Category Archives: Child rearing

Phone calls from PoPo and GongGong

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Since we got back from San Francisco, my mom has been calling occasionally to see how Kaia is adjusting to preschool and being back in New York. Given that Kaia is turning four in just a few months, she’s definitely far more aware of her surroundings and what’s being said around her now than she was one year ago. When people call, she always asks who it is. And now, she’s been requesting that we call PoPo and GongGong. She wants to “see” them via the video chat, but she doesn’t quite understand (or accept) that they refuse to do video calls with us, and that with them, it will always be voice-only.

The other day, my mom called, and Kaia asked if it was PoPo (she could probably recognize her voice through my phone) and asked if she could talk to her. She started waving and saying hi to PoPo. When PoPo asked her if she enjoyed San Francisco, Kaia responded, “Yes.” When PoPo said to Kaia, “Kaia, I love you!” Kaia even responded with, “I love you, too.” Even though I obviously have a complicated relationship with my parents, this still made me feel really happy inside to hear them communicating back and forth like this over the phone. I smiled at Kaia talking to her PoPo and then started laughing when Kaia replied “No!” when PoPo asked if she could come to New York and visit her.

Right after we got off with my mom, out of nowhere, my dad called. My dad hasn’t called me in three years since that difficult email exchange we had in August 2022, when he lashed out at me over something completely innocuous and lost his temper in a big way. He asked if Kaia was there, and then he actually asked to talk to her! I put my dad on speaker phone, and he asked Kaia how school was, if she was going home, and then called her a “good girl.” Kaia kept yelling excitedly, “GongGong! GongGong!” Then, he turned back to me and said it was time to go, and to take care. Then, we said bye and hung up.

I don’t think I will ever have an uncomplicated, 100 percent peaceful relationship with my parents where we fully understand or even accept each other. But after all that’s happened in our life together, I know deep in my soul that they tried the best that they could… even if their best was not always great with Ed or me. I know they love me and want what’s best for me. At the end of the day, I have an infinitely better and more privileged life than they could have ever even imagined for themselves. And a lot of it is because of them and what they’ve given me. And well, even if our relationship continues to be complicated, annoying, and absolutely infuriating, I do want them to have a relationship with Kaia, their only grandchild, and I want Kaia to know them and love them. So, these brief little phone exchanges have had a weird way of almost feeling like bits of healing for me.

I hope Ed is able to see all of this and smile down at us. I only wish he could also interact with Kaia directly in the flesh now.

First day of Pre-K was what I expected: lots of “big feelings”

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Thursday was Kaia’s first official day of Pre-K, aka 4K, aka preschool. She’s attending the same school as she did 3K, so same commute down to Chinatown, same building, same set of faces. But this time, she’s in a different classroom with different teachers and maybe a few different students. The enrollment is pretty low right now: we were told there are only six kids in her class, three returning (so she has two familiar faces with her right now). The other three kids are TBD. On the first day of school, it was just the three kids from last year’s 3K class, so a tiny group.

I picked her up at around 5 as I always do. Kaia was pretty quiet. She walked and willingy held my hand, but as per usual, she didn’t really want to talk much. She demanded treats (she got two mandarins). And on the way home, I had this prediction in my head that she’d probably have a difficult evening. And I was exactly right.

Dinner was painful. She whined and whinged through the entire meal. She expressed she didn’t understand why some kids were no longer in her class or school anymore (some had left for other, closer schools; others were moving up to kindergarten at elementary schools). She didn’t know why she wasn’t in her same classroom with the same teachers as last year (different class, higher level up, so different teachers). We tried to explain to her, but to no avail. She cried and was really upset. Her shower wasn’t any better; she cried almost the whole way through it. Drying her off, applying lotion, and blow drying her hair felt like an Olympic feat. I was mentally exhausted by the end of it. Before it was time for Chris to read to her and put her to bed, I just held her for a little bit. My poor, sweet baby: she’s just so confused about all these things all at the same time.

I figured it would take time to adjust to all the changes. This is a lot to handle for her age — so many changes all at once, and so many big feelings for such little people. But that’s what getting older is all about: handling lots of change all the time and figuring out how to manage your emotions all at the same time. People my age and older are still trying to manage all that without losing their crap.

