Category Archives: Writing

Adoption Story…

Posted
Filed under Writing

Not too long ago I was gifted a DNA kit from a friend. I had admittedly been a little scared to use it. As a child I used to make up my own origins. I used to believe I was an alien. That I had dropped out of the sky and into the loving home of my family. Because, as an adoptee of a closed adoption, I could be anything. Anything was possible, Clark Kent was adopted.. Nobody could tell me different. I’d believed I was half Korean, half English, and a fourth Irish, because it’s what I wanted to be. It was my own small world and it’s what I felt..

Then they came out with home DNA test kits. And I was afraid. Afraid I’d finally have some answers and they wouldn’t live up to my dreams. And honestly, a little bit afraid I might find some family. Oddly enough, that it would be that easy. Spit into a tube, send it off prepaid postage, and the door to the mystery would open..

But I did it..

And I held my breath.. With half hope, and half fear..

And around 10:30PM, I got an email. My results were ready..

And after 32 years, I am reminded that I have a storyteller’s heart..

99% East Asian, and 1 faceless 4th cousin. And I am admittedly heartbroken. Just enough to crush my dreams, but not enough to answer my questions. I honestly don’t know what I’d really been expecting. People always told me to look in the mirror and I’d see who I was. But it wasn’t the right answer for me. It’s why I have a zipper tattooed on the back of my neck. There had to be more to me, I felt it, I believed it. But the truth is there. It is what everyone already knew about me, but me..

99% East Asian.. 1 faceless 4th cousin..

…But now the box has been cracked, and the game is afoot..

September 24, 2015

Posted
Filed under Writing

Last day in Oxford. Spent the morning in the large and unusually laid out Ashmolean Museum. Couldn’t help myself imagining all the statues coming to life and dancing to some disco song. Alas, it didn’t happen. Perhaps it was too early in the day. After, we found The Eagle and Child pub, where The Inklings used to meet up. Consisting of some of the great authors such as Tolkien and C. S. Lewis. I guess it was a good thing I read that book by Lewis on my way here. The sun finally came out on our last day here and we stole upon an opportunity to climb one of the towers for a view of the city from up high. 127 steps up and I was finally able to see The Radcliff Camera in full. From so high, I was reminded of an episode where a young Morse has his eyes painfully opened to the real world. Hard to imagine, in a city so small and self contained. People go about their business in their own little worlds. Worlds so distant and dreamy you could almost expect a young wizard to come whipping by on a broom. No, the streets are nothing like the crime riddled world of Morse and Lewis. It is a place of prestige and intelligence. It is a place that could easily crush the dreams of the faint of heart. But without all that, I can see why it is a place that inspired the campus of Hogwarts, the lands of Middle Earth, and the world thru the Rabbit Hole. It is a place that opens minds both academically and imaginatively. A place I will remember forever.

California Poppy

Posted
Filed under Writing

I love the California Poppy. Eschscholzia californica, also called Cup of Gold. Its such a simple but spunky flower. Opening up like a cup taking in the sunlight. And when the weather gets unsavory and cold, like at night, it closes up nice and tight as if saying, Eff you World, Im gonna hang out in my own space.

Olympic Peninsula

Posted
Filed under Writing

I still believe there is no more beautiful place than the Olympic Peninsula on a bright day. Morning coffee at my beloved coffee shop. Dreamy faces and heavenly scents. Early geri-excersise group on the docks. I lose myself in the exquisite brew and my favorite album, as i cruise. Down the highway. The road is bright, cradled in the arms of the the forestry. No more beautiful colour than sunlight streaming thru leaves. The trees tease sashaying their hips to reveal glimpses of the water. Sparkling like crystal blue fields made of sapphires. Until they open completely and the channel is the end of the road. I board the ferry to the big city, find seat in the sun, and as the seats around me fill up… the sounds of meaningless chatter pull me from the dream.

Daffodils

Posted
Filed under Writing

I love Daffodils. They are tenacious, blooming early in the year, fragile and temporary, they are small and under appreciated, they are beautiful without asking for attention..

