Category Archives: Family dysfunction

Gullible

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So, I just spent the last couple of days pondering how stupid people can be to believe headlines and articles like the ones I posted about yesterday. Now, I’m finding out that my parents are the ones who actually believe these things.

Granted, I had a feeling my dad may not have been on the Hillary band wagon in this election, but I also knew he thought Trump was “insane” as he said himself this past September. Why did I have this feeling? Well, when he was taking a break from his computer when I was home in September, I saw several open tabs on his web browser that had the label “Killary.” Gee, I wonder what positive things those videos were discussing and factually reporting.

Today, my mom says to me on the phone: “You know, if you want to know why Hillary didn’t win the election, I’m sure if you go on the internet or YouTube, you can find out all the awful things she has done.” She goes on to insinuate that the Clintons have murdered hundreds of people.

I insisted to her that she cannot believe everything she reads, and it’s important to have sources when citing things. I don’t know why I even bothered saying this to my mother, who has no idea what that statement even means. She got frustrated and said I don’t believe these bad things about her because I lack wisdom (yep), and it’s not like the government does anything for her, anyway, so why should she care about them?

I told her that if she really felt that way, that she gets zero benefit out of the government, maybe she should just leave this country. I mean, hey, the government doesn’t do anything for her here, right, doesn’t provide her Medicare, doesn’t give her social security benefits that she is happy to collect every single month until she dies, didn’t enforce her disability payments all those years? The government also didn’t give her two children free education from preschool through 12th grade, right? If I recall correctly, she had zero years of formal schooling in Vietnam, and if she did have it, her mother would have had to pay for it. And because my maternal grandmother was cheap and sexist, she refused to send my mom to school.

Sometimes, it’s like my mother has completely forgotten what she fled to come here for, and now, she’s just one of these same ungrateful Americans who thinks that government is all bad and doesn’t benefit people like her. She didn’t respond very well to what I said, but I don’t really care. She really shouldn’t try to act like she can have a conversation about politics when she knows zero about our political system or any political system for that matter.

Election results with mom

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Sometimes, I really don’t know why I bother. Maybe it’s because I wish sometimes that I could actually have intelligent, intellectually stimulating conversations with my uneducated parents (yes, and as my good friend’s proud-working-class-wannabe-hipster boyfriend who is 48 years old just pointed out to me, “And with that, you just lost the blue collar vote.” Well, fuck you, too. Now I need to apologize for being educated and understanding how to differentiate facts from fiction?!). We just cannot have an intelligent argument. It’s never going to happen, ever. But this is what happened on Friday night over the phone:

Mom: Are there riots going on in New York?

Me (playing dumb): Why would there be riots? What are you talking about?

Mom: Well, because that white man won the election and Hillary lost. There are riots happening all over San Francisco. So dangerous.

Me: That “white man” – you mean Donald Trump?

Mom: Yeah, him.

Me: Well, can you blame them for being angry? Now, we have a racist, sexist, bigoted fascist running this country with no experience at all.

Mom: Did you vote for Hillary?

Me: Yes, because I’m not stupid.

Mom: I don’t know why you are so upset. What has Hillary ever done for you? Has she ever put a roof over your head or put food on the table for you? What has she done?

Me: That’s the stupidest thing you’ve ever said. WHEN HAS TRUMP PUT FOOD ON MY TABLE OR GIVEN ME A PLACE TO LIVE?!

Mom: Okay, okay. I don’t want to talk about this anymore – there’s no point in arguing about this.

(She also made sure to add somewhere in this ridiculous conversation while laughing: “Well, he couldn’t be all bad. Otherwise, why would so many people have voted for him?” Ummm, millions of people think that people of color are inherently less intelligent than white anglo-saxons, and that women are innately inferior to men — does that make it right?!!!!).

