| How We know We're Getting Old... | 1:08 AM |
The father of my son called me the other day and told me this hilarious story. So he was at the gas station/diner/liquor store early in the morning one day -- he travels a lot for work so probably gas station -- and this young chick in her early 20s wearing a tiny little mini skirt and looking like she'd been up all night drinking and partying starts chatting him up asking about his tattoos and stuff. And he's thinking, hey, yeah, I've still got it...rock on when she asks him if he has any sons.
Um yeah
Can I have their number?
Yeah, well, he's 14
Yeah, can I have his number?
Uh, no...he's fourteen.
I didn't have the heart to tell him our child was 15. Though to be fair, he couldn't been 14 when the event actually occurred.
My son's father is charismatic -- he could always talk to the ladies, so I don't doubt that this little young thing saw potential in him as a sire of fine young sons she'd like to meet. But you know you're getting old when you cease to have potential as a mate, but the fruit of your loins sure looks interesting.
And he's not the only one getting older. It's fascinating to me to see how my body is changing -- all these years, I foolishly thought I was safe from all the bad things that happen to women's bodies as they get older, but gosh, was I wrong. This last year has been especially enlightening in this regard. Weight that I used to drop easily is much more tenacious. And exercise which I never used to get enough of -- is becoming more and more of a pain in the butt to make time and energy for. My body is more tired, my feet ache, I want more sleep.
But for all that, I can't complain about getting older. At least no one's asking me for my daughters' phone numbers yet ;)
| My Son, The Jock | 10:49 AM |
My son called me yesterday just after his first water polo practice and I was so proud of him! Not because I want him to be some high school jock, but precisely because he's not. I've tried to encourage him to exercise, to moderate what he eats and to make healthier choices. I try to lead by example and hope that my passion for running and vegetables gets ingrained in his brain and sprouts new neurons that help associate running -> mom -> good.
Treading water for a long time is hard. Even more so for someone who isn't in physical shape. He just had his first practice but they have their first game this week. And he doesn't have to play if he doesn't feel comfortable, but he said he thought he'd give it a shot anyway.
He just started high school, too, so I was asking how he liked it. He says he's getting pushed around. Walking down the hall, someone'll just push him against the lockers. Being a girl, I didn't know this kind of torment in high school. I think there was some mild freshman hazing in band (yes, I was in my high school band), but it was nothing. Is that because you're the new kid? Yeah. So I guess it's happening to your friends, too? No, just me. Porsch (his older sister) thinks its because of the way I dress. Cause they're all gangsters.
Oh, it made my heart cringe! I was picturing him in my head in his clothes and wondering what about them might be offensive -- a futile exercise really because what do I know about what's in the minds of today's teenagers? Not to mention teenagers growing up in a different environment than I did. I didn't even know what was in their minds when I was one of them.
Are you going to join a gang? No, mom, why would I do that?
I'm proud of him because he's strong and makes do. Like I do. You learn what lessons you can, then move on. Not to say that nothing gets to you and that things don't end up festering in your heart, but there's a resilience that makes even the worst of things bearable enough to get through. Because if they weren't, you'd end up crazy or dead. High school isn't forever, but it always seems like it is.
| 96th Birthday | 10:58 PM |
We went to my grandma's 96th birthday party today. Seeing me and my sister always makes my grandmother cry. And it's hard on my aunt and uncle, too -- the ones that were closest to my mom. All of which wets my eyes and breaks my heart (used to make me bawl).
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| Grandma on her 96th birthday | Cousin Joseph, Me, Doug, Cousin Allis, Jess |
| christians my ass | 1:38 AM |
my son went on a trip with my mother's church down in southern california. he enjoyed the trip, but when i asked if he'd met any interesting people he said no. he said that most of them weren't nice. he made one new friend, but didn't like most of the other boys. and he told me why and it just broke my heart. and i just wanted to hug him and hold him. children are so cruel. they say such mean things to each other. so relentlessly.