Life and Death

Posted
Filed under Writing

It was Christmas, 2015 that the explosion happened at the dinner table. My brother and I, my parents, my aunt and uncle, and two younger cousins. We might have been having fun, wearing tissue paper crowns and racing wind-up penguins across the table. It was much later and the two younger ones were locked into their electronic devices, the rest of us remained at the table, wine glasses close to empty, listening to my uncle tell stories. And then my brother snapped.

I dont remember how old I was when I finally began to understand the kind of person my uncle was. My mom tells me she saw the look that crossed my face the moment it happened. That my aunt saw it too. 

It took years for my brother and I to finally decide we’d had enough of my uncle. My brother had packed his things and nearly drove home that night. It took an hour long, heated conversation for him to finally come out and say he wouldn’t do a family gathering that included my uncle again. My brother was eventually persuaded to stay, but it was the last Christmas we would spend with my aunt, uncle, and cousins.

December 2017, right before Christmas, my last grandparent passed. Some time before that my mom and I had gone to lunch and she’d told me what my grandma’s life had been like. How hard it must have been. It was lovely to hear she’d had a smile on her face when she passed. That perhaps my granddad had finally taken her hand and that they were reunited.

And it was that passing that finally brought us all back together. To raise a glass to celebrate her life and love, together.

Not present, was my uncle. 

Five days prior, the doctors had discovered cancer in his bones and lungs. They told him he had a few months at best. That day he stopped eating. My aunt believed he had given up hope. She called her eldest daughter, away at college, and told her she needed to come home as soon as possible. And that afternoon we helped my aunt get ahold of hospice.

I’ve struggled to remember the anger I felt, to remember why it was important. Maybe there is a reason it all happened like this. My sweet and endlessly loving grandmother, hanging on to life for so long. No one knows why. Perhaps it was for this. Perhaps it was to bring us all back together at this time when love and support was needed. Perhaps this was her lasting gift to us.

The Drive

Posted
Filed under Writing

It is dark when I set out. My small jeep and my small family. The road is long, like 280 miles long, but its a road I’ve come to know well. I program Google Maps to give me directions. A route I easily know by heart, but perhaps so the journey wont seem quite so lonely. Another voice to me, where the cats will only meow. I have my podcasts cued up, 6 hours worth. Usually something of an educational nature, or sometimes mystery crime stories. Something to keep my brain engaged, where the dark monotony would pull me into sleep. 

In the darkness, the world seems small. Just two strips of pavement and a steady stream of white and red, like two string lights side by side, bending and curving along. The rain is falling, making the windshield explode with white and red light, like a muddied fireworks show, instantly whipped away with each sweep of the wipers. Its possible I get lost in it, the kaleidescopic patterns flashing before me, just following the stream of red lights. The cats each claiming a side of my lap. The voices of the podcast suddenly lost to me, something about math and physics and the birth of the universe… and then I notice red lights flashing more rapidly. Red and blue..

I pull over, out of the way, but the lights remain behind me. I continue to pull over. I hit the rumble strips as I pull off to the shoulder. The slowing speed rouses the cats. I watch as the flashing red and blue follows me off to the shoulder. I don’t have the tightening in my chest, or the pit in my stomach, the way I did the last time I was pulled over. Over 10 years ago, sorrowfully driving back to college. The year I dropped out and moved to Oregon. 

The flashlight beam illuminates my passenger window. A police officer and my uncaged cat lock eyes. I roll the window down and am informed I’m being recorded. He asks me if I was aware I had been going 70 mph. 

“No. Not really.” I respond, blandly. 

“Whys that?” He asks.

“I guess I just wasn’t really paying attention.” 

He asks where I’m going and I tell him Seattle. He scoffs and says I have a long drive. After having just gotten off the most patience draining 8 hours of work, I simply nod and say, “yeah…”

He lets me off with two warnings. One on paper, the other by telling me he didn’t want the next time he drove up to me to be at my traffic accident. I laugh, but he reminds me that he is being serious.

“Watch your speed when you pull out.”

I watch him as I pull out, adhering to the speed limit, unsurprised when, after a few moments, I see his lights go on again, for someone else.

