Leaving on a Jet Plane

Just the other day, I was reading an article in the newspaper about residential schools in BC.  During my undergrad studies at SFU, I remember reading literature about students who had attended these schools.  I had studied textbooks about their experiences, their indoctrination, and some of the social issues that have arisen from these institutions.  This newspaper article discussed how these Aboriginal children were educated in these residential schools and how many of them were lost.  Some of these children were forced to attend these schools.  Some of these parents were sold on the idea that their children would be getting a greater education. 

 

When these children went to school, they were to forget their language, their history and their parents. Sometimes, these children never made it back home to their parents and families.  It was the death of these children. It was the death of their culture. It breaks my heart because sometimes the parents would not know that their children had passed away during school until it was summer break and their child just never came back home. 

 

When I was a baby, my mother left me.  Luckily, I was so young, I do not have any recollection of being left behind. I do not have any conscious memory of being sad or having to suppress this painful experience deep inside me.  I only know this because my mother told me. 

 

When I was an infant, my parents made a courageous decision to leave their family and friends back home and come to Canada without any real plans other than to make a living and to raise a family in a beautiful and prosperous country.  But in order to get ahead, they decided it would be better for me to stay behind with my grandmother who was my “mother” for 6 months.  When it was time for me to come to Canada to join my parents, I came on an airplane as a barely 2 year old guest to a complete stranger whose task was to ensure that when we landed I was reunited with my parents. After arriving in Canada, I cried for months, looking for my grandmother, not recognizing my real mother.  Thirty-seven years later, my mother still weeps when she tells me this story. 

This story of being separated from my parents, these Aboriginal children being separated from their families and their homes rings deeper in my heart because I have two small children of my own.  The perspective suddenly shifts when I hear these stories as a parent because I couldn’t imagine living without my children.  As parents, we are torn to make decisions that we think might be for the greater good of our children. That is what makes these choices so painful, yet courageous.  I am thankful every day that my children are close and I can hold them tight. 

 

Love

My son was asked to write about “Love” for a grade 4 assignment. 

 

In essence, it was a nine year old summarization of 1 Corinthians 13. Included in his understanding of love were hand printed words like patience, understanding, and trust.

 

Maturing into the teenage years, my definition of love was filled with angst and dramatic romance because I just didn't know how to love.   

As I entered into womanhood, I kept searching for a love filled with passion and excitement.  Relationships that started out with novel enthusiasm and passionate discovery soon fell short.  My love was merely fanciful and fleeting.

After many years of being married, I see the definition of love more clearly.  In spite of the fact that there is nothing passionate or exciting about sharing the same bed or parenting the same children or sharing the same bathroom sink for 14 years, I finally understand the love that was summarized by my nine year old son.

 

I never realized the depth or capacity of love until I had children of my own, with the man I married. It began with learning to love our children, but as a result our love for each other deepened. It was as if the love sapling had taken root deeper and thicker into the rich soil of our family. Our patience was tested, our trust was tried, and understanding expanded to outside of ourselves.

 

Suddenly the clear diamond that my husband bought for me as an engagement present doesn't sparkle so brightly as the smile that spreads across my daughter's face when she sees her daddy walk through the door.   His arms not only embrace me, but lift our babies out of their cribs.  His hands not only hold mine, but help the children build their school projects or bandage their wounds.  He not only drives an hour during his lunch break to come meet me for a rendezvous, but to see his son's preschool graduation ceremony. No longer do I see the young man that I married, but I see the father he has become. His love is understanding and trusting and patient.

LOL

Eggs!  I see them over-easy, I see them sunny-side up, I see them scrambled.  Eggs are nutrient rich, lean and high in protein.  Aesthetically, their whites and golden yellow yolks are pleasing as much to the eyes as they are to the palate.  But the ones that I am most fond of are the ones that are just over easy and slightly greasy from the oil in the pan to ensure that they don’t stick to the pan and rupture the beautiful soft yolks. 

Why?  These ones remind me of my grandmother.  As a child, we didn’t eat a lot of eggs and most of the time, when we did, it was scrambled haphazardly, which I think my parents made because we were always in a hurry to get to school or piano lessons, or maybe my parents were just too tired to wait patiently for the egg whites to cook slowly, while keeping the yolks soft.  So whenever we went to our grandmother’s house and she made these eggs for us, what a treat!

But the treat wasn’t necessarily the eggs itself.  The treat was being with my grandmother and her love of laughter and her hunger for joy.  As a child, she used to take care of me while my parents went to work.  There wasn’t ever a lot of money.  There weren’t shopping sprees or elaborate lunch dates or any fancy cars to drive us anywhere.  There weren’t any dolls with sophisticated wardrobes or a 3 storey doll house.  There weren’t any video games or indoor play places with a maze of jungle gym apparatus. We walked where we needed to go.  We ate when we were hungry.  We talked when we were together. 

