Category Archives: Aging

Back in Chicago for the first time since pre-pandemic

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We were not planning a family trip to Chicago this year. But given the insane fuel costs due to the war in Iran on top of the fact that we’re current in the U.S. Open season, flying directly back from SFO to JFK this week would have been ridiculously expensive. In the end, we decided to fly to Chicago, stay three nights here, then fly back to New York on Friday; we also used miles to book these flights. This wasn’t the worst idea in the world: both Chris and I love Chicago; we’ve both come to visit separately for both work and pleasure. Kaia has never been, and so we thought it would be fun to spend a few days here together. Plus, our timing is right: not only did the Obama Presidential Center just open, but the world’s FIRST Hello Kitty Cafe also just opened here!

Since it’s still a working week for me, I had to spend several hours this morning working and doing meetings before going out for the day. Chris took Kaia out (and to the Hello Kitty Cafe already!) in the morning, and I ended up meeting them at Millennium Park, right where the Bean, aka Cloud Gate, is. As I walked down from our hotel to meet them, I started thinking about all the times I’d previously come here and what I did each trip. I’ve done about half a dozen work trips here over the years, and I have always tried my best to eat at interesting restaurants or grab coffee from fun cafes to maximize my time here. On one work trip I took here back in 2010, I remember I had to arrive by Sunday for an early Monday morning meeting. So I took advantage of the day and arrived early Sunday to spend the whole day exploring Chicago by foot, which included a few hours at the Shedd Aquarium (AMAZING place!).

The one non-work trip I did was for a girls’ Thanksgiving long weekend trip in 2009. That was the trip when I stumbled upon a German-style Christmas market just a few blocks from my hotel, and before my friends arrived from San Francisco. There, I had some good chatter with the German vendors there, who happily educated me about the glorious and magical Christmas markets I could experience if I traveled to Germany during the holidays. I had no idea that was even a thing back then, so my curiosity was piqued. It was then that I decided that I absolutely had to go to Germany during the holiday season. Four years later, Chris made that dream a reality for me, as we took our first trip to Germany (Berlin and Hamburg) during Thanksgiving week 2013! That trip cast a spell on me for European Christmas markets. After that trip, we just kept on going with the European Christmas market Thanksgiving week trips. Fast forward to 2022 and to present, Kaia has now also joined us for four of these trips! A new family tradition was born, all ignited from my very first leisure trip to Chicago in November 2009.

I love Chicago for many reasons. I love the layout of the city, the river, the lake, and the L. I love how walkable it is. I love the parks and the green spaces. I love the food scene here. I especially love the great things I’ve discovered here, including the beginning of my obsession with European Christmas markets and all things related to them. So I’m quite happy to be back.

Last day with family in San Francisco for this year

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My family tends to go through the same behavioral patterns in the last day or two when I am home. My mom goes through an anxious, angry period where she is either aggressive or passive aggressive with me, getting mad at me for innocuous things or accusing me of having feelings or intentions that she makes up. If I am not home during a given period, she will call repeatedly and ask when I am coming home; this is her way of actually saying, you need to come home now. On Monday, we planned to have dinner at my aunt’s upstairs, and my uncle would also be joining us. She asked us to come at 5 since my uncle needs to leave early since he cannot drive in the dark. So at around 3 while in Mission Bay with Chris and Kaia, I called home to let my dad know that we’d be back before 4. I could hear my mom in the background saying I was late and that I needed to come home right away. I could hear her angst, but I shrugged it off.

We went to pick up ice cream (black sesame and mango!) from Joe’s Ice Cream, a neighborhood ice cream shop that’s been around since I was a kid. Then we walked home from there. When we arrived back and I came into the kitchen, that was when I could feel my mom glaring at me with her eyes burning. “It’s almost 4 o’clock now. You are late,” she hissed at me. “You should have been home a long time ago! They are already upstairs waiting for us and eating.” Um. It wasn’t even 4pm. Who the hell was going to be eating dinner at this time? I said nothing and did as I promised, which was to help make a steamed eggplant dish to bring to the dinner along with my purchased dessert. She proceeded to get mad that we went out at all today and didn’t tell her, as she was hoping we could “talk more” together. I did not have that same hope.