There’s no point in explaining that Hillary as a woman would be a symbol of change and progression for our backwards country. I’m 30 years old; I still have not seen a female commander in chief of this stupid country. There’s no point in telling her that many of the policies that Hillary has advocated for have very likely benefited my mom either directly or indirectly. She could never understand that.

And as Chris aptly pointed out, “Hehe, now your mother is jealous of Hillary. That is hilarious.”

 

Cubs trigger

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For the first time in 108 years, the Chicago Cubs have won the World Series as of last night. For those of you who know me, you know that a) I don’t give a sh*t about sports, and b) I especially hate baseball. I think it’s one of the most boring sports on earth. The only reason I am writing about baseball tonight is that the World Series enthusiasm reminds me of the few baseball games I have been to where I actually enjoyed myself (whether I paid attention the whole time is another story), all games where I never paid for my tickets. And then I remember how mad my brother got at me the one time I went to a San Francisco Giants game at the expense of a company I was interning at during college, and he couldn’t believe I would go to a game with my company and not with him.

“It’s different!” I insisted to him. “The company’s paying for it, so I don’t have to spend anything on it! If we went, we’d actually have to pay.” (I’m still a cheap Asian at heart. Our parents taught me well.. or maybe not).

“That’s not the point!” Ed yelled back. “You’re willing to go with your colleagues but not with me! Who cares about the money — I could pay for it!”

I explained to him that it had nothing to do with my colleagues vs. him; it had to do with paying for tickets and not paying for tickets, but Ed would not have it. His feelings were hurt, and I felt bad and had to say I was sorry. He didn’t talk to me for a few days and said I was being selfish.

I look back and really regret always declining every time he asked if I wanted to go to a baseball game with him. Ed never had real friends, so he would go to a game only if our cousins went with him or if I went, or if the occasional church semi-friend went. And I always declined, completely forgetting his “circle” of people was so small, and that if I declined, it meant he may not be able to go and enjoy these experiences at all. All Ed wanted was someone to spend time with to have these experiences, and I denied that to him. Sometimes, I really hate remembering all the little things I could have done to have made his life better. There’s nothing left to do now. And remembering and then regretting doesn’t make me feel better.

Glass Castle

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On my birthday ten years ago, a little memoir called The Glass Castle was published and became a national bestseller, which was then translated into over 20 languages. I remember at the time I was intrigued by the book and put it on my mental to-read list, primarily because it dealt with real life family dysfunction and how the author got through it. I thought at the time that maybe something about this book could resonate with me. And this week, I started reading it, and it’s been hard to stop because of how honest Jeannette Walls’s voice is and how much I can actually relate to her sentiments around both her parents and her siblings.

The dysfunction I grew up with isn’t “dysfunctional” from a white person/outsider view because I had all the “basics” for survival that parents are supposed to provide their children: a safe home to live in, food on the table, the ability to go to school. These are the things that Walls and her siblings were deprived of; even though they were able to go to school, they never went with a packed lunch and oftentimes went by for days without a single mouthful of food going down their throats. I can’t relate to these predominantly “white” problems that the average poor Asian American family would probably not have. Walls’s family has all the stereotypical poor white dysfunctional problems: a deadbeat dad with a drinking problem who cannot provide for his family, a mom who is unfit to take care of herself, much less her four children, and is resentful of a mother’s responsibilities, the constant running away from debts for everything from rent to electricity bills. The four kids grew up going from town to town barely knowing what it was like to have running water or electricity in their homes, or a refrigerator with even a loaf of bread in it. Oftentimes, their mother would use her last few dollars on chocolate, which she’d eat by herself while hiding under the bed covers. Her children would eventually find out and take the chocolate away, splitting it into equal pieces for everyone in the house to share. The father stole grocery money and disappeared for days, if not weeks, and spent it all on alcohol, cigarettes, and prostitutes. The kids eventually had to fend for themselves, earn their own money, and find ways to get out of the house on their own. And they all did.