One time, I specifically remember the both of us walking to one of her friend’s apartments.  We knocked on the door and when the door opened, there were almost a dozen other “grandmothers”, some of them playing card games, some of them laughing and dancing, and even one other grandmother by the window smoking a cigarette.  Back then, smoking wasn't as taboo as it is today.  But if you were a woman, a Korean woman at that, it was completely forbidden.  That day, that cigarette and all those women dancing and playing and laughing represented a rebelliousness and carefree-ness that was liberating.  For a moment, I felt like I was peeking into a secret and exclusive club that didn’t need anything other than the pleasure of each other’s company and joy in that moment.  And in the centre of the room, performing a Korean folk dance with all the other ladies boisterously laughing and clapping along, was my grandmother, giggling and smiling.

 

 

 

All those ladies have long since passed away, including my grandmother.  And many of those grandmothers probably passed on their humble heirlooms or jewels or some tidbits of wisdom to their offspring.  When my grandmother passed away, she left her resounding laugh to my sister.  And to me, I have inherited her love of that laughter and happiness.  Every time, I hear that laughter out loud and feel a ridiculous joy regardless of what is happening around me, I think of my grandmother’s eggs.

Wake Up Call

I’m not sure when, as a parent or daughter or wife, you suddenly acquire this fear of “the dreaded phone call” but I always remember my parents saying that whenever the phone rings in the middle of the night or any ungodly hour of the night, there is a strange and fearful dread as you pick up the phone, even more so if someone you love is not at home. 

 

My sister and I have this crazy ritual that drives our spouses insane.  We call each other almost every single morning.  And then as the day progresses, we call each other throughout the day as new information breaks or as we remember something that we forgot to tell each other that morning.  And then again, we call each other in the evening before bed to recap and repeat the days’ events. 

 

One morning, the phone rings.  Big surprise!  It is my sister. 

 

She starts speaking in a hushed tone, “The surgeon from the hospital called me late last night to say they’re rushing [her husband] into an emergency surgery.  He said to get to the hospital in 20 minutes, say your good-byes because it looks like he’s not going to make it through the surgery. ”

 

My heart suddenly feels tight and I feel like I can’t breathe.  And everything she hasn’t said to me over the phone explodes through my brain: 

 

He’s passed away and my sister didn’t want to call me in the middle of the night to alarm me.

 

She went to watch him die without me there to hold her hand.

 

She didn’t give me a chance to say good bye to him.

 

Her voice interrupts me as I start to feel my eyes burn and she tells me that he made it through the surgery, but he is still not stable and at any moment his condition could turn.  This was the beginning of a 2+ years journey of hospital stays and hospital visits; infections, wounds and scars; sedation and unconsciousness; breathing assisted, breathing unassisted; tears and anger and relief. 

 

That dreaded phone call became the wake up call for me.  Tell those that are precious in our lives how much they are valued and loved.  Take care of those you love, including yourself, for those loved ones depend on you.  Find joy in the moments you share with them. 

We are the Champions!

My son finally got his baseball tournament championship trophy this week. He’s allowed to keep it for two weeks before he needs to pass it onto his team mate who will also get to keep it for two weeks before passing it on.  That means two weeks for him to show his buddies, brag to his grandparents, take pictures with it and show his classmates for show and tell.  To him, this trophy represents victory.  It is an accumulation of all the runs he made home, the batters he struck out and all the MVP medals bestowed on him. While kudos goes out to his team for winning out 5 other teams; this trophy represents something more.

I see a team made up of the players, parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles and friends who come out to practices and games.  I see a team who sits through the rain or huddles under sleeping bags as the sun and temperature goes down to cheer the kids on.  I see a team clambering under tents to shade themselves from the scorching sun, toting barbecues to make hotdogs to feed the kids.  I see a team of parents coming straight from work or getting ready to go to work while they fit in a two-hour long practice on the weekends for their kids.  I see a team of dedicated parents, and in turn, disciplined kids. 

I see a boy tripping and scraping his knees during practice.  I see a concussion from a baseball accidentally flying into a dugout and landing right on the cheek of a player.  I see another boy get a line drive right into his chest and fall over trying to catch his breath.  I see my son pitching and getting a strange ball bounce right on his forehead; holding myself back from running out like a frantic, concerned mother while he is bent over.  I see his head swell up, the ball's stitch marks imprinted on his head and his eyes water.  And when he gets up, I see members of both teams clap and cheer encouragement. I see these kids return to the field or get right back up to home plate to bat, sometimes with trepidation and a little nervousness.  In turn, I see a team of courageous and resilient kids. 