Kaia tries to invade our bed and bring all her faves with her

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Co-sleeping is a practice that is not embraced or encouraged in the West, but in the East, it’s quite common for parents to share their beds with their kids as old as 10 to 12 years old depending on the country and region. Kaia is like any other child: she wants to feel safe and loved, and she feels that way when she is close to her parents. So it’s been a mini struggle on and off since she turned 1 to get her to sleep in her own crib, then bed. She’s now sleeping on her own with a little fighting here and there, but for the most part, she sleeps almost the entire night in her own floor bed. Sometime between 5-7am, she will wander over to our bed. And along with her, she will drag her favorite stuffed animal(s) of the moment, a random book, a blanket, her waterproof blanket (that we keep under her in case she wets the bed).

Although I do want her to sleep on her own, I would be lying if I said that I did not think this was cute, or if I said I genuinely did not like it. It’s her way of showing that she needs us, that she wants to be close to us, and who can fault that in a young child of her age? When it’s between 6-7am, I always like it when she comes over with all her stuff, taps my back, face, or head, and says, “Mama! Mama! I wanna come!” And then I help her onto the bed, under our covers, and she gets in. Then, if I don’t wrap my arms around her, she demands, “Mama, cuddle! Cuddle!” And then I hold her, and she drifts off into a little sleep before it’s time to start our day.

“Keep her out of my bed,” Chris always warns before he falls asleep for the night. For the most part, we do. But sometimes, I don’t really mind it when she comes earlier than 6am. It’s a way to show she loves us and needs us. And I’ll savor these sweet moments as long as I can.

Kaia’s first day of preschool, and reflections on my child’s developing humor

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Today is Kaia’s first official day of Pre-K, aka 4K, aka preschool, aka the year before official, formal schooling begins for her. We’ve been really fortunate to live in New York City in a time when Universal Pre-K (UPK) has not only been offered, but also because we were lucky enough to get a spot for both 3K and 4K, and at a Chinese immersion school that offers 3.5 fresh meals cooked onsite every day. While she dawdled with breakfast this morning, Kaia was eager to start the day and get into her promised first-day-of-school outfit: her much awaited Ms. Rachel dress, complete with a polka-dotted tutu that Chris got her months ago; I decided that today would be a good momentous occasion to finally let her wear it. Plus, it would likely fit her better at this point since we sized up. We took first-day-of-school photos with her updated letter board from birth, and Chris took her down to Chinatown for her first day in class with Ms. Vicky, her new teacher. Her new Chinese teacher is still to be confirmed.

It’s always a bit bittersweet, these milestone moments in her life. Every day is a gift watching her grow, develop, learn new things, find her likes and dislikes, and become her own person with her own unique personality and quirks. But every day that she gets older and reaches these moments, I know that she’s moving farther and farther away from me. Because that is ultimately the goal of “successful” parenting: getting your child to grow into an independent, self-sufficient adult who no longer “needs” you to survive. Every now and then, I go through old photos and videos on my phone or in our Google Photos, and I re-watch videos of her from a few months ago, a year, two years, three years ago.. even from the minute she was first born. It’s crazy to see how much she’s developed in every single way: her speech development, the clarity of her words in two (sometimes three – Cantonese!) languages; how her limbs have gotten so much longer, how the sweet baby fat on her cheeks, arms, legs, and all her joints has been slowly dissipating. I get nostalgic. Yes, those days were tougher, but my heart was always so full of love and a deep sense of gratitude that I was lucky enough to not only become a mother, but also become a mama to this very cheeky and sweet Kaia Pookie.

A friend of mine who has two kids told me that the one thing she regretted not doing more of with both kids was taking more videos. She says most people focus on photos because they’re easier (and they take less space!), but she said she always loved the sounds her babies made, and also being able to see how their sounds progressed into babble into words and then finally into sentences. So because of what she said, I probably still, to this day, take more videos than I should (if only Google Photos storage was free….) because I hate to think I could actually forget one of these cute or hilarious moments with my Kaia. Some of my absolute favorite videos of her are when she’s simply busting out laughing over something that I don’t quite understand, but because I just adore the sound of her laughter so much, I go along with it. There was a video when I kept encouraging her to “Biiiite. Chew, chew!” And she’d laugh hysterically every time I said “bite,” and then repeat it after me with her high-pitched laugh. Another video that I love is when I did a version of “peek-a-boo” and keep my back towards her. Holding her Habbi Habbi language wand, I’d jump up and say, Haaaabbiiiiiii, HABBI!” And when I’d say the second “Habbi,” I’d jump around to face her with the wand, and she’d crack up almost nonstop; she even slapped her hands together and on the bed multiple times.