Throughout the book, Walls expresses her anger and frustration, but it’s obvious she holds no grudges against either parent. She makes it obvious that no matter what her parents did, no matter how much they neglected her or beat her with a belt, she still loved them and always would. In interviews, she is constantly asked how she was able to forgive her parents for what they did to her. But in mature adult fashion, she responds that it’s not about forgiveness; it’s simply about acceptance. Without the experiences she had, she wouldn’t be who she is today. That’s kind of how I feel about my own life, as I’ve been asking repeatedly by multiple people how I’m still able to visit my parents so regularly, how I was able to publicly speak so highly of them at my wedding events. One friend said, “You were so nice to say all those great things about your parents at the wedding. You really didn’t have to do that.” It’s true. I don’t have to, but I think it’s important to acknowledge that they weren’t all bad, and I have experienced a lot of life’s greatest privileges because of the sacrifices they made for my brother and me. Sadly, Ed isn’t with us anymore, and he was treated drastically different than I was. But to compare to Walls’s experiences, Ed never knew what it was like to not have electricity or running water, nor did he know what it was like to have a literally empty refrigerator. She says that her parents weren’t perfect, as no parent is, but she thinks they did the best they knew how to for her and her three siblings. And as hard as it is for me to acknowledge, even in light of Ed’s suicide, I feel the exact same way about my parents.

What actually does bother me is how a lot of people have received Walls’s memoir. I skimmed a few reviews of the book, and a number of them have accused her of fabricating information and exaggerating how bad her life really was. How much could she really remember from her childhood, from the ages of 3 to 6 to 9? The people who accuse her of this have clearly led lives within a privileged bubble and just have a complete inability to fathom parents who would feed themselves before their children, drunkenness that results in constantly losing jobs and falling deeper into debt, or delusional thinking on the parents’ parts that they’ve “never let you down, have we?” (I can relate to that. My mom insists all the time, even after Ed’s death, that she is the best mother in the world and no one else can compare. She’s not joking. She really means it). The foster care system in this country is huge because of parents who fall into these exact categories, and it’s so disturbing to think that people are not aware of this. I’ve even been asked myself if all the things I’ve shared with friends are “really true;” in the same way I’m sure Walls responds, why would I ever lie about experiences with my own family — what do I have to gain from this? Neither Walls nor I would share information simply to garner another person’s temporary sympathy; the reason we share stories is so that hopefully, other people can increase their levels of empathy and ultimately understand us and how we think better, as well as people who have had similar experiences. Because isn’t that what all human beings desire — to be truly understood?

Aubergine

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Tonight, Chris and I went to see the play Aubergine, a play about the power of food as a form of expression that could potentially be stronger than words. It was particularly amusing because the playwright is Korean, and it’s told from the perspective of a Korean American who has already lost most of his Korean language skills. Throughout the play, they touch on a variety of issues, including lack of generational understanding, the pressures to live up to strict Asian expectations and upbringing, the failure of Asian families to acknowledge many truths and human emotions. In the end, the protagonist’s father dies after not having had the soup that his son, a chef, had so painstakingly made for him as his last meal before leaving this world (he even killed a live turtle for this soup to please his uncle, his dad’s brother who came all the way from Korea to see his older brother one last time). And the son thought in the end, he didn’t even want to eat my soup; he died without me in the room. Not only did he not want my soup, he didn’t want to have his last moment on earth be with me. It was a painful moment.

Shows like this always remind me of the inevitable fact that one day, my parents will pass from this world, and it’s absolutely terrifying to me. In the back of my mind, I wonder and probably know that there will be many things I won’t get to say before it’s too late; it’s like how I felt with my brother. Except in my parents’ case, in a “normal” life, children should live to see their parents pass, not vice versa. I should accept this as a fact, as a part of my upcoming reality whenever that may happen. Will they know that I always worry about them and wonder if they are truly happy? Will they know that I always wanted the best for them in the same way that they always thought they wanted what is seemingly the best for me? Will they know I wished every day that they could trust the world a little bit more and have a little less anger against everyone? I don’t think so, and it’s mainly from a lack of understanding. And to be brutally honest, will they know that even though they may one day die, my anger against them because of how they mistreated my brother will likely live on forever in my life, until my death?