As 4:50 rolled around, my mom started yelling that we’re all late and that we all needed to get upstairs, pronto. I was still cleaning up and washing dishes in the kitchen. Kaia was running around happily. My dad was doing something somewhere in the basement. Chris was lying on my bed, asking what the rush was. The reason she wanted us to go upstairs as soon as possible was that she wanted us to be done with this family dinner as soon as possible. She can only keep up her “family dinner” face for so long, and she had nothing to say to my uncle. While at dinner when we were asking my aunt questions about her potentially changing living situation, my mom got mad at me for asking questions and insisted we “let her eat her dinner.” I told her that it’s normal to have a conversation at the dinner table, and that shut her up; not everyone wants to eat in silence and call that a “family dinner” for god’s sake. It’s almost like she is in pain being at a dinner table with any wider family members and she needs to find a way to make it stop as soon as possible. When they invite her, she feels a need to “return the favor” and invite them back right away, which is “suffering.” Thinking about this is so exhausting.

There were some nice moments, though. This morning before we left, Kaia kept insisting to my dad that he show her his worms in his compost pile before leaving. Obviously this made my dad beyond thrilled, so he was happy to comply with her ask. Then as he rummaged through random junk in the garage, she insisted she wanted to stay with him to watch what he was doing. This attachment she’s developed to my dad has been really endearing. Every time she yells, “GONGGONG! GONGGONG!” and runs after him, it makes me smile and chuckle. Chris commented that my dad has probably never felt more desired or more affection from another human in his entire life before now. He is probably right.

And as we packed up the car to go to the airport, while she was being a little bratty and refused to give my mom a hug and kiss until the very last minute, she had zero problem giving my dad endless hugs and kisses and grabbing onto his leg until she had to let go and get into the car. My dad’s big goofy grin in this moment was pretty epic… and this is coming from someone who never uses that word.

When we got to the airport lounge and sat down, I asked Kaia if she missed Popo and Gonggong. She nodded her head and quietly said a drawn out, “Yeah.” Then, she didn’t say anything for while, but out of nowhere looked at me and said, “We never got to see Jiujiu… because he died.”

Yes, that is true. At least she waited to say that until after my parents were gone because I am not sure how they would have reacted to hearing Kaia say this.

The soft side of my dad

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In the evenings before bed, my parents like to make hot chocolate. They don’t do anything fancy; they use 2% cow milk, a little heavy cream for extra richness occasionally, and different forms of hot chocolate mix. The latest versions I see that look quite depleted in the cupboard are Whole Foods brand or some random organic cacao blend. My dad already pre-measured out the evening mugs for milk and was planning to warm them in the microwave and mix in the hot chocolate blend. But I told him that I’d make it properly over the stove for all of us tonight. I finally asked him why he didn’t use the Dandelion Chocolate hot chocolate mix I got him; two of the three glass jars were still sitting in the cupboard fully sealed. He hesitated initially and said that he found it a bit too sweet for bedtime, which I could understand. So we compromised, and I mixed some of his unsweetened cacao into the Dandelion hot chocolate blend.

As I heated the pot over the stove, my dad stuck around while I mixed occasionally. We actually had a pretty decent chat. We somehow managed to cover glucose and cholesterol levels, general health maintenance, diet modifications based on age, dental care and insurance, my work, the Nepal flooding (!), and general house maintenance in a very short space of time while in the kitchen together. I’ve realized over all the years of returning home that my dad really does not enjoy table side conversation; he actually detests it most times and rarely says anything at the table unless it’s something specifically interesting to him. Because of this, I usually don’t probe him much at the table. My dad’s favorite way of talking to anyone is while each person is sort of side by side. One person may be occupied with a task like heating milk over the stove (me) while the other person (in this case, him) lingers nearby. One person asks the other person an innocuous question out of the blue. The other person responds. Then the conversation either builds on that topic or another unrelated topic comes up. But the door has already been opened to allow the conversation to flow pretty easily.