The rest of the drive is unremarkable. My speed slowly creeps back up. I follow the lights, like lights guiding me to an exit. One cat settles across the center console, my empty Red Bull can crinkling under his weight. The other settles between my thighs, face resting in my stomach. We drive like that for the next four hours. Occassionally the voice of Google Maps will calmly remind me which exit to take.

The road gradually grows smaller. Three lanes, to two lanes. The white and red lights grow fewer. And the trees begin to close in. Until eventually I am alone, on a two way road with a yellow line down the middle, cradled in the green embrace of the trees. I am listening to the sound of an old man’s voice recall the murder of his daughter. My speed slows as I come to my first stop sign in 6 hours. Both cats perk up. Soon enough, we’ll be there.

Sick Day – fin

Posted
Filed under Writing

324 miles and morning seems like a lifetime ago. But I woke without the foggy, thick feeling in my brain. My nose still ran like a faucet, but I think I’m pretty well resurrected from the Death Plague. I made some coffee for my mom and I, and we video chatted with my dad, in London. It was nice to smile and laugh together. Then, in our own time, which took alot of time, we head out. Just down the road, my jeep waited, also resurrected.

Its only been a couple weeks past our one year anniversary together, and shes cost more money than shes worth. Yeah, I call my jeep a “her.” She’s far too small and dainty to be referred to as a “he.” Like an Undine, all deep, aquatic teals. Small, mighty, and trouble. She’s been nothing but a thorn in my side. Never failing to hit me in the head when I open the back to load things in, and her back window refusing to stay up on a hot day in the sun, despite functioning a/c, and never, never failing to go dead after the slightest amount of neglect. All boats are referred to as “she,” perhaps because men loved them as they loved women, or perhaps because they were as high maintenance as a woman. 

I am hoping the approaching new year will prove better for us. For her and for me. A new beginning. Although truthfully, I don’t hold much hope. My heart has been cracked and broken too many times to hold much of anything within it. Everything is just going to happen. Maybe one day I’ll meet someone who knows the art of Kintsukuroi.

She brought us home. I unloaded her contents back into my small apartment. I sat on my couch, while my cats settled back in. It was dark, and late, and cold. Tomorrow, I’d be back to work. No more sick days.

Sick Day – day 5

Posted
Filed under Writing

My mom shoots a look behind us as the sound of Christmas music blares from right on our heels. “Thats me. Its my purse,” a woman offers. “It helps keep my cheer up while on my lunch break,” she doesn’t smile. We both turn back to the cashier and complete our transaction.

Its not a mystery how Christmas snuck up on us. Its just hard to be cheery when your last grandparent is laying in a hospital bed, no longer eating or drinking, no longer recognizing anyone. Its hard to be cheery when you’ve just celebrated the life of a 32 year old woman whose hand you held at her wedding, and then she was gone 12 hours later. Its hard to be cheery when you’re making follow up appointments to address your own cancer scare.

The mall is tedious and full of people. Its lunchtime on a Tuesday and I’m not sure why they’re all at the mall. The presents for friends are easy. The presents for pets are the easiest. We get those all done before noon. Its the presents for the family that are the challenging ones. We walk thru the mall, eventually stopping to get underwear for my dad, and plain tank tops for myself. We stop at the center stand to get Summer Sausage. What do you get when no one really wants anything.

I’d noticed the Christmas decoration boxes upstairs. Out and open, but not unpacked. No Christmas lights along the roof, no stuffed Santas, or holiday table runners. Just the small set of bells on a bow, around my kitten’s neck. Tiny jingling as she trails around underfoot.

This year proved challenging for all of us. Externally, as well as internally. With a heart attack and a triple bipass surgery. The loss of a well paying job. A serious job suspension, served twice. And a car that keeps dying despite multiple auto mechanics saying they can’t find anything wrong. 

I suppose the holiday blessing isnt in the gifts or the decorations or the music played around every corner. The blessing is just us. We can all be together, happy (ish) and healthy.

Sick Day – 4ish

Posted
Filed under Writing

Another early morning. Frost on the cars and thick fog blankets the streets. We are surprisingly efficient this morning. We head down into town for a quality cup of coffee. The kind where the baristas weigh the grounds before pouring a shot. And for a monday morning, its pretty hoppin’.