Sadness

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I arrived back at JFK at about 4:50am; the winds were in my favor overnight, and so our plane landed about an hour and ten minutes earlier than scheduled. I grumbled at the idea of going back to the office on time, so I decided to sleep a bit longer and come into the office late.

The first full day back in New York is always strange for me. It’s me, back in the freedom that New York City provides, away from the prying, manipulative hold of my parents. It’s away from all the clutter of my parents’ house, the endless screws and paper clips and razor blades that are scattered all over the floors in certain rooms; it’s also away from the darkness that is increasingly becoming my parents’ house.

My bedroom always looks a little more depressing every time I come home. It’s the bedroom that Ed and I grew up in, where both of our beds still stand, where the frames of photos of us and our parents are turned inward, looking stupidly organized (“the light will eat them up and they will fade!” my dad insisted, when he turned the photos away from frontal view. In other words, you cannot see the photos; you can just see the backs of the frames. What a great way to display photographs!!). The blinds are closed, which means no natural light comes into the room. My parents’ bedroom is even worse, with thicker blinds that block out the light even better, and piles and piles of paper, buckets with endless tools and screws, and who the hell knows what else all over the floor. There’s barely any space to get around the bed, and I honestly do not know how my tiny mother hasn’t had an accident tripping over something in her own bedroom yet. Oh, and they lock that room when they aren’t home, even when it’s just me home, which makes their bedroom even more like an unwelcome lair, hiding needless secrets that they never want exposed. In fact, they lock both their room and my old room, always fearful that someone will expose their secrets and get whatever rare valuables they seem to be storing.

In New York, I’m also away from all forms of irrational thinking that my parents have. So while they lock the two bedroom doors, my dad has had this strange desire, since Ed passed away, to leave the gate unlocked when he or my mom is home. It drives me nuts. Why would they keep the gate unlocked but lock their bedroom doors? Even though I grew up in this house and lived there until age 18, my parents don’t think I will close the gate without slamming it because many visitors slam it. My dad put in this weather stripping for it over a decade ago, which for a lot of people, makes the gate harder to close. You really just need to press it for an extra second, but everyone is too impatient and slams it. So my mom and I will usually bicker when I try to close the gate and my mom insists she will do it. That’s the kind of thing my parents like to argue about — how to close a gate and who will do it. When I’m in New York, I never have to worry when I go out with visiting relatives or friends about someone sneakily paying the bill behind my back (and thus my being “indebted” to them); I also never have to worry about others paying the bill and then getting mad at me later that they paid it. I always have to think about that whenever I go home. It’s a really irrational worry and form of stress, but that is instantly on the agenda as soon as I step into my parents’ house.

So despite all the above, the truth is that as soon as I enter SFO, go through security, and reach either the airline lounge or sit down at the gate, I actually miss my parents a lot for anywhere from 30 minutes to an hour. I miss my mother’s love and hugs and kisses, the way she is always concerned about whether I’ve had enough to eat or whether I will be safe. I miss my dad’s sheepish hug at the end of my trip, the way he usually pats my back awkwardly in his own way of showing fatherly affection. I miss my dad always asking me if I want anything at Costco (his Costco love will never die; he’s an Asian dad, after all, and loves his deals) even though I usually decline. This time, because we had to get some wedding photos printed at Costco before dropping me off at the airport, I humored my mom and agreed to bring back women’s gummy vitamins. She was so excited; my dad wasn’t, though, because my mom insisted on buying me the name-brand gummy vitamins vs. the Kirkland Signature brand (Costco brand) gummy vitamins.

