Why don’t I like Avi? (“Long Story Short” and ghosting Jewish parents)

I like Shira.

I especially like her more than Avi, her older brother in the hit animated Netflix show “Long Story Short” that hilariously and heartwarmingly time travels through the ups and downs of an American Jewish family over the decades.

But it’s a bit bizarre that I prefer Shira. After all, it’s her older brother Avi who I identify with the most, especially when he makes his impassioned speech about how suffocated he felt by the Judaism of his childhood — I too felt overwhelmed by a joyless emphasis on the Holocaust, stifling obligation, antisemitism and being “afraid all the time”. And, let’s face it, Shira is a little bit crazy. It’s so out of proportion when she slams the door in her brothers’ faces after younger brother Yoshi confesses about the “accident” he had with the sperm she was planning to use for IVF. “I pray to God we have a girl because the last thing this family needs is more boys,” she tells them furiously as she shuts the door.

But I guess I can forgive a person for letting their anger get a bit out of control (and for carrying resentments from childhood into the present). What’s harder for me to forgive is the kind of conflict-averse passivity we see in Avi around his mother Naomi, like when she crosses all reasonable boundaries and buys an iPhone for Avi’s preteen daughter Hannah without asking her parents first.  

Avi is reluctant to confront her at all, which infuriated his wife (and me while watching it). “Just tell her!” I screamed inside, having to resist the urge to try and reach through the screen to shake Avi by the shoulders. “Just tell your mom that there really is a way she could see Hannah more — if she was just willing to stop belittling your wife and your parenting decisions. Tell her that she can get what she wants if she just backs off. And ask her if she’s willing to do that?”

But, it’s not just Avi who I want to shake by the shoulders. I see this same issue playing out in so many families, maybe especially in American Jewish families: The adult children feel suffocated by parents who they experience as pushing or criticizing them instead of just loving and accepting them and their choices and mistakes. 

Instead of confronting their parents and expressing the clear and specific boundaries that they need, they flee. Maybe move to the other side of the country so they only have to see their parents a couple of times a year for Passover or Thanksgiving etc. They ghost their parents, just like  Avi’s doing  with his infrequent visits even though he’s stayed in the same Bay Area he grew up in. He turns down the precious opportunity to clearly confront his mother when she gives him the gift of her clearly expressed emotion and deep need. He flees toward a more emotionally detached and intellectual debate about whether his daughter needs a phone instead of engaging in an admittedly challenging negotiation about his and mother’s emotional needs. 

Later, he passes up another opportunity to address the core conflict when Shira aggressively confronts their mother about how judgemental she can be. “You push us away,” says Shira after her mother claims to be pushing and criticizing them out of love. She turns to her brother and says, “right, Avi?” 

“Boy, yeah. Things are being said,” he passively responds.

But it’s not like he never confronts his mom. Like many passive people, he finally reaches his limit and unhelpfully explodes at her, questioning her value as a mother. “I swear to God, you’re like an octopus,” he says. “You’re smothering us in your arms, and just sucking and sucking and sucking.” All the other children know he’s gone too far. 

And, while he does make one final effort to confront her while trying to apologize for his outburst, he ends up just making a vague comment — “something has to change” — before walking out of the room. He offers nothing concrete and specific for her to do. Nor does he try and make it clear about how she might benefit from a change. He’s not negotiating.

I can see why someone might sympathize with Avi’s reluctance to confront his mom. After all, Naomi is an incredibly overbearing and aggressive person. “I love you, I love you, I love you, say it back,” she says when greeting a beloved family member. (Shira’s twin sons have the perfect rejoinder to this excess — “it back!” they exclaim.)

But, for me, the most important question is not whether a parent is easy to confront — it’s whether they’re capable of listening at all, whether they’re capable of making changes (and have sufficient motivation to do so). If someone really can’t listen, then there really is no point in confronting them.

Yoshi (of the sperm “accident”) suspects his mother is this kind of person. “When has Mom ever changed her mind about anything,” he says after Naomi expresses such shock that he has adopted Orthodox Judaism. “She’s not gonna accept me and I’m not gonna stop being Orthodox.”

But at the very end of the episode, Naomi comes into the hot tub Yoshi is soaking in and gently asks, “tell me about your Shul?” Yoshi is reluctant at first and says that she doesn’t really want to listen. But she insists she does. The episode closes with a beautiful image of mother and son companionably sitting in the hot tub together watching the moon over the Pacific. 

We have recently come through a long (near) month of Jewish holidays.  For some people, holidays are a time to dread, a time when their usual strategy of avoiding overbearing parents breaks down as they feel forced to return home for the holidays. I too used to be like that. I was long estranged, alienated, consumed by wounds from my childhood — and I protected myself from being hurt again by ghosting my parents.

But we don’t have infinite time to get around to finding a way to negotiate real relationship with our loved ones. Life is short, time runs out.

Can we end estrangements? Can we get closer? It’s up to us to find ways to make our needs and boundaries clear. But that is not enough if our loved ones are incapable or unwilling to listen.

Are you giving them enough credit?

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In case it hasn’t been clear up to this point, I love this show. Give it an extra star if you’re Jewish or interested in (American) Jews, but its wonderful treatment of the universal topics of family dynamics and of grief makes it accessible to anyone. Also give it an extra star if you love adult animation, especially if you loved “BoJack Horseman” (both shows were created by Raphael Bob-Waksberg). (I do have some criticisms, however, of how “Long Story Short” leaves out some important aspects of American Judaism — see my ‘Long Story Short’ — Bad for the Jews?.)