I watch the main barista, the image of a PNW hippie, with his wool sweater and dark beanie. He bounces around behind the counter taking orders and shmearing bagles. He smiles the whole time. How wonderful to have so much pride and love for your job.

Aside from the two baristas and myself, I realize everyone else is twice my age. A sea of grey and white hair, sipping coffees and chewing bagles. Some of them stare deeply into their phones, others engage in gossipy conversation. Everyone seems local, familiar with the barista named Patty. Its cold out, and they all wear their name label puff jackets and thick raincoats. You’d rarely see anything less up here. My own no-name, black cotton button up is tucked under the table. Its loud, and echoy in there, the sound of the music long drowned out. A phone rings loudly, and I watch as men feel their pockets, some lift their phones off the table to check them, women dig in their purses, or hold them closer to their ears, only to put them back when they realize if wasn’t theirs. 

The barista still bounces around behind the counter. The steady stream of people coming in doesn’t slow. We eventually finish our own cups, and abandon our seats for the cold outside. The fog is beginning to thin, and the sun is coming out.

Sick Day – day 3

Posted
Filed under Writing

We slept in.. I woke to silence in the house, save for my mother’s deep breathing down the hall. There was no 60’s music and espresso steaming from below. I rolled out of bed and padded downstairs to let my fur sister outside. I found the decaf coffee and pulled out the espresso machine from under the cupboards to start a cup for my mother..

When I finally hopped into the shower, I began reflecting on the fact that everything happened 8 years ago. People fell in love. People moved. Cats were adopted. Lives changed. Eight years ago, I chose to go Right instead of Left. I dropped out of college and moved to a town where I knew all of 3 people. And I’ve been here ever since. This town where I felt aching love for the first time, where I lost my virginity, and where I felt soul crushing heart break for the first time. This town where I got my first job caregiving. Where I smoked a joint for the first time, and was fired from a job for the first time. This town where I made some of the greatest friends, and lost some even greater ones. This town I found a life in. I worked my way from low paying caregiver, up to certified CNA2 in the local hospital. I started out living in a house with 4 other girls, to soundly living by myself. I started out afraid of being alone, to discovering I’m strong enough to be alone..

This town sucked me into its miasma, and I lost myself. I wonder how my life might have been different had I chosen to go Left instead of Right. Had I not chosen the more romantic and edgy option. Where would I be right now? 

Mom and I drive for 45 minutes to get dockside. The fishing boat bobs up and down as she buys boxes of fish. The sun is out, but the chill still bites my nose..

I think about leaving. About packing up and getting out of dodge. Leaving the perfectly sized apartment I found. Leaving the perfectly suited job I have. Leaving the ones who make me feel seen. The intern who asked why the Rose Fire seemed dimmer than normal. The co-worker who caught sight of me yawn and stretch, and blush slightly when he said it might have been the most adorable thing he’d seen. The friend who frantically worried about me when I accidentally slept in til 4pm and hadn’t heard from me. The baristas who know my coffee order as “what Rose gets.” The doctor who routinely encourages me to further my career. The friends who continually tell me to write. And the friends who tell me that my absence would be felt if I left..

I think about it..

I lay on the couch, fur sister under foot, Thumbs at my shoulder. Mother is finishing laundry, and making soup. We are getting by. Tomorrow we will probably sleep in again.

Sick Day – day 2

Posted
Filed under Writing

Its hard to gather my thoughts together, as I lay here on the couch staring into the fireplace. We spent 5 long hours on the road to say goodbye to my father. I watched him roll his bag down the ramp and around the corner, his destination: The Motherland, perhaps to say goodbye to his own mother. My last grandparent, laying in bed, fading away.

He is going by himself, a short trip, and I wonder if it will be burned into my memory like when he went over when my grandfather passed. He went alone then. I remember laying on the ungodly 70s couch in the livingroom, watching a daytime marathon of the first season of Alias. I would follow the show all the way until the last season. Which is typical of me, I can’t finish anything. I remember rolling off the couch and hugging my father goodbye, perhaps disgruntled to have my marathon interrupted. After all, I didn’t have many memories if my grandfather. Snapshots. Me watching him roll his own tight cigarettes in the darkened diningroom. Him yelling at me to stop playing with the hose. The fear I had after he’d been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s, that he wouldn’t know who I was, but the fear melted away when he saw me. Recognition lit his eyes and he smiled and called me Little Love. And shortly my father returned, he had presents in tow. He had found various Manga for me. All of which, I still have. One of which became one of my favorite series.

