Made from the best stuff on Earth

You wouldn’t know it by looking at them or even knowing them, but my parents have the hoarding habits of a doomsday prepper. If you opened the door next to our kitchen at the edge of our foyer, walked down the decrepit, rotting wooden stairs framed by spiderwebs into our basement, the lowest level of our house is crammed with pasta sauce, ziploc bags, storage bins that haven’t been opened since I was in grade school, the broken down beams of my childhood bed, and a deluge of personal belongings and canned goods that would supposedly last us until climate clock drops to zero. 

That’s not what this is about, though. Despite my parents’ Hollow Earther tendencies, there is one thing in our basement that they always replenish. And it’s not what you think it would be, not necessities like sanitary products or cured meat; no, what they always have sitting in the cool biome of that damp space is a case of Snapple. Now, if you do know my parents, you would know they’re vehemently against sugary drinks. Soda is not a part of their food pyramid-- anything without whole ingredients is strictly a cheat. The one exception to that unspoken rule is Snapple. And you may ask, why Snapple? Because Arnold Palmer or Arizona tea is debatably better, and ever since Snapple went from fun glass bottles to the bedeviled plastic screw tops with their god awful childish rebrand, they’ve lost their mass appeal. Quite frankly, my parents don’t give a shit about any of that. 

It’s a story I never get tired of hearing. When my parents emigrated to the United States back in 1996, they settled in New York for a brief stint, impermanent residents of 34th Street. During this time, while they toiled and labored to make a living, trying to navigate a world where they didn’t speak the native language and racism and sexism ran rampant around every corner, they never took for granted any luxuries they saved up for. And in this instance, it was a Snapple during their lunch break. My mom would detail the times when she would collect the measly coins two bottles cost, making sure there was enough pay for both her and my father, and always looking forward to the day she could splurge on the ice-cold extravagance. It was not something they could treat themselves to every day, but when the hour came, they relished every drop of that processed tea. 

For most people, their “I’ve made it, mom” moment is the achievement of a significant milestone. Graduating from college, a job promotion, financial independence, marrying the love of your life, home ownership, surviving a mental illness, whatever it may be, it’s a pivotal, unforgettable peak in your life. For my parents, they knew they had achieved the American dream when they could comfortably buy a Snapple for lunch every day. I think about this often, how a single bottle of iced tea can represent such an incredible feat for my parents, how it can hold such a heavier weight for them outside of the liquid ounces. I think about how easily I could buy a soda for every meal of the day, the comfort of my every day life, and my heart aches for the younger selves of my parents, two kids who were the same age I am now, fighting against every odd thrown at them in a world that wasn’t made to accommodate them. 

My parents aren’t without their flaws, but it is undeniable that the sacrifices they made for me to live with the privileges I have today. Most, if not all, first-generation children can relate to that fact. It is a complicated thing to hold love and anger for two of the most important people in your life. Two people who have fought against the strongest of currents, the weight of the world on their shoulders, just to put enough food on the table. I would never change their roots because it has given me the culture that I celebrate today, a lineage rooted so deeply in history that I can’t even fathom the very tip of my family tree. Their leap of faith across the Atlantic Ocean is why I am able to think with nuance, why I am able to learn from personal experiences, but I also can’t help but wonder if this was not their predetermined past, how would things be different? For me and for them? 

It is a guilty speculation I reckon with, that if my parents were not immigrants, if they had not found community in the church, if their upbringing was not as laborious and arduous as it was, would it change their morals? Would their political beliefs align with mine? Would they not have sought religion for a sense of kinship? And thus, would I not still dissect the religious trauma that had inundated my childhood? Or is it nonsensical, the rabbit hole of it all? Would life still bring them into the mother and father they are today, even if everything started off differently? Is this the path they are meant to be on, even if Chapter One was rewritten? Would the epilogue still be the same? 

I rack my brain with these theories, but I know it is a fruitless endeavour. It is pointless because I obviously can not change the past. There is nothing I can do with history. As well, even if I were given magical powers to alter the past, I would not do so. It’s a funny thing, isn’t it? That with friends, the alignment of morals and values is held in high priority, but with my parents, I can not help but be angry with them, but still love them. There is an irrefutable empathy I hold for them, and not just because we are bound by blood. 

I know that many, if not all, of my questions will be left unanswered. It is an ambiguity I have yet to make peace with, but I know that I have no say in it. So the Snapple will sit in my basement, its perpetual presence there the same way the generational crisis it catalyzed sits in my stomach.