Long ago, I gave up on the idea that I could change my relationship with my dad. We’ve had many ups and downs over the years. I spent a lot of my childhood living in fear that he’d lash out at me the way he did with Ed. And yes, of course every now and then, he definitely did lash out at me with his fangs. But I have forgiven him for his shortcomings because I know he had a miserable, difficult, and impoverished childhood, with very little love or direction given by either of his parents. I have moments when I get pissed because I am human, but I try to remember his childhood hardships. I have come to terms that we will never have the ideal daddy-daughter relationship or closeness I wish we could have had. I have made peace with it, mourned it, and let it go. Instead, I do exactly what ChatGPT suggested I do, which is to find power in the moments instead of forced, idealized, longer periods of time together. So if that means offering to make him hot chocolate and chatting over the stove one on one, or dusting the living room surfaces side by side while having random chatter, then I will embrace it. Those are the times he feels the most relaxed and open to me. Those are also the times he seems the softest to me.

What I’ve also loved watching during this trip particularly is how much Kaia has embraced my dad. She actively engages with her Gonggong, shows him that she wants his attention, and will not accept any less (this level of stubbornness is truly amazing and so hilarious to watch). On Sunday, he had to go out to pick up dinner takeout; she blocked the door and prevented him from leaving. When he tried to climb over her, she grabbed his leg and said he would not be allowed to leave. Eventually I had to intervene and pick Kaia up to let my dad out of the house, but it was such a cute and sweet (and likely infuriating for my parents!) moment to see.

Each night we’ve been at my parents’, I tell Kaia she has to go to each of them to hug and kiss them good night. What she has also done, which I did not tell her to do, is she proactively tells each of them she loves them. The first time she did this with my dad, he patted her on the back (his version of a hug…). Then when she actually uttered the words “I love you,” I could see the shock spread over his face… then eventually melt into this huge grin. Then she kept doing it with him night after night. I just loved seeing how big my dad’s smiles were each time. It was almost like for the first time in his entire life, at the age of 78, he was experiencing verbalized love and physical affection repeatedly, all from this tiny little human who has been a temporary resident at his home.

I loved seeing my dad feel loved. I had a moment when I almost started tearing up. For his entire childhood, my dad was deprived of love and affection, which turned him into this hard, stoic, emotionless man that he became. He focused on survival and financial independence only because that’s all he knew. And now, his little 4.5-year-old granddaughter gives him the love that he always needed but didn’t realize he needed.

Eating less as we age

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The more I read about health and fitness into my 40s and 50s, the more pretty much all the sources say that we need to eat more protein… and likely less carbs. As we age into our late 30s and early 40s, the loss of muscle mass naturally accelerates, and for optimal health and fitness, we’re supposed to counteract that by increasing protein consumption and strength training. The frustrating part about this, though, is that these recommendations come at a time when our appetites just naturally start to decrease. For years, I just never ate much breakfast at all on the weekdays because I didn’t have the appetite upon waking. Now with my increased focus on body recomposition, I have to force myself to eat some form of (high protein) breakfast, otherwise I will just never hit my protein target for the day. And the only way I can eat breakfast is by drinking it through a smoothie, otherwise I just start feeling too bloated or stuffed.

When traveling, and especially while in San Francisco with my parents (really, my mom!), we eat a lot of carbs. It’s not necessarily a “bad” thing because these are all the things that are either homemade or are bought with love by my parents because they know I like these things. But I tend to eat a lot more carbs than I normally do, which means I just feel fuller… all the time, and especially in the last few years in my late 30s. While here, I also remember things I like that are really good in San Francisco that I just don’t have in New York (like my beloved scallion bao!). So since I’m not back that often, I want to enjoy them while I am here. But at the end of the day, I can only eat so much before I just feel too stuffed.

Let’s take today: we ate breakfast at the Westin St. Francis hotel lounge, where I tried to eat a higher protein breakfast by focusing on scrambled eggs, egg white bites with mushrooms and spinach, and French-style yogurt. Later in the morning, we went to Dandelion Chocolate Factory, where Chris had a chocolate milk, I had a chocolate “nibby” horchata, and we shared (with Kaia) a chocolate canele. Then we walked a few blocks and had half of a pistachio baklava each (generous samples!) at Baklava Story. Forty minutes later, we shared a super burrito at El Farolito along with a passion fruit agua fresca.