the weekend before last i'd listened to a radio program on how cruel young girls were. 10, 11 year olds in canada. how relationships are so important to girls and because we're socialized to not be overtly agressive, we take out our anger and hurt and frustration by sabotaging the relationships of other girls -- the things we hold the nearest and dearest to our hearts, we break.
some girls go home every day with their hearts broken. i'm sure some boys do, too. and what can you do as an adult? how do you teach your child to cope with that? if your kid is just being psychologically damaged, there isn't anything you can do. you can't control the children around your child. you can do your best to teach your kid to be tolerant, to communicate, to work out problems, to not purposely hurt people, but it doesn't necessarily shield them from those kids out there that don't have those skills.
i think the hardest part of being a parent is knowing that your child hurts and feeling like you can't do anything about it. and when you're so far away, you can't even wrap your arms around him to comfort him. and yourself.
| Family at Christmas | 12:07 PM |
Spending time with family this holiday I was wondering what it was like to grow up in one culture, one country with certain expectations of your family, and then to be transplanted as an adult to another country. You've been here for multiple decades, but do those expectations of your family still exist?
Christmas was nice, but busy. I met my sister's boyfriend's mother and brother. I saw my son and spent Christmas morning with his family (and realized again as I always do when I get to spend time with them that I miss seeing them terribly). The mothers are devout non-Catholic Christian. At dinner with Doug's mom and my mom sitting across from each other I hear Doug's mom ask, So Sharon, when did you come to Christ? and I almost snorted water out of my nose. I've been telling all my friends because it's such an incredulous question -- to me anyway. And to most people I know. It's a completely meaningless and non-sensical question if you yourself are not a devout Christian. But the two of them were dead serious about it.
It was nice to see my mother socializing with someone. Patty kept saying what a wonderful job she did raising us girls and all I could think was how superficial most relationships are. How when you first meet people all you really see is someone's ability to be social and polite. Meeting the three of us -- my mother, my sister and me, you'd have no idea the ways we hurt each other, the ways we're cruel and disappoint. But I suppose that's why familial relationships are so complex and painful -- you don't get to know most people that intimately, you don't have to spend that much time with most people. But when you do, it's equal parts heartache and unconditional love that make it worthwhile.
| Thanksgiving | 3:03 PM |
I love the holidays. Even though it's stressful to get away from work, and there's never enough time to bake all the goodies and get all the gifts and pack all the clothes in a timely manner, I still love the holidays.
Highlights from the trip:
- Jess in her 4 inch heels and frilly skirt with an apron tied around her 20 inch waist looking like she stepped right out of Stepford wives.
- Mention of Boise on the television. Josh: Boise's the capital of Idaho. Yes, it is. Jess: Idaho? Josh: Yes you are! Much laughter ensues at Jess's expense :)
- Hot cranberry guts pop out of the pan my mom's stirring and land on my finger. I say fuck. My mother looks at me in horror, the cranberries don't understand what you're saying. All the better reason to swear at them!
| Traveling Through Vegas and Back | 8:17 AM |
I spent the long weekend in Willow Valley, AZ (just past Laughlin/Bullhead City, near the Colorado River) with my son and his family. I couldn't find a direct flight out there so I flew into Las Vegas and drove through to Laughlin (which takes less than 2 hours). I haven't done any traveling in a long time and when you don't do something for a while, you forget how much you love it. I arrived in Vegas in the evening just after 7, and it took 2 hours to get a rental car and find my way to the highway, but once I got on that highway it felt so damn good. The moon was full (thank god, cause it was would've been dark as hell without it), and I didn't really know how to get to where I was going when I first got on the road, but I worked that all out. Being on a highway I'd never been on before, driving through the occasional small patch of lit up town -- I felt like a little girl -- so excited, so adventurous. And I remembered again how much I enjoy seeing new places for the first time on my own. Traveling with friends and loved ones is fun, too, but there's something slightly more raw about going by myself -- I process things differently without someone else around to influence my mood or my perceptions.