But thats how it is for me. I’m never there when my family members pass. I simply have odd memories of when it happens. Having to stay at my best friend’s house while my mother and father both flew to Seattle when my first grandparent passed. It was the middle of indoor soccer season and I was getting ready for an evening game. And perhaps it was for the best I ended up missing it. My parents weren’t there, with their pockets full of Rolos to hand me during the game. My brother and I each took turns talking with them on the phone. They cheerfully wished me good luck on my game and I passed the phone to my brother. When he hung up, he told me Grandpa had died. They hadn’t told me because I was young. I fell down and began crying. In hindsight, it feels a bit dramatic to me. I don’t remember feeling any emotion at the time. Simply that… people cry when family members pass, and so I cried..

I am staring at the fire, and wondering what is burning itself into my memories right now. Mother and I drove back in the dark and the rain, quiet. The sound of the rain on the windshield, like soft radio static. We arrived home to a dark and silent house. I put on my pajamas and curled up on the couch, my father’s usual spot. Mother sets about preparing dinner. And right about now my father would be just taking off..

Sick Day – day 1

Posted
Filed under Writing

I’d forgotten I wouldn’t be able to sleep in. After deciding to call in sick and desperately waiting around for 2 hours for someone to jump my car, I probably mistakenly, made the long, dark drive North. I was plagued with fatigue, and sinus pressure, my ears were both plugged, and at one point felt my blood sugar tank, having eaten nothing all day, and rabidly pulled into a McDonalds. I managed to finish my two burgers, fries, and shake while getting completely disoriented in the dark and lost on my way back to the highway. I pulled into my parent’s driveway at 11pm, having been awake nearly 18 hours, sick, and exhausted, and fell into bed.

I was roused at 7:30, wrapped up in blankets, and pets, and phlem, and sinus pressure. Mom offered to shut the door and let me sleep, but I valiantly rose and off we went. 

A leisurely, if rainy, morning in Sequim, WA. We were handed broken candy canes, during breakfast, by the slow walking, pipe smoking Santa. After, I watched him haul himself back into his white creeper van, and drive away. We patiently navigated shopping aisles, carefully avoiding what I like to call, The Parade of Geezers. Mom hushes me, telling me they can hear me. I give her a look and ask, “really mom? Can they?” We finally find some cold medicine and after wrestling with the packaging, I down some greatfully.

“What are you doing?” My friend texts me. “Sitting on the couch, coughing, and looking up Hoodoo books.” I respond.

I took a long nap. Waking at some point, covered in sweat and needing to pee. Its silent downstairs, and I crawl back into bed. I think about random things. The fact that I never really get sick. My life is so stressed right now. With the new kitten aka monster, and the new adventure car that has been a piece of shit since I got it, the changing dynamics of my work, the bittersweet wedding and then death last month, the failing health of my grandma, my own cancer issues… and when life’s got you down, what better answer than to give you a cold… I think about all the people who keep telling me how much money I could save if I quit drinking, like I’m some kind of chain smoker who spends hundreds of dollars a year commiting slow suicide by smoking each day. No one ever talks about how much money I could save if I quit eating food. Or how much money I could save if I quit taking showers. Well maybe think on that. And then I think about DNA testing. The answers it might provide me. And the answers it might not. “You’re Korean,” my mom laughs at me. “Am I? Am I really?” I respond. I am past 30 now, navigating thru my first life crisis, trying to figure out how to dip my toe into the water of my adoption, and am starting to face my first real health issues. As a child, calling myself a box of chocolates was cute, the mysteries of an adopted child, but now is a time when I need some answers. “Just make it simple,” my mom says, about the dreaded Letter to my Birth Mother, the key to opening the door to begin The Search. “You’re over thinking it too much,” she says. But she doesn’t understand how terrified I am. At worst, this could be the first, and the last letter I ever write to my birth mother…

I wake up again and we head out to dinner with friends. We were 15 minutes late, but thats not unusual. I order a Hot Toddy and Crab Risotto. The place is loud, and warm. And because, as is the way with loud places, we all talk louder. I’m sure the combination of cold medicine and alcohol was a questionable choice, but for the time being my sore throat and cough were abated. We asked what our friends did today, in the rain. “We went to Sequim, WA.” 