I thought about Kaia’s early humor, her “peek-a-boo” excitement, her imitations, her “tricks” on us, and when she now tries to hide things in her one of her palms and wants us to guess which palm has the secret object, all while I was reading this place on “Why Are Kids So Funny?” in The New Yorker this week. The article mentions how babies often wait a month or two to smile, then a couple more to start laughing, “but once the humor gets going, it achieves what A.I. researchers might call a ‘fast takeoff.'” Human beings are distinctive for many reasons, but maybe “the speed with which children embrace humor suggests that it, too, is fundamental to human nature. We laugh, therefore we are.” Humor “allows human beings to find their way into their own humanity and into the human community.” I was reminded of just days ago when at dinner time, Kaia noticed that my mom calls my dad “Cal,” short for “Calvin.” When my mom calls him “Cal,” many people’s ears will register this as “cow” because of her accent, and so Kaia thought this was so funny that she started saying, “Cow, mooo! Cow, cow, go home, cow!” I am not quite sure where the “go home!” part came from, but the “Cal sounds like cow” connection cracked me up. And she said it so many times I lost count. My mom found this funny, while my dad didn’t quite get it and carried on as though he didn’t hear anything.

I love watching my child laugh and be funny, and trying to elicit our own smiles and laughter. I love watching her find her way into her own personality, her own humanity, and finding her way with the people around her. Watching her experience life and grow has definitely made me a better, more empathetic person. It’s honestly hard for me to even imagine life without this little cheeky bubba of mine. And with her, there is most definitely far more humor in my own life, our shared life.

Clams, “bivalves,” smaller portions, and the love language of food in Asian families

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During our last two nights in San Francisco, I purposely didn’t make any plans because I figured we should spend those meals with my parents. After the fiasco of the previous Saturday lunch in the Sunset when my dad was scrolling his phone most of the time, my mom joining him and started scrolling her phone, their complaining that the food was taking too long (as they always do when it’s a place I pick), and then my mom refusing to pose for a quick selfie Chris wanted to take (Chris said this was the true cherry on top), neither Chris nor I wanted another meal out with them. They are most comfortable in their own home for them to come and go as they wish, for my dad to leave the table the second he’s done, for my mom to fuss about every five minutes on something unimportant. When we got back to the house on Friday late afternoon and my mom suggested we eat dinner out at a specific (and unnamed because she rarely knows the names of any place) restaurant, multiple times I declined and said we’d just order out. I suggested a neighborhood pizza spot, Gaspare’s, where we could order online and pick up, and so we did that. We got a pizza for us (half mushroom/sausage, half mushroom/pesto), and an order of clams and linguine for Pookster.

I didn’t think much of getting a separate order for Kaia since we know she’s not really into pizza, but I didn’t think that my parents would be so impressed that she likes bivalves. They marveled over her pulling out each individual clam from the shell and shoving it into her mouth. She also picked at the endless little clams that were dotted throughout the pasta between bites of the linguine noodles. And my mom couldn’t believe someone so young was into clams (while she also freaked out in the beginning, insisting that the clam shells could be dangerous with potentially sharp edges). In the process of ordering the clams with linguine, I had also forgotten my dad loves clams, so he also enjoyed this dish while pretend-fighting with Kaia to eat some of her clams.

My parents clearly made a mental note about Kaia and her love of mollusks, so when they ordered takeout tonight from a local Cantonese spot, they ordered one fish dish and one scallop dish. I was surprised when they unveiled the food to see that the scallops were actually presented directly on their shells, and under a bed of vermicelli noodles seasoned with a generous amount of garlic and scallions. Unfortunately, Kaia is not as interested in scallops, but they wouldn’t have known that when they chose this food. In the end, she mostly ate the noodles that were elegantly placed on top of the scallop shells. While the flavor of the dish was very good, I was a bit disappointed with how teeny tiny the scallops were. I didn’t want to say anything to make it seem like I was critical, but overall, the quantity of scallops and the size were a true letdown.