And I had so much fun hanging out with the family. That part of my family is something of an anomaly in my life. Everyone they know seems to think it's weird that I'm such a part of their lives (ex old lady hanging out with the new wife). And from an outsider's view, I don't quite fit in (just look at the photos :), but I have so much fun with them -- I don't get to do it very often so every time I do it's like realizing for the first time (again) how much I enjoy being with them. We had a giant brawl on Saturday night, but by Sunday afternoon were sitting on the beach again, by the river, enjoying ourselves (almost) as though nothing happened. And I love that we can do that -- talk through the worst shit and still be friends. And that my son gets to see that -- not that I want him to see that -- but I like that he sees that we work through our crap together because of him. Because if it wasn't for him, they wouldn't be a part of my life in any way.
Josh is getting so mature. We had our little sex talk. And we talked about drugs and alcohol and smoking (I've been hearing so many commercials lately about how kids whose parents talk about it are less likely to do it :). He told me about a friend of his who's fucked up beyond anything I can even imagine -- at 11 years old his father kicked him out of the house one night and he slept in the driveway of a dairy by Josh's house cause he couldn't wake anyone up at 2 in the morning. How can you do that to an 11 year old child? It breaks my heart.
But besides all that seriousness, we had fun in the water, chasing uncle Casey around on the Seadoo, playing games in the sand, throwing rocks. It was hotter than anything I've experienced for a while, but even that was novel and enjoyable.
And on the way back -- I couldn't drive through Vegas without at least stopping once and playing roulette so I spent 20 bucks in New York New York after having a nice breakfast on Monday morning. There's something about Vegas, too, that's so exciting -- leaving there on Friday night, the lights got to me. It's not so impressive during the day, but the hotels are so big, there're so many people wandering around -- you can't help but be drawn in a little. It took me over 12 hours to finally get back to my house from the time I started out in the morning. That breakfast and the really sweet old dealer at the roulette table flirting with me, was the best thing that happened all day.
| Father's Day Without the Dad | 12:29 AM |
Ugh...my father. I bought him a Father's Day card and never mailed it (I don't have his address). So I emailed him instead. And today he emails me, "I am doing better without the stress of being captured." Jesus, god. Do you have to rub that in every single time we communicate? My mother called me tonight -- actually she called me Sunday and I never called her back. I made a weak attempt this morning, but was foiled by her lack of call waiting and rather relieved to get a busy signal. I passed out on my bed at 9pm and Ed came and woke me at 11 -- my mother never calls my house, always the cell phone (and I'm the worst cell phone user in the world -- don't know where it is half the time and the other half don't answer it). Poor little thing, she was so worried about me. My sister text messaged me the other day -- Mom and I say hi. Call us sometime. I feel awful, but I can't seem to motivate myself to get in touch with them. I miss them and love them, but christ, they make me sad and frustrate the hell out of me.
| Sex Ed | 10:21 PM |
I was just talking to my son and he said he started sex education last Friday. Sex education! What did you guys talk about? We just started with the book -- we talked about puberty. Growing hair and stuff. Next week the boys and girls are going to be separated for lessons. Has your father talked to you about sex? No. Do you want him to talk to you about it? Uhhhhh....I don't know. Do you want me to talk to you about it? Uhhhhh....I don't know. Well, why don't we talk about it the next time I come visit you.
Gosh, he's so old -- I was telling someone at work today, hey, you're twice my son's age! My co-worker was born in '81. 1981! I don't normally hang out with people who's birth years are in the '80's. But I'm sure there's plenty of them in my group.
