Category: General Musing

Miscellaneous

Leaving it all behind

My brother Onk emailed me that one of dad’s employees is collecting used toys to take to an orphanage over the weekend.  Apparently, he’s been doing this for many years.  Onk asked if he could pick “the ugly ones” of my stuffed animals to give away.

Have I mentioned to you guys that I have a massive collection of stuffed animals back in Thailand?  As in, when we renovated my room when I was 13, dad had built-in wall-to-wall 3-level shelves for my “friends”.  And yes, the shelves were stacked, some double layers, with stuffed toys.

I mean, as far as I know, growing up, I had more stuffed animals than anybody in my class, and possibly, more than anyone I knew.

My mom and I had talked about donating the stuffed animals for years. When I left home 15 years ago, mom had all of them wrapped up in clear plastic bags and cellophane to keep out the dust. I would come home to stay in my room, surrounded by my old friends.  Even when “my” room became mom’s walk-in closet in recent years, I would still go in to my room to at least say hi to the toys.

I mean, how can I not say hi to my old friends?  They have witnessed me growing up.  They were my confidants, my co-stars and captive audience, my guests at tea parties, my rescues and hapless victims need rescuing.  Among them was where my imagination grew and where I learned to keep my inner adult in check.  But I digress.

I have asked my mom to donate the majority of the stuffed animals, keeping only the sentimental ones many times. Same goes with my clothes I left behind. But she always said, not yet, not yet. My dad said deep down the stuffed toys and my clothes in the closet reminded her of me, and that was why she kept them.

Those stuffed toys gave me so much happiness growing up. Now that mom is gone, it is as good a time to share my joy with the less fortunate children just as I have meant to do all these years.

I gave Onk a list of the ones with sentimental values that I can recall off the top of my head. I told him if he actually sends me the picture of the shelf, I can tell him exactly who to be given away.  But in our case, I will have to have faith that my brother knows who gets to go to a new home.

And yes, I realize I called them “who”, not “which”. Hey, they were my childhood imaginary buddies. They will always be somebody to me.  In my mind, all the toys are just like in Toy Story.  They are alive when you’re not looking.  But I digress again.

It’s just strange not getting to personally say goodbye to some of them though.  I hope they would forgive me and learn to love their new friends as much as they have loved me all these years.

Serendipity

Ninja Grief strikes again.

This time, the door was left wide open for an attack from visiting with Ray and Hsiao-yen who were in town from Hawaii last night.

Ray and Hsiao-yen go back a long way with my parents.  Ray and my dad went to college and grad school together.  Naturally, when my mom came over with my dad during graduate school, the wives were buddies as well.  I knew them my whole life even though we were living in different countries.  And of course, my recent visit to Hawaii to attend Ray’s daughter’s wedding has strengthen this lifelong bond.

Last night after dinner, Brandon drove me out to La Mirada where they were staying last night to drop some stuff off.  We didn’t expect them to be home already but they were.  So we went in for a visit. We talked about our families, work, and politics.  And of course, the subject of mom came up.We recounted our last time we saw her alive.  Ray saw her when we was still talking.  I saw her not long before she passed.  I didn’t want to go there, but we sort of ended up there anyway.  How could you hang out with your family friends and not go there?

Telling someone new that my mom passed away, I expect that to hurt and it does.  But I never quite expect that remembering my mom with friends of the family would be equally painful.

Being with Ray and Hsiao-yen last night was like being in the living room with my dad and my mom again.  They are one of the closest people I have to my family.  Being there with them brought me great joy and at the same time great longing to have my family put back the way we were before.

I want my mommy and daddy, dammit.

I guess I have been trying to put everything about my mom’s passing away.  You know, I’m trying to get on with my life.  Most days I can do that successfully, but of course the feelings do surface occasionally.

Once in a while, this grief would pop up and swing that 3×4 of Pain and Sadness quite literally right in my chest.  Sometimes I deflect the blow and walk away with a few tears in my eyes.  And sometimes, like today, I get knocked off my feet and reduced into a puddle of tears, especially when the 3×4 is wrapped in barb wire of Homesickness.