At that point, I realized that there was very little chance I’d eat anything substantial for dinner that evening. We picked up some pupusas in the Mission for Kaia to eat on the ride back to the hotel. Come dinner time, we had a few nibbles at the hotel lounge again, finished the leftover pieces of bean/cheese/pork pupusa that Kaia did not want, and shared a single slice of emerald beaut plum raspberry crumble pie from Three Babes Bakeshop (that was a truly excellent slice of pie in every possible way!). And that wrapped up our eating for the day. Yes, these foods, even the beverages, are far richer than we’d normally eat on a day to day basis back home in New York. But when you think of the sheer quantity of food we ate in this day, it really wasn’t that much. Once upon a time, I could easily eat an entire super burrito from El Farolito in a single sitting all by myself. But alas, those days are now in my past.

Happy 47th birthday, my sweet Ed

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Dearest Ed,

Happy 47th birthday. It’s strange to think that if you lived to now, you’d be three years away from 50 — half a century old. This year as you would know, I celebrated my 40th birthday. I realized that although it’s technically middle aged, I didn’t really “feel” middle aged, if you know what I mean. When we were little, I used to think “40” or “50” were “old.” Now, I sit in my 40.5-year-old body and do not feel old at all. In fact, I feel like I have just started to really live life in the last decade and that I’m only getting started in many ways! So when I think of it from that perspective, it makes me even sadder to know that you aren’t here… because that means that you never really got to begin living a full life. You left us just before you turned 34. I have now lived over seven years longer than you did. That feels quite unfair because it’s not like I did anything to deserve more than you.

I am in San Francisco now. Chris, Kaia, and I stayed at our parents’ place last weekend. We went to visit you at the Columbarium on Sunday. I got annoyed when visiting you because I noticed some internal fingerprints on your niche’s glass, plus some large dust particles that settled inside. So I went into the office to inquire about having it opened for cleaning. The employee who worked there told me that they would charge us $495 (YES, THAT MUCH) to open the niche. I told him that I simply wanted to have it cleaned properly, that I wanted nothing else changed. He said that in 2014, the year after you died, Dignity Memorial took ownership of the Columbarium. Once upon a time, if a family wanted to open a niche to clean or rearrange items inside, they could easily do so and schedule the visit to open and and make changes; no charges or questions asked other than to prove you were family. Now, when you want to do this because of this greedy private equity-like company, they want to charge us almost $500 to do this! This is just utter bullshit. As Chris says, “fuck those fuckers.” The moron who told me this actually had the balls to say to me that since Dignity Memorial took over the Columbarium that service has become “more refined.” No, Dipshit. Service has actually just become greedier, with all this ridiculous nickel-and-diming of grieving families and loved ones who want to have basic, simple things done in memory of their loved ones. To me, there are few things more sick or disgusting than taking advantage of people at their most vulnerable moments in life, and that’s what Dignity Memorial does.

The reason I share this with you is that I honestly wish I didn’t even know what the fucking Columbarium was. I wish you never had to die so that our parents never had to find a resting place for you. I wish I could never have entered that damn place ever. Some people say that the more knowledge you have, the better. This is an area I would be so, so happy to be ignorant to, because all I see when I think of funeral homes and crematoriums is how their owners’ eyes light up with dollar signs at the thought of people constantly dying. Death is inevitable for all of us, right? But when people like you die far too soon, it’s hardly like they care. They’re just happy to collect our dollar bills and make money off our loss of you.

Here are some things I wanted to share with you that I’ve noticed in the last year since being back home. I was actually shocked to go down to the basement and notice that it felt like there was less “stuff” cluttering the rooms than before. Our dad apparently also got rid of my entire Disney VHS collection, all your old VHSs, and CDs. All my old DVDs are gone. So those two shelves flanking the living room mantle are pretty clear (just full of dust, which our mom wants me to clean during this visit). Oddly enough, I don’t even know where the hell my wedding DVD went…?