It feels weird to be thinking about talking about sex with my son. A friend of mine emailed me and said how much he appreciated having his mother talk to him about sex when he was young. And how much easier it was to talk to her about it than his father. I thought Josh might be more comfortable having his father talk to him about it, and figured I'd let him know I was available for any questions, but my friend's email made me realize I should just talk to him -- if he's uncomfortable, he'll let me know and we'll talk about something else. But I like that the fact that my 11 year old can be mature and comfortable with adult subjects. And I like to think I had something to do with that :)
| The Crap that Sis Reads | 12:13 AM |
My sister and I don't communicate extensively via email so our notes to each other are short and informative -- like about flight times and the status of our mother and / or father. Every now and again, one of us sends the other a more personal note through email -- she sent me the cutest email today. It was about this blog -- she doesn't read it daily, but checks up on it every now and again. And she said that when she read it she felt like she was just reading some writer's blog, and not her sister's blog. It was the sweetest damned thing. And she said reading it made her squirt water out her nose (actually, she just spit it out her mouth, but it makes so much a better image to think of water spraying out her nose :)
| My Son, The Pirate | 12:42 AM |
I can't wait for my sister and my son to arrive for a three day visit! My son emailed today and asked if I wanted him to burn a CD for me. I told him, why don't you bring that CD up and we can listen to it, but I don't want a copy. Then he emailed and said, well, dad was going to give me some money but now he doesn't want to because I said I wanted CDs and he said I should just download the music. Ugh. Cringe. I haven't downloaded/burned/accepted any illegal music since I started working at EFF. I can't do it. I have a very strong moral conscience. I've been debating mentally for two weeks about how moral I'll be after I leave there, and I have to say I'm leaning towards the side of being legal and owning only legal music. Yeah, I probably spend a lot more money, but man does my little brain breathe freely.
I told my son to get that spending money from his father -- he'll need it for his trip. And maybe we'll run to Amoeba and he can buy some used disks. I told him I'd explain why he can't burn me that disk and why he shouldn't download music when he got here.
| Loving My Parents | 1:24 AM |
Don't get me wrong -- I love my parents. Because I am an irrational fleshling and because family members get a huge emotional allowance. I can detach and make assessments about the type of people my parents are, but don't agree with me. Don't make your own negative assessments, and please don't disparage, ridicule, or otherwise bad mouth them in any way.
Just a couple of weeks ago near Valentine's Day, I was talking about my father -- how I adore and worship him, and how he means the world to me. But when I went to go consider why, there was no reason why. My father, because of his detachment and silence, is mostly a figment of my imagination. I have not a single childhood memory of him. He was not a part of my life except in the abstract and as a voice through my mother (supposed voice -- I suspect now that my mother just always spoke for him). Someone asked if he was "just there", and he wasn't even just there -- he spent a lot of time at the hospital. He is literally the father of my imagination. Some of his qualities are real -- his beautiful and easy smile, his dry sense of humor, his intelligence. But most of the qualities I've attributed to him throughout my life are not actually qualities he possesses.
And my mother. I have not a single childhood memory of her either. Odd, isn't it, that I don't have many childhood memories at all? I have one significant memory involving my first cat when I was in elementary school. A few others from Ohio based mostly on pictures. A few beyond that. My sister has significantly more memories of that time in our lives than I do (that time in our lives going up to and including the early part of high school).
My mom got us to do all the right things -- took all the right lessons, moved to a city that was rated high for education and made sure we excelled, kept us from working too young. She pushed us -- I don't ever recall it as encouragement, it was always push and cajole and control. Or punish.
But now, even having said all that, I sit here in my apartment back home from the weekend feeling wretched that I didn't spend enough time with my mother, that I wasn't patient enough with her, that I didn't show her enough love this weekend.
I love them. Completely irrationally and sometimes undeservedly, but always unconditionally and helplessly. They are my parents.
| Mom Redux | 11:54 AM |
I think my mother was referring to my freckles. This morning she told me I had lots of stuff "developing" on my face, and would I like to use her cream. I almost lost it -- how am I supposed to take that? I made her leave the bathroom, then looked at myself in the mirror trying to figure out what she could possibly be talking about. It couldn't have been blemishes because my face isn't breaking out right now. I could only conjecture that she must be referring to my freckles.
I thought about it all day. I think part of my frustration and lack of patience with her stems from our complete inability to communicate effectively. I'm so comfortable communicating openly so it's incredibly frustrating to be unable to. The language barrier is one thing, but even if I spoke Korean flawlessly and/or she spoke English flawlessly, we would still never be able to fully communicate with each other. Our relationship has never been that way. And her belief system is so completely different from mine that I don't think we could ever communicate on the same level -- we would baffle each other. The language barrier is an easy excuse and prevents us from completely and utterly hating each other.