Like today.

I cried while getting ready for work, and it just didn’t want to stop.  I had to call in sick.

Maybe it is because I didn’t grief properly like Olaina once wrote about Justin’s way of dealing with his mom’s death.  But then like Celeste told me, these sad days are going to continue for quite a while.

Things happen for a reason though.  I mean, this entire chapter started with a chance meeting two days ago.

On Monday, Nhien asked me to help her bring up a few boxes of stationery from our messenger waiting curbside.  As we rolled our dollies out of our building, I spotted a guy that looked remarkably like Ray.  It couldn’t be Ray…could it?

He swung around again, and now I saw that it was indeed Ray.  I called out to him.

Ray was out of context to me at first glance.  I too was out of context for him, he said.  So out of context that it took him a few more seconds to realize who I was.

“What are you doing here!?” I asked as I hugged him.

“Actually, I’m lost,” he said.

“Where were you going to?”

“XXX Flower Street.”

“You’re in front of it!”

“Seriously?”

“Yes!  THIS is my building too!”

Serendipity is the word Ray used.

I was meant to go downstairs to run into Ray and effectively help to find where he was going. I was meant to get to Ray’s place late last night so we could visit instead of just dropping off stuff.  I was meant to be with my “family”.  I was meant to remember my mom.

Buddha/God/Gods/My karma/The Universe wants me to deal with my grief and to remember what it is like to have a family, to be with the parent figures.  It was a round and about way of doing it but He/She/They/It makes damn sure I get there.

Now, if He/She/They/It could turn down the volume knob on my crying, that would be awesome.

Big Trouble in Little China

The Rice and Beans crew struck again.  I mean, I don’t know what it is about going to get pho that brings out the funny in us.

Yesterday, Nhien drove me, Celeste and Eva out to Chinatown to our favorite pho place for lunch.  We parked on the streets, just outside a paid parking lot.  You have to J-walk to get to the plaza where the restaurant is at.  So, we started to look both ways.  Eva spotted a police car cruising down the road.

“Girls, cops are coming.  Don’t cross yet,” she warned us, but at this point Nhien and Celeste were already took a few steps into the streets.  We waited for the police to past and then we started making our way across.

“Well, this is Chinatown.  There are two Asians and two Mexicans on the side of the road,” I said.  “What does he think we’re going to do?  I mean, J-walking is built into our genetics make-up.”

*

When we were walking back, it looked like they were starting to set up a farmer’s market of sort in the parking lot.  There was a truck full of produce that was being unloaded.  There were a few tents set up, and an outdoor cooking area.

“Oooh, can you imagine a farmer’s market here with Chinese street foods?” I pondered aloud.

“Oh yeah, that would be awesome,” Nhien said.

Out of the blue, Celeste uttered, “No dogs allowed or we’ll cook ’em.”

“What?!?  Where did you see that?!?!”  All of us asked her at once and started looking around for the source of the comment.

I spotted a sign that said NO DOGS ALLOWED.

Celeste looked at us, perplexed.  “You guys thought I was serious?”

Oh Babies!

The season has begun.

Please head over to congratulate Beth Fish and Chris Rude Cactus with the new addition to their family Owen Gregory “Wally”.  The ever so adorable Mia Bean has a little brother!

Following Beth/Chris/Mia’s footsteps, within the next few weeks, I have 4 more pregnant friends due.

I’m not sure who’s going first but I think James and Aurora go first with Dresden William “Peanut”.  Then Nan and Mike are expecting a baby sister for Owen.  Then Celeste’s brother and his wife will welcome their son Noah, a baby brother to Sadie.

Coming in last is Shane’s sister Toni and hubby Eric with a baby boy.

I’m pretty sure I’m leaving someone out of this list. I mean, 5 babies in a span of a month! What was in the water last June?

All of these new birthdays are adding on to the already crowded March. We already have 7 birthdays in March.

It’s going to be an interesting month.