Chris noticed that funnily enough, there seems to be more alcoholic drinks in the house. I found a bottle of Canadian whisky, a new coffee liqueur, a pumpkin-spiced coffee liqueur, and two types of ready-to-drink margarita mix — standard and even mango! Chris uses that as a little drink for himself to keep him sane while he’s here.

I spent at least four hours vacuuming, dusting, and cleaning multiple areas of the house; after filling the bathroom sink with water and cleaning just our old bedroom, the water turned black. I also had to get a tall step-stool to vacuum up a bunch of cobwebs that lined the living room, dining room, hallways, and our old bedroom. It was not fun, but it seriously needed to be done. And every time I think I am done, I find a new area of one-inch thick dust or yet another cob web to vacuum up. I have lost count of the number of spiders I’ve vacuumed up this visit.

Also, can we talk about your bed for a second? Why the hell did you ever decide to buy a new TWIN SIZED BED for yourself as a GROWN-ASS adult?! Chris slept in it two nights in a row while Kaia and I slept in my old bed, and he had horrible, lingering neck pain for days after. The bed is so tiny; as a grown adult, you can barely move in it! It’s barely even big enough for Kaia to move around, and she’s 4.5! I didn’t understand why you did it then, and I still do not understand it. You always gave yourself too little — too little credit for anything good you did, fewer things than you ever deserved.

A few days before we left for this trip, Chris asked me if I was excited to go home. I looked at him blankly and said, “Meh.” He grimaced and said we go on this trip for me, so if I feel that way, I should question why I still keep going. The truth is that I feel very “meh” about it because San Francisco is a reminder that you are gone from this world, and that hurts my heart every time I think about it. While I feel your loss in New York or anywhere else in the world I am, I feel it the most acutely when I am back home… because that was and is your home. And obviously, I feel “meh” because I know I will inevitably have to deal with our parents’ emotional immaturity, their constant nitpicking and criticism, their endless drama, lack of reasonable rationale, and the eventual and inevitable fights based on a bunch of nothing. I am not “free” here. I always feel restricted here, even as middle-aged adult with a 4.5-year-old child. You were never “free” here. But now you are free.

Kaia is starting kindergarten at a new school in a couple weeks. She’s been asking a lot about you in the last couple months because she is just starting to understand death. She keeps saying on this trip that her JiuJiu used to live here, that he’s my brother, but that he died. And so she doesn’t get to see him. She’s said this a few times now, and a few times I started tearing up. It is a loss that you never got to meet her. It is a loss that she will never get to meet you. And it a loss that I can never see the two of you interact and have any kind of relationship.

Even though our parents obviously drive me crazy, I will say that during this trip, I do enjoy the quick moments of watching them interact with Kaia a lot more. Our mom is now 72, and our dad is now 78. They are getting older, more frail, and more tired. I can see it a lot now. But I can also see they are trying with her. And so you know what — that effort is enough for me now. I’ve made peace that they will never be the parents we needed, nor the maternal grandparents I wish Kaia had. This is okay for me now. It’s no longer a mental struggle.

Maybe I just feel this way because I’ve finally reached an age or the stage of “wisdom” where I’ve just accepted life for what it is. I just let things be the way they are. Even though it’s been over 13 years since you’ve passed, I can still feel your presence in this house every time I enter and exit it. You are still here to me.

Okay, I think it’s time to wind this down and go to sleep. I miss you, Ed. I wish I could see you playing with Kaia here. I know you’d have so much fun playing catch with her and teaching her other games the way you did with me.

I love you. I hope I can see you in my dreams again soon — it’s been quite a while.

With all my love,

Yvonne

Having conversations with AI about your parents and family dynamic

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My esthetician told me the other day that she has a client who uses AI for literally everything in his life. He told her he even uses it for therapy. “Why do I need to pay a therapist when I can chat with Claude or ChatGPT about all my problems?” he asked her. He insisted that ChatGPT gave him not only good, accurate answers, but even prompted him with questions back that really made him think.

“I was like, ‘dude, this is where I draw the line,'” she said she said to him. “You cannot use AI for therapy! It’s just not the same thing!”