The next day, my dad asked me how much we paid for the clams and linguine. When I told him, he exclaimed what good value it was because that scallop dish he got was four dollars less, but had barely any food to eat. I always smile a little to myself every time my dad inadvertently compliments me (or anyone, really) because compliments do not come naturally to him. He is 100 times more likely to poo poo on anything than to praise.

One thing I noticed they did differently during this visit is that not only was there far less food in the fridge (though somehow, there were over a hundred eggs in the fridge, for reasons I have zero visibility into…), but they also ordered far less food for our meals together, which meant they’d have far less food left over. I was really happy about this. No one enjoys eating leftovers for days on end, and given it’s just the two of them, they really shouldn’t have too much food around, anyway. Maybe it’s my parents finally coming to terms with the fact that they are actually getting older and can’t just keep eating the same or keep storing food forever (though I did have to throw a lot of rotted cantaloupe and plums out because they had way too much fruit they couldn’t get through in time).

My parents and I do not have the best relationship — it’s quite far from it. But I do see and acknowledge the times when they do try. One of the few love languages they both share is food. It’s one of the oldest and most classic ways for Asian parents to show love and affection. I was really touched when I saw the scallops they got for Kaia (even if she didn’t like them). I like that they finally listened to me when I said not to order too much food, or when I insisted that we just eat at home.

I’m grateful that the second weekend at my parents’ place fared much better than the first weekend, and that in general, my dad seemed more engaged with Kaia and talked more, and that my mom seemed a tiny bit less controlling and more willing to relent than the prior weekend. We only see each other once a year, and it always makes me feel better when we end on a positive note.

What changes in ten, twenty-plus years

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I feel like every time I come home to San Francisco, I notice yet another thing that has changed. I hadn’t passed 6th and Geary Blvd in ages, and I was shocked while walking along Geary yesterday to see that the entire area that used to be the Ashley & McMullen family owned funeral home was not only demolished, but completely replaced by a multi-story condominium building. There’s no way this happened in just the last year, and I guess I hadn’t passed this part of Geary to notice it. I don’t know why that felt so strange to me, though; condos replace older buildings all the time everywhere, especially places like San Francisco that have a housing shortage. Both my grandma and my uncle had their funerals at this funeral home, in 1995 and then in 2000.

The Alexandria theater at 18th and Geary is still abandoned and looking worn down, a pigeon-poop filled home that is blocked off to humans by aggressive gating. Gaspare’s, the neighborhood Italian American restaurant in the Richmond, still seems to be going strong; we ended up getting takeout pizza and clams with linguine from there on Friday night for family dinner at home. B. Patisserie, a popular (and at that time, very innovative) bakery run by a Chinese American female pastry chef that opened in 2012, is not only humming along in the same location on California at Divisadero, but they have even opened a second location in the heart of downtown now. We went there yesterday and enjoyed some pastries and coffee before walking to Japantown. While I was there, I thought about the week and a half I spent at home in November 2014 because of my dad’s scheduled bypass surgery. His hospital was walking distance from the bakery cafe, so I remember meeting my friend there for lunch one day, and also going there on my own a separate time to decompress a little.

On Friday, I took Kaia to the South Park playground to play while I caught up with an old friend there who drove out to meet us. She was meeting Kaia and also seeing me as a mother for the very first time. It was funny to be in that area after so long, as the last time I remember being in South Park, it was summer 2003, when I had a full-time summer writing internship at WireTap Magazine, a now defunct youth magazine that was owned by the Independent Media Institute (which also used to own Mother Jones). Over twenty years ago, I was an aspiring writer in high school, and today, I am living across the country and am a mother. The play structure had completely changed in the children’s play area, yet the park and surrounding buildings all felt the same. Even some of the fancy cafes that were there twenty years ago still remain today, like Caffe Centro.

People always say things like, “If these walls could talk….” The truth is that there are memories that are conjured every time you walk through old hallways, streets, and neighborhoods that you had frequented, especially when you call the city or town your childhood home. The memories are always a mix of happy, sad, infuriating, and even indifferent, but they are ultimately what colored our lives at a given point in time. Because Kaia is with me, I can see the city through her eyes now. On this trip alone, I’ve lost count of the number of neighborhoods we’ve taken her to and playgrounds/play areas where we’ve played: the Richmond, the Bay Area Discovery Museum in Sausalito, Chinatown, North Beach, South Beach, downtown/the Ferry Building area, the Tenderloin, Noe Valley, the Fillmore. I love watching her run around and play on these local playgrounds. Of course, they are not the same as the playgrounds and structures I played on as a kid, as all of them have been redone regardless of the neighborhood. But when I asked her if she likes San Francisco and being here, she vigorously nodded, “yes.” And that made me feel warm and fuzzy inside.

