Interview with Grandpa Enoch

The other night, I interviewed my Grandpa Enoch. I chose to interview him because he is very opinionated, just like me. Some of his opinions are serious, but several are quite hilarious. The following is a sample of some of the things we talked about. Disclaimer: I also discovered through this process that I am a terrible interviewer.

Me: Do you think that you are an opinionated person?
Grandpa: Very much so.
[silence]
Me: Okay… you want to talk more about that?
Grandpa: Oh! Yes, I'm opinionated. It's not one of my better attributes.
Me: Why not?
Grandpa: Well, maybe I shouldn't have an opinion of everything.
Me: Like what?
Grandpa: Like everything! Somebody says something, and I have an opinion about it. Somebody'll say, "You know, I love scrambled eggs." Well don't you think you would like fried eggs better than scrambled eggs? Is it important that I have to express myself?
Me: I feel like that's different though, because that's an opinion on someone else's opinion.
Grandpa: Okay.
[more silence and me giggling]
Me: If you could choose three opinions that you feel strongest about and are the most important, what would they be?
Grandpa: I have an opinion which is very minor. I'll go into a store, like a market. I open the door, and there's somebody in back of me. And I hold the door open for that person, and then they walk in ahead of me and take the number before me. And I always think, all I was doing was opening the door. I wasn't saying you could go ahead of me. And I think they're oblivious, like "Oh, I'm ahead, so I can take a number." I try not to do that.
Me: But what if, instead of holding the door open, you just push it open and look behind you so they can catch it? Then you're still in front.
Grandpa: I always try to hold the door open. And then we play al fonzi gaston [this is a miscellaneous French phrase that I could not understand], that means, "No, you go!" "No, you go!" It's a very small thing.

The following question came about because Grandpa Enoch is obsessed with changing the English language. He belives the word 'horizon' should be pronounced 'hoe-ri-zun' (emphasis on the last syllable) so that it sounds more like 'horizontal', and he also believes that great-aunts and uncles should be called grand-aunts and uncles. I made up a tagline for him that goes like this: Grandpa Enoch: Rewriting the English Language since 1930 (because he was born in 1930).

Me: If you could change one word in the English language, what would it be?
Grandpa: That's a very good question.
Me: I know you've got a list of these.
Grandpa: Hm... vomit.
Me: What would you change it to?
Grandpa: Expel.
Me: Like instead, everyone would just say 'expel'?
Grandpa: See, 'vomit' is like an onomatopoeia. It sounds like it is. And in Yiddish, the word for it is called 'brech'.
Me: That's also kind of an onomatopoeia.
Grandpa: It is. And it's a classic onomatopoeia. Yeah, maybe I would change it to 'expel'. Or 'discharge'.
Me: So you'd use euphemisms?
Grandpa: Yeah, yeah. But we do a lot of... of...
Me: Vomiting?
Grandpa: No, we do use a lot of euphemisms. We do a lot of cleaning up.
Me: That's probably a good thing.
Grandpa: Sometimes I think we may overdo it.
Me: Really?
Grandpa: Yeah. And I can't give you an example.
Me: Because you know I'm going to ask.
Grandpa: Yes. Well, I can't think of anything.
Me: That's okay.

The following exchange occurred repeatedly over the course of the interview:

Me: These questions don't make any sense. I'm a the worst at interviewing.
Grandpa: You're a great interviewer!
Me: +100 Self-Esteem Points!!

Eventually we forgot about the interview and the conversation degenerated into him telling me about growing up in Chicago and old cars and this crazy road trip he took with his family as a kid for three weeks. True story.