I told her I didn’t necessarily think that AI should be used as a replacement for therapy, per se, but I do think that it can help untangle a lot of thoughts, experiences, and opinions you may have, and then synthesize all of those things and make some sense out of it for you to move forward. In fact, I actually did this regarding my parents the other day. I described my dad’s personality, upbringing, and general history, gave specific examples of (what I perceive to be) atrocious things he’s said and done to my brother and me, and this is what it responded with (much later down the line):

<start>

I would think about your father’s story as having two layers.

The older layer is probably his long-established personality:

early neglect → radical self-sufficiency → difficulty depending on people → poor emotional communication → criticism instead of teaching → anger when others violate his expectations → retreat into solitude → limited emotional intimacy.

And now there may be a newer late-life layer affecting organization, discarding, motivation, or executive functioning.

One of the saddest consequences of this type of upbringing is that a child can become extraordinarily competent at surviving while never learning the skills required for intimacy. Your father may genuinely have believed that providing materially and leaving his children to become independent was adequate parenting because his own benchmark for parental care was so extraordinarily low.

He could look at his childhood—poverty, infestation, working parents, almost no supervision—and conclude:

“My children had food, a decent home, and opportunities I didn’t have. I did well.”

Meanwhile, you could grow up in the same household thinking:

“Why didn’t my father teach me anything, talk to me, encourage me, or want to know me?”

Both perceptions can coexist. His history explains how he could have such a limited conception of fatherhood; it doesn’t erase what you and your brother missed.

And that may be the most useful framework for understanding him: he gave you more material security than he received, but emotionally he may have transmitted much of the deprivation he grew up with.

<end>

I read this, and I realized this is the same conclusion I came to in my mid-twenties to make sense of my dad. I always knew he loved us and was concerned about us; he just had zero idea how to show us he loved us. He is just so terrible with words. He was emotionally illiterate, yet he obviously provided for us and never let us be without food, clothing, supplies, and shelter. Ed and I always knew we grew up with a million times more than what our dad grew up with. About a year before Ed died, I tried to explain this to him. I even told him that our dad wanted to make sure to save extra money to provide for Ed… because our dad wasn’t confident that he would be financially self sufficient after his future passing. Ed was shocked and didn’t believe me; he was always hurting with our dad because he got the worst of our dad. Our dad was purely brutal with him every chance he got. And Ed couldn’t handle it and just concluded that he was an awful person who never should have been a dad. But I said to him at the time that our dad has no idea we think what we think of him … because from his perspective, he thinks, “My kids have more material stuff than I ever dreamt of growing up; I did a good job as a father. What more could they want?” Ed could not wrap his head around this and said that was insane.

Frankly, I have a hard time understanding that pretty much every single time I have a difficult or annoying interaction with my dad, or every time I overhear him say something that I think is just unnecessarily harsh or bitchy. All the context and personal history matters, but sometimes I just wonder: does simple human decency need to be taught? I understand all of this academically, but to have to deal with it every time we’re together is just painful, exhausting, and not even remotely enjoyable.

Therapy nor conversations with AI about tough topics like this will “solve” any problems you have. But I do think it’s good to be able to allow AI to summarize all these experiences, emotions, histories, etc., in a way that allows you to make sense of it all… and potentially help you make peace with how you move forward with these tough relationships.

The baby tooth that persisted… and finally fell out today

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Dear Tooth 29,

We were together for so long, you and I. I got warned by my childhood dentist that if I were the average human, you’d stay with me and your opposite friend on the left side of my mouth, Tooth 20, until max, age 30, and then you’d both fall out. But you persisted! You never showed a smidgen of weakness or looseness… I thought that maybe, just maybe we could be together forever. Well, that was until tooth 30 decayed during pregnancy, requiring a root canal. And the root canal so close to you destabilized you, and alas, you became loose. That was in May 2022. Today is August 9, 2026. Since your foundation was destabilized, you stuck with me for another four years and three months. I kept thinking that you’d peace out sooner than that, but no, you tried to be as loyal as possible! I knew the end was coming very close when you completely uprooted on the inside of my mouth, and I could feel your teeny tiny roots sticking out every time I ran my tongue on the inside of my bite. So, I finally brushed my teeth tonight. And given you were squished in and not moving, I pushed you from the outside, and POP! Up you came! I loosened you from being wedged between the two neighboring teeth and out you came. A little blood came out, but not too much. The wound is fresh, still red, with a little hole there. But the tiring anticipation of waiting for you to finally fall out… is finally over. It was a bit anticlimactic, if I do say so myself. I had hoped that you would come out when I was in the comfort of my own home, maybe after flossing or brushing. And this is exactly what happened. A few weeks ago, I was scared that you might fall out at a work dinner — too much anxiety and stress there!