Even though this team has tasted victory for this tournament, I also see the losses of the entire season. Sometimes, it is close and the stress and excitement is overwhelming.  Sometimes, they lose by so much that it is crushing and a ‘mercy rule’ is there to save any semblance of dignity left for the team.  I see tears when a batter strikes out.  I see embarrassment when an outfielder misses that perfect pop fly.  I see self defeat when a pitcher lets too many players get onto the bases.  But I also see players chanting and cheering each other on.  I see boys asking an injured player if he is alright.  I see kids still coming back to play the next game.  I see kids coming to practice wanting to do better.  In turn, I see kids building comradery and exemplifying sportsmanship. 

They all see the trophy, but I see champions.  They have hit it out of the park. 

The First Date

I see a lot of dates where I work:  handsome young couples on first dates; sloppily-dressed young couples on their 365^th date; old couples still holding hands after 40 years on their dates. But the ones that always make me smile are the dates between a father and his daughter.  These dates manifest itself in many ways:  sometimes it ends up looking like a food fight; sometimes they are frantically doing the puzzles in our colouring books; sometimes he is wadding up huge amounts of napkins to wipe the tears from her eyes.

One day, an older well-dressed gentleman in his sixties walks in to our restaurant and says that he needs a table for 2.  Great, I seat him and tell him that when his date gets there, I will send her down.  After about 15 minutes, a woman of 40 walks in and says that she is meeting her father.  I send her down, he stands up to greet her and gives her a hug. 

She says, “Aww, dad, you got all dressed up for me?”

“Of course, always.” He replies, sheepishly.

They sit down and for an hour, he sits enraptured by her stories of her work and how she is not sure about what she wants to do with her life, about her daughter and how fantastic she is doing in school, and about her husband and how he’s looking for a new job.  I see in his eyes, regardless of the fact that she is a middle-aged woman who has her own family and husband and life, that she is his little girl.

As a child, my father and I rarely had alone time, let alone “dates”.  He was always working, but as a little girl he was a superhero to me.  His hands could always fix anything.  His imagination could create anything. His music and stories could always make me smile.  He was always my safe place.  And now as a grown woman I start to see that his hands are old from working; he has all these dreams and ideas that he is racing against time to fulfill; and sometimes his guitar is out of tune when he sings.  But he is still my safe place.  And no matter how old I get, I will see him as my superhero. 

I think it’s my turn to take my father out on a date.

 

 

It's a Charmed Life

Look at the beautiful bracelet I got for my birthday!

For the longest time, there was part of me that would shudder at the idea of owning these ubiquitous bracelets, the little bracelets with plenty of room to continue to add to the collection of little charms and trinkets. There are endless choices and endless combinations and endless amounts of dollars that can be invested into them.  A practical side of me refused to buy into these charms because to me, they symbolized the next hot item that we all needed to have.  Like standing in line to get the newest toy or edition of an electronic gadget, I said no to being herded like blind consumer lambs to the corporate slaughter. 

 

On another level, I was noticing these on the wrists of every mother or grandmother.  Rather than viewing each charm as badges of honour, representing the characteristics and skills of the children they gave birth to and created, I saw them as a resignation to  motherhood whether we liked it or not.  I had refused to purchase a mini-van and further, the stick men families on the back windows of the mini-van based on this same principle. 

Yesterday, my kids and their cousins spent hours colouring and drawing elaborate versions of “Happy Birthday” on little home made cards folded from plain white 8.5” x 11” paper.  Then all in a line, they encircled me like a little bracelet, made me sit down and presented me with the single strand bracelet.  I was ambushed. Each child, one at a time, each presented me with their beautiful little card and then handed me a little white bag.  My 10 year old decided it was appropriate to give a charm with hockey sticks and a puck.  He says it was so hard for him to choose between that or a baseball since I love to watch him play both.  My 5 year old niece presented me with a stud called the “Rock Star” as she is the singer of our family. My 8 year daughter chose a little figure skate because we have finally found something that she loves; it was that or a “BFF” charm she claims.  My 7 year old niece says because she is my lover, there are 4 hearts on her charm.

 

 

So here I am gushing.  I get the brilliance of these charms, because to me, they are a representation of these special little people who have thought, contemplated and combed through thousands of different pieces to pick one that was perfect for them for me. They, at one point in their life, even if is just for this little moment, are my “lovers” or “best friends forever”, or my little musicians or my athletes. They are completely and utterly charming.