIV, brought it out in her the most, made her the least secure about who and what she was. Now that he is poisoning the ground, ironic vengeance on the world that poisoned him, she clings fearfully to her position, terrified that at any moment one of us will fall from grace and soil it.

My aunt is blind, refers to us as the Compsons, and is my grandmother’s most valuable asset at the moment. She’s on her way to a second child and a third degree, and the only onew who stepped out of the shadow.