We had a long run together. I’m proud of how long you lasted. All dentists who have ever looked at my mouth feel the same. And well, Tooth 20 is still going strong, hanging out on the left side, the opposite side of my mouth from where you lived, firmly rooted in with its tiny roots in my gum tissue. I hope you will send it your best wishes to stay with me until my last breath. I really don’t need two holes in my gums, do I?

As for where you are now, I told Kaia that once you finally fell out that she’d be the first to find out and see you. And I kept my word. Chris finished reading bedtime stories to her this evening, and she asked me to come over for a good night hug and kiss. When I came over, I told her I had something interesting to show her. So I opened my mouth for Kaia to see. A big smile slowly crept over her face: “Your tooth fell out!” she whispered loudly. “Where is it?” I had you in the palm of my hand for her to see. She promptly picked you up, stared at you intently, and then tucked you under her pillow.

“My tooth!” she shrieked with joy. Well, sort of.

Now, she is wondering whether the tooth fairy will come visit her. I insisted that the tooth fairy would pay her a visit only when one of her own teeth fell out; she couldn’t lie and say this tooth was hers, even though it is a baby tooth! The tooth fairy will know!

Thanks for an amazing 40 years together. Okay, so maybe you came in when I was 1-ish year old and so we actually had 39ish years together if we had to be more precise, but the point is… thanks for sticking around for way longer than anyone thought you would. I will eternally be grateful. And Kaia is very, very grateful now to be taking good care of you under her pillow as she sleeps.

Sincerely,

Yvonne

Mourning for a version of a person that is gone

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I was at lunch yesterday with my friend, telling her about the situation with my aunt. I told my friend that when I was little, I was obsessed with my aunt. Ultimately, my aunt is the reason that I love baking because she was the person who spent quality time in the kitchen with me. She’s the person who always proactively asked me about what I was learning in school, what I was interested in, and actually wanted to know me for me. Although my aunt is genuinely a good person and always had been, I know part of her love and interest for me was because she looked at me as the daughter she never had. She had three sons when each time, she really wanted a daughter. So I got all the cute hand sewn dresses and hand knit clothes she intended for her own. I got showered with endless girly gifts and jewelry that she would have loved for her own daughter. But once I got older, and once she came back from being away in Boston for a number of years, she was almost a different person. She officially converted to being a Jehovah’s Witness. Her main concern was the congregation and her “brothers and sisters.” And since at that time, I was a pre-teen/teen, I was changing a lot, too. At that point, I was finally seeing with greater clarity all the dysfunction in my family with eyes wide open. I also realized that at this point, she rarely wanted to acknowledge anything that was ever wrong. I could never have a deep conversation with her. Maybe it was always the case that this was impossible, but when I was in elementary school, that never would have even entered my mind given I was so young and immature. But it always made me sad that we could never have a real conversation together. It was impossible and still is impossible for us to have any meaningfully deep conversation about anything. I don’t know if she is incapable of it or if she just actively avoids it. I guess I will never know; it will always remain a mystery to me.

I told my friend all this. She paused for a while and then looked up at me and said, “Wow. Do you think that some of this frustration is because you never really allowed yourself to mourn the version of her you loved that is gone?”

I didn’t know what to say to this. I suppose I never looked at it this way. It makes sense my friend would hear it this way since she’s a deeply feeling and empathetic person. I guess my friend is partly right: my aunt and I will never have that sweet, simple relationship we had when I was a toddler, kindergartener, or elementary school-age child, where it was easy and always just about baking, having fun shopping and doing playground outings, or enjoying treats together. But as I mentioned here earlier, I am not sure she was ever capable of having a deeper, meaningful relationship with me. So this second part is not a “loss” per se, but more something I wished we could have had that we just never did and never will have.

