Christmas 1978, and the disco romance is in full bloom.
This is my dad at 18 years old visiting my mom at her parents’ house while they were dating.
My dad was the young Gypsy hoodrat from Delray in Detroit who could dance. My mom was the blonde bombshell from the suburbs. They couldn’t have come from two more different worlds.
My dad grew up surrounded by Gypsy musicians, glamour, dancing, and a culture that valued family above everything else. My mom was the badass rock-and-roll girl from the burbs who could walk into any room and become the life of the party.
Music, dancing, and beauty are what brought me into this world.
The Gypsies in Delray took to my mom right away, even though plenty of them would have preferred that my dad date a Gypsy girl. My mom fit right in. She always had that effect on people.
I grew up immersed in that culture because, in our tradition, the man was very much the head of the household. Some of my earliest memories are of incredible musicians, family parties, dancing, glamour, and trying to figure out when my Gypsy grandmother was swearing at me in Romani 😆
Looking back, I realize how different my childhood was from most of my peers. It was a world all its own.
One day I’ll write about all of it. It’s too big for a tweet and too complicated for an article. Growing up between cultures, between worlds, and trying to make sense of both.