San Francisco Columbarium – changing hands, charging higher prices, and reducing quality of service

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Back in July 2013 when Ed passed, the San Francisco Columbarium was owned by the Neptune Society. About a year later, it changed hands and got acquired by Dignity Memorial, the primary brand of Service Corporation International (SCI), which is North America’s largest provider of funeral, cremation, and cemetery services. They own over 2,000 locations across the U.S. and Canada. I never realized it changed ownership. My parents took care of all of Ed’s arrangements plus their future arrangements ahead of time. I wasn’t even aware of the change of ownership until today when we visited Ed.

Over the years, the service has been really strange and inconsistent. They used to provide a decent coffee/tea machine in the main lobby. That has been taken away. They also had a really practical and logical digital directory where you could look up a loved one to see exactly where and in which hall their niche was located. All of these things have been removed. There was a period when they actually closed as early as 3pm (WHAT!) on random days of the week, and we were rudely greeted by a locked and chained up gate when we tried to drive in. Today when we visited, the main door to the Hall of Olympians, where Ed is, was locked. The sign on the front said to sign in at the front desk before getting admitted. It made no sense to me. We did enter through a side door that was closed but unlocked, and an employee was walking around from the main office and asked us to keep it closed for security purposes. But, there’s no ventilation or air conditioning inside, so I started sweating almost immediately upon entering; it wasn’t even that hot outside, as it was likely 69 or 70 F when we arrived, but inside that hall felt like a sauna. Chris insisted to the employee that the door at least be kept open during our short visit, so the worker relented and said it was okay just while we were there.

This annoyed me for a few reasons. Clearly, vandalism was a concern here, but the security guard who used to walk in and around the Columbarium in previous years was gone. So this led us to the conclusion that they probably stopped paying for security services (because they want to cut costs) and instead wanted to keep all the doors locked. That’s extremely unwelcoming and creates an uncomfortable visitation experience for families and loved ones of people who are interred here. My parents paid over $20K for this niche, and the service has declined over all these years to the point where it feels like we’re getting ripped off. Yet there’s nothing we can do about it.

One of the workers who helped me cut flowers to put into Ed’s little vase made it pretty obvious she hated working here and wasn’t treated well. “But no one else would hire me,” she lamented in a bitter tone. Before she expressed this, she said that it was tolerable to work here, “If you do every little thing correctly and follow all the rules and make no mistakes.” Ouch.

In general, I have always hated the death industry. It’s a necessary one (sort of), but one that preys on the grieving, on the vulnerable mental states of those who have lost… and many who have lost too soon, like us with Ed. This whole experience was pretty infuriating. The only thing that made me feel better was when Kaia kept peering into Ed’s niche and waving to him. When I told her it was eventually time to go, she said “bye bye” one last time… walked away, but then ran back twice to look closely at her JiuJiu before finally taking my hand and walking out with me.

I don’t know when I will first have a real conversation about Kaia’s JiuJiu with her. I am sure that at some point in the next couple of years, she will ask, and I’ll have to figure out the right, age-appropriate way to explain this. But regardless of how the topic gets brought up or which way the conversation goes, I have a feeling that she will respond with empathy and love. She is not even four years old yet, but I can see my Kaia Pookie seems to care deeply and have concern for others, even those she has not even met.

My mom’s first ride in a Waymo

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On Saturday when we went to the Ferry Building Farmers Market, my mom said she wanted to come with us while my dad waited for workers to come remove the staging in front of the house from having the facade painted. I figured it would be a good idea since now that she hasn’t worked in over two decades, she rarely has any reason or desire to go downtown. Plus, she would never be interested in visiting any San Francisco farmers’ market without me. Before we even arrived in San Francisco, Chris had declared that he wanted to take Waymo, the self-driving cars, as much as possible while we were within city limits (Waymo only works within the city and on local roads now). We took it a couple times while back here in August 2024, and Chris was eager to have the self-driving experience again.