It reminded me of what my therapist said to me when I was pregnant and due to give birth any day. She told me that I should give myself the time, permission, and grace to mourn the relationship with my mom and dad I wish I could have had, but never got to have and never will have. It’s the same with my aunt: I do wish we had a different, better, and deeper relationship than what we have now. But this will never be. And we just have to work with what we have because c’est la vie.

Summer for the City 2026 – Festival Orchestra of Lincoln Center: A Mother’s Love

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For the last three years, I’ve been able to enjoy at least one pay-what-you-wish performance at the Lincoln Center’s Summer for the City arts series. The performances I’ve seen have ranged from orchestral performances to modern opera, but they’ve all been a little escape from my day to day life and a way to appreciate the arts scene at an affordable price just steps away from my apartment. Whenever I have gone, I feel very lucky that I can walk five minutes to David Geffen Hall and five minutes back. Ever since we moved to this part of the city, I always consider it a privilege that we live so close to a global performing arts space.

Tonight, my friend and I had dinner to celebrate her belated 40th birthday, and to see the Festival Orchestra of Lincoln Center perform “A Mother’s Love,” a series of mother-child inspired orchestral performances. What I had forgotten about and was reminded of was that there was a guest performance by Abel Selaocoe, a famous South African cellist/vocalist tonight. As soon as I heard his voice over the cello, there were goosebumps all along my arms. I could tell my friend was called to attention because her eyes immediately widened, and we were trying to see Abel’s mouth move from our far right seats. He was singing in his native language over his cello, but he also did quite a bit of throat singing, which I am not used to hearing. He used this deep, guttural voice that seemed to bring out more than a single pitch at the same time. It was such a strange and ear-catching thing to be able to listen to in person, and in a performance hall as renowned as David Geffen Hall.

My friend went a little nuts after, especially since she loves to sing and sang with a group at her high school. She could not stop talking about this cellist’s throat singing. And all I could hear was the sound of his voice in my head after. I immediately made a mental note to look this performer up on Spotify and ‘favorite’ his available music so I could listen to it in the background while working.

My friend and I don’t get out at night that often, but this was a great reason to be out. Every time I walk home from these performances, I feel thankful to live in this great, diverse, art-filled city, and to live so freaking close to the Lincoln Center.

I spent 1 hour and 45 minutes commuting this morning in Manhattan

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It is a little strange to think that it’s already been over 6.5 years of 100 percent remote working for me. The pandemic started it at my last job. Then I got laid off, found this job, and miraculously, I am still here! I accepted the role as a remote employee and have never looked back. I had always been in a office five days a week prior, as that was just “normal” back then. But now that I am fully remote, it’s hard to imagine being back in an office five days a week, every single week, especially with a child.

Because Kaia has been in school in Chinatown, I am usually on the subway six days of the week (plus Saturday when we’re out and about). I obviously love having reliable public transit since I hate driving. And I love the New York City subway. But occasionally, I have days like today when I really hate commuting when it’s not by foot — completely. Somehow, it took me over 40 minutes just to get her from our apartment near Lincoln Center to her summer camp in Chinatown. I had to take two trains, then walk about 12 minutes from the stop before her actual stop with her to her school. After that, I got on the 6 train to go up to Park Avenue South and 27th Street for today’s office space; that commute took over an hour because the 4/5/6 trains had some signal malfunction, and every single train was either not moving or moving at worse-than-snail speed. I took the 6, then transferred to a yellow train at 14th Street/Union Square to go up to 28th Street. When I finally got to the office just past 9:40, I realized I had already spent an hour and 45 minutes just commuting today. Just think about this: almost two hours to get from Columbus Circle to Manhattan Chinatown and back up to NoMad. THAT IS MAD.

When the subway is working fine, with no signal malfunctions, no sick passengers, and no idiots who decide to go on the train tracks, the subway is amazing. And when it’s not going great, which affected five of the trains I tried to take today, it’s completely and utterly maddening. And it reinforces my desire to keep working remotely or only consider companies that will allow hybrid work. So much time (AND MONEY) is lost when crap like today happens.