Respite – fin

Posted
Filed under Writing

Shes not tired, atleast not as tired as she should be. She finished the lime redbull ages ago. By now darkness had fallen and an odd mist was all around. She drove at a little less than a comfortable pace, but it was okay, the cars in front of her kept her honest. One cat on her lap, the other in the passenger seat. Some time ago her GPS had failed. It wasn’t that she didn’t know the way, having driven it a dozen times since last spring, but that the 280 mile journey felt a little less lonely. And though she knew the heavy clouds and fog probably had something to do with it, she half suspected her GPS was simply giving her the silent treatment from having been argued with so much on the trip up. Silent, save for every hour or so loudly chiming in with, “GPS signal lost!!” Rudely interrupting the soothing sound of Aaron Manhke’s voice, and causing her heart to jump more than it should. Aaron’s subject matter, half hour long podcast episodes of Murder and Monsters. It is her cup of tea, and driving thru the dark and the mist, provides for the perfect atmosphere.

Once darkness falls, the drive becomes dangerously monotonous. She suddenly finds herself traveling thru a wormhole. She might be flying thru a Stargate. And when the rain starts falling, and the cars in front of her begin spraying water at her, she might have been traveling thru hyperspace. Destination: Home.

And in those long, dark hours, one cat cutting off the circulation to her foot, soothing, but spooky tone of Aaron’s voice in the background, rain drops hitting the windshield, almost creating its own sound of radio static, she feels herself changing. Mentally morphing herself back to reality. When she reached the end of the wormhole, she would be back home. Back to life. Back to her every day. 

One cat suddenly sits up and begins yowling and pacing back and forth, as though awoken from a nap and not quite sure where he is. “I know buddy,” she says, rubbing his head til he settles back down, this time on her other leg, “you and me both…” He lets out a sigh. Aaron continues his story. GPS chimes in that her signal has been lost. “You never even tried,” she says, begrudgingly. But then shrugs, soon they would be home..

Respite – Day Extra

Posted
Filed under Writing

The truth is, I just couldn’t do it. I couldn’t go back home yet.

I squished over in the large bed to make room for my fur sister. The emotional creature she is, she could sense I was leaving when I eventually began gathering my things together. Her cold nose pounding on the closed door while I was getting dressed. And though my mother talks to her, the truth is, no words will soothe her soul when I leave again.

But I couldn’t do it. The long weekend, in which I’d traveled 280 miles by jeep for some rest and relaxation, had turned into anything but that. The 60 mile drive to the hospital, the impromptu wedding, the death, the mourning, the dinner, and the 60 mile drive back. I came out more exhausted than I went in. 

The clouds were heavy and grey, threatening to pour at any moment, but we still piled into the car and drove into town, to have a Me day.

 I wish I could tell you how exciting it was, but it wasn’t. It was falling in love with a local coffee shop’s brew, and the boys who wear flannel, not cuz its hip, but because thats just what you wear up here. It was smelling herbs and spices til we choked, and tasting oils and vinegars til our tongues burned. It was spending half an hour in a shop no larger than a trailer, locating gems. It was inhaling incense in the New Age shop and feeling the magick all around me, or maybe it was the woman gently singing along to the music. It was eating burnt pizza in a hut and laughing with my mom, and trolling thru the grocery store, cherry picking items. Lamenting on the lack of availability back home. The truth being, its never been home. The truth being, I make the 280 mile drive up here, cuz this is where my heart is. This is where I rest, and write, and breathe..

Eventually the rain began to come down, and we grow tired, so we began back. Back to the house where dinner was cooking and the pets were waiting. Tomorrow, life will resume its flow. I will pack up my things, and my four pets, and I will make the journey back. Maybe I didn’t get the rest I’d come for, but I am leaving with so much more. This weekend scared me, but it also opened my eyes. And for the first time, I finally feel my age.