So without telling my mom, Chris ordered a Waymo to appear at the house to take us to the Ferry Building. When it was coming up the block, my mom panicked when she saw it and asked if that Waymo was for us. “Oh, no, no, no!” she cried. “I’m not getting into that! This is so dangerous!” I urged her to get in and not make a fuss. We buckled in Kaia with her ride-safe belt as she giggled in glee and excitement. “WAYYYYY MOOOOOOO!” she kept yelling happily. Kaia is absolutely obsessed with Waymo and can spot any of them from far away on the street or through the window. Every time she spots one, she yells out, “WAYYY MOOOO!”

When the doors closed and we started the ride, my mom began to calm down. She liked the welcome message, that it says hello and urges you to fasten your seat belt and enjoy the ride. She loved how clean the car was and the (at-the-speed-limit) speed it was driving at. And she especially loved the message that came at the end when you are approaching your destination — it reminds you to take all your belongings, and not to leave your phone or wallet in the car. “Oh, that’s so nice!” she laughed at the auto reminder message.

Later, my mom admitted to me that she was really scared and didn’t think that self-driving cars should be legal. But then once she got into the car, she realized how comfortable, clean, and nice it was. “It’s so clean and well maintained!” my mom exclaimed. “And it drives so safely (read: slower)!”

The very first time I got into a Waymo in August 2024, I was a bit leery initially. But after the first 30 seconds, I got used to it right away and love it. As Chris loves to create verbal bullet points for all the pros of self-driving cars, his points are all true: these cars are safer. You don’t have to worry about a driver judging you for any reason (what you look like, how you talk, what you talk about, how long it takes you to load the trunk/get in the car/get your child properly fastened in). There’s no need to feel rushed when getting in and out of the car because the driver will negatively rate you. If you need to take a phone call or call someone, you can do it without annoying the driver. You also don’t have to worry about whether you are slamming the door or trunk too hard, whether you are bothering your driver with any seat preferences you may have (some Uber/Lyft drivers really don’t like it when you sit in the front seat alongside them). And you have full control over things like heating/air conditioning and music and can calibrate them yourself.

And as someone who has always hated driving and hasn’t driven a car since 2008, I think that self-driving cars really should be the future!

The moment I wanted to bash my mother’s face in

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Before I became a mother and would tell older colleagues and friends that I’d never trust my parents with my future children alone, many of them scoffed at me and said I was just saying that. They insisted that once the reality of how expensive daycare, nannies, and babysitters are had hit me that I’d relent and give in — to allow my parents the pleasure of having “quality” time with their grandchild, and also to relieve my bank account from paying exorbitant sums for mediocre childcare.

Kaia is over 3.5 years old now, and I still have not relented. And the few moments I do, I regret it because she gets exposed to all kinds of dangerous things just in my parents’ house. Their pills, both vitamin supplements AND prescription medications (who the hell can keep track of which is what?) are scattered all over random surfaces and tables and benches. My mom leaves sharp knives and scissors in her reach. My dad has razor blades and high blood pressure medication just inches from her little hands as though it’s no big deal. And the place is just filthy with mouse droppings everywhere. She got her hand and foot snapped in mouse traps. And to make things even worse, my mom refuses to listen to me when I tell her not to give her any candy. My parents’ house has so much candy in endless forms in every nook and cranny of the house that I cannot even keep track of it all!

I got so mad at the cob webs all over the walls and ceilings of the bathroom — these have been there likely since the pandemic and no one has made any attempt to clean them up. So, this morning just before 8am, I took out my dad’s old vacuum, climbed up on top of the sink, and started vacuuming. Both my mom and Kaia were confused as to why I was vacuuming. I looked at my mom and said, “Do you think these cob webs are clean? A spider will come bite and kill you!”

Shortly after my vacuuming stint, my mom said she was leaving for her JW Sunday morning. So I figured we’d have some quiet time in the house before we left to meet my friends and their kids for a morning at the Bay Area Discovery Museum. But then Chris came over and asked, “Why is Hoj outside with your mom?” Confused and annoyed, I went outside to see that my mom was standing in the driveway, and Kaia had already run up half the block on her own, completely unattended. I could actually feel the blood rushing to my face to see her just standing there, looking down at me. I ran up to her, grabbed her hand, and walked her down with me. The driveways are small and narrow on this block, and the visibility is low when cars are backing out. A driver could easily miss someone of Kaia’s size when backing out. Not to mention that at the top of the block is Fulton, one of the busiest, high traffic, and high speed streets in the Richmond District. What if she had run all the way up there on her own and gotten hit by a car? So many awful, deadly incidents could have played out if the timing were all wrong.