It sounds horrific, doesn't it? But I can honestly and unbiasedly say that my parents are two of the most unpleasant people I know. I can safely avoid people who fall into that category in the rest of my life, but you can't let go of family quite so easily. And they probably only fall into the "most unpleasant" category because I tend to avoid unpleasant people and because I take most of what they do quite personally -- something I wouldn't necessarily do with an unrelated acquaintance. But at 30, they've been my parents for every single year of my entire life. And unfortunately, they will continue to be my parents until one or all of us dies.
| My Mother, The Witch | 11:18 PM |
My mother...jeez. I wonder if it's her way of communicating with me -- run out of things to say or can't say the things she wants to say so she says something unpleasant. Like, "make sure you work out regularly", which my little brain immediately translates into you're looking overweight and/or unhealthy. And, "You should put on some makeup -- why's your face look so dark?". Dark? What does it mean that my face looks dark? Is that purely a figuratively worded question? Or does she literally mean my skin looks darker than normal? Figurative or literal, I know it means something like you look unhealthy and unattractive.
Maybe she's punishing me for not being the daughter she wants me to be -- the sweet, listening, attentive, and obedient daughter she was perhaps hoping for. Though I've been making a concerted effort to be more patient with her, to listen to her go on even when it's emotionally difficult because I know she just needs someone to listen. I'm trying, I really am.
Luckily I have a pretty decent sense of self, but it's still frustrating to hear her say these things. Not to mention the fact that it brings back loads of emotional dry heaves from half my lifetime ago -- mornings prepping in the bathroom mirror, 14, 15 and scared to be a girl that age anyway and having to deal with the running commentary of a not so sympathetic mother. Loquacious and vitriolic is how I remember the mother from my youth. Is it any wonder, then, that I have to work so hard to be sympathetic to her?
| Not Enough Time | 11:59 PM |
I've been thinking lately that there's never enough time to connect with all the people you care about. Walking around the city yesterday I was thinking of friends - a close girlfriend I seem to have drifted from, an ex co-worker I've been meaning to catch up with, current co-workers I haven't had lunch with in a while, my sister - and my intentions are good and from the heart - I think of things I want to share with them, or compose the emails I want to write to them, and sometimes - even often - I never get to actually do it, but there's something about that process that makes me feel like I've shared a little bit with them.
I got an email today from a family member whose life I haven't really been involved in much because there are so many family members and I was afraid of being considered a favoritist. But I know she's been troubled lately so I emailed her. And the email she sent back overwhelmed me with emotion. It just breaks my heart that a 15 year old girl is hurting so much. I thought of one of my shittiest days - cause I still have them occasionally - and couldn't stop crying thinking of what a teenage girl without my experience and hardened skin must feel on her shittiest day.
Someone asked me something the other day - the actual question isn't important, but that small bit of conversation left me with the impression that he thought I wasn't involved or interested enough globally, politically. And I thought about it afterwards and about why not. It's not that I don't care or am completely oblivious, but it's not a high priority for me. And I realized that I'm just trying to make sure the people I care about feel good - mostly my son, but also the children (god, now teenagers) that I've inherited from his father's side of the family, and my immediate family and friends, too. At some point you have to decide which things in the world mean the most to you. And for me - yes, I'd love to have Josh grow up into a less polluted world, eating healthy meat, led by a liberal president, but it's more important for me now that he grow up feeling good about himself and knowing that I love him and that we all love him. And that my troubled teen knows that I love her, too and am here for her whenever she needs me. I just don't have the energy to try to save the world, too.
| Grandfather's death | 11:32 AM |
My father's father passed away today in Seoul. My dad forwarded me an email from his younger brother. I didn't know my grandfather. I've seen a picture of him with my grandmother, who passed away a few years ago, holding me as a baby, but I've never had any direct contact with them.
And seeing an email from an uncle I've never met to my father - an interaction I've never witnessed before either - combined with the death of someone intimately tied to my dad, regardless of what that tie was like, made me shed a few tears. More than anything else, though, it isn't so much my grandfather's death that saddens me, as not having a relationship with these people that form my extended family.