My mom stood there, looking at me helplessly when I brought Kaia back down to the house. “My leg hurts!” She cried in defense of herself. “I have a dislocated disc! If I ran after her, that would be it for me and I’d be dead!”

I could barely contain myself. It was like fire was coming out of my mouth. “Anger” didn’t even describe exactly how infuriated I was. “WHY DID YOU TAKE HER OUT OF THE HOUSE?” I screamed at her, knowing full well that this was in public in the early morning and could easily wake up the neighbors, but I truly did not care. She needed to hear how stupid and irresponsible she was. “SHE COULD HAVE GOTTEN HIT BY A CAR COMING OUT OF A DRIVEWAY AND DIED! SHE COULD HAVE DIED BECAUSE OF YOU! HOW CAN YOU NOT SEE WHAT YOU DID WAS WRONG?! YOU WERE JUST GOING TO STAND HERE AND LET HER GET HURT? WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU?”

My mom proceeded to protest, but nothing mattered at that point. If I got any closer to her, I would have wanted to bash her face in and inflict serious bodily harm on her. The idea of my little daughter, my only baby, dying on the watch of my mom was far too much for me to bear or think about. All I could think was, first, you let Ed die, and then, you want to let your only grandchild die, too?! I slammed the gate and then the front door so she would realize how badly she fucked up.

Well, that was naive of me. After 39-plus years of dealing with her twisted logic, her lack of rationale, her constant victimhood, her holier-than-thou attitude, apparently I refuse to accept that she will never admit wrongdoing in any situation where she was, point blank, in the wrong. Of course, my mom wouldn’t acknowledge she did anything wrong. When has she ever admitted fault in her life with Ed or me even once? Instead, she spent the rest of the day thinking… how dare her daughter raise her voice and yell at her, her mother. How dare she be so cruel to me. When Chris brought Kaia back to the house before I came home from my spa afternoon, my mom confronted him about the situation to try to “explain” what happened — all defensive, zero remorse. Regardless, he wasn’t going to deal with her; that was my job since she’s my mother. He simply told her to keep Kaia in the house and walked away.

Then when I did laundry this evening, once again, she tried to defend herself, saying she would have died if she tried to run after Kaia (the cripple sob story because she just let her 3.5 year old grandchild out of the house, completely unattended where cars could potentially hit and kill her — no big deal, right? If she ran, she’d push her disc further out of alignment, and thus her back would be ruined and she’d die, etc.). My mom said she was upset because the real problem was that I actually had the guts to yell at her. “What kind of child speaks to their mother this way? What kind?!” Refusing to admit wrongdoing is a theme in my family – and something I want to break the cycle of.

“You can talk to your husband or your mother-in-law like that, but never to me! I will not accept it!” she hissed.

I insisted she was wrong, that she put my child in danger, that I could never trust her to care for Kaia, that neither of them could ever be trusted with her unattended; and how insane that she would ever suggest I leave Kaia with her at home while I went out with my friends. “She would be dead by the time I got back!” I yelled at her.

I ended the conversation by walking away. I refuse to normalize stupidity and irresponsibility. I refuse to accept child negligence and constant verbal abuse and gaslighting — even of adult children. I will not.

Kaia expects visitors at dinner now

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Last week, Kaia got to be in the company of Chris’s cousin, her husband, and their baby for three days at dinner time. This week, she had Chris’s friend unexpectedly visit and have dinner with us on Tuesday. Then yesterday, our friend came over to see and play with her before she and I went out to dinner together. So, she’s been quite used to having company over. And Kaia being Kaia, she loves being around people and being social in her very toddler-esque ways. So when we came home today, she asked if “friends” would come over. I told her that tonight, we’d have no one coming over, that it would just be the three of us before we got ready for bed and got on a plane to go to San Francisco tomorrow. She gave me a very glum face and said, “I want friends to come,” and then demanded that my friend’s husband come visit (the friend who came yesterday).

I love watching Kaia interact with our friends and family. I love seeing her build bonds and attachments to them. And I also love seeing how she connects partners to partners and siblings to each other. This is my sweet Kaia Pookie making sense of the socially connected world we live in.