I wish they could be happier and more content with life. Every time I leave, I know that their level of happiness will decline and pick up again the next time I come home. With my coming home, it’s something they look forward to. I’m honestly not sure if they look forward to anything else in life. And that always is a worry lurking in the back my mind, that they really aren’t living for much outside of me, their one living child. It always makes me feel sad and a little helpless, kind of like how I felt when Ed was at the end of his life and I knew he was struggling, but I had no way to feasibly help.

Leaving home

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Leaving home always leaves me with mixed feelings. I love my parents very much, but the harsh truth is that I cannot be with them for long periods of time, otherwise I lose my sanity. I always feel sad on the way to the airport because I know that my mom has that sinking feeling in her stomach, knowing her only living child is leaving her for the other side of the country. She starts worrying about every last thing: the weight of my carry-on roller bag, whether the night flight will make it all the way to New York (she thinks that flying at night is more dangerous, but obviously she’s just basing that on her lack of knowledge of how airplanes work), and if the driver who takes me from JFK back to my apartment will be a creep or not. She always reminds me right before I leave her at the curb side to stay longer the next time I come home so that she won’t miss me as much (that doesn’t really make sense, but it just means she wants me around longer, even if we do argue).

I always wish my parents could be more positive, that they could try for once to see the best in people and stop nitpicking at everyone in their lives, including each other. I wish my dad wouldn’t have a last argument on my last day with me about the shower, insisting that his tiles never mildew because he always wipes the tiles down after a shower (they will always mildew, just at a slower rate). I wish my mom wouldn’t accuse people like my aunt of trying to take advantage of her. I wish my aunt would stop inviting random Jehovah’s Witness strangers to what are supposed to be “family dinners.” I have a lot of wishes, but they will always just be that — wishes. I know they want the best for me and miss me when I’m gone, but that’s why I do try to come home at least two to three times a year to see them, and when I do see them, I try to have them participate in enjoyable, productive activities together. It’s always hard. That’s all I can say. It’s just inevitable that my mom will get upset over something irrational, blame me and start yelling. It’s also inevitable my parents will argue about senseless things, too, and blame each other for everything that is wrong. It is always hard. No peace exists at the house on the hill in which I grew up. It’s just a cold place with a lot of bitterness.

Space

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Being in my parents’ house, the home in which I grew up, makes me realize that having a small Manhattan apartment really isn’t such a bad thing after all. When you have a smaller space, you tend to have a lesser desire to buy more stuff, which means less chance for clutter. Less space also tends to mean less to clean, which is always a positive in my book considering how anal I am about cleanliness. But to be honest, being in this house for too long ends up getting me angry for some reasons that have little to do with Ed. It has to do with how inefficiently this space is used and how worse it seems to get every single time I come back.

This second floor flat is technically three bedrooms and one bath. Only two people, my parents, live here. Yet there is stuff everywhere — all over the floors of the bedrooms, on the breakfast room booth seats, and even sitting on multiple chairs throughout the house. The sunroom (the third bedroom) floor has model trains, busted computers and hard drives, nails, and screwdrivers everywhere. There are papers scattered around the perimeter of the room. And then right in the center of the room are two vacuum cleaners; one is busted open while the other one has a cord that is undone. In my bedroom, there are two beds. My bed is usually covered with papers piled high everywhere when I am not home. I know this because my mom told me. Maybe, just maybe if my dad cleared all the clutter on the desk in the room, he could actually have space for all those piles of paper.

The sunroom makes me pretty mad because it used to be the play room in the house, the house where we had plants, an extra bed, and fun things. Now, it’s a room that is completely wasted and serves zero purpose other than to dry clothes. A desk sits in there with two chairs (one of which is obviously extraneous) piled with junk on them. The desk is covered in about 10 different open hard drives. As someone who’s lived in Manhattan for four years now, I get mad when I see space that is wasted. You have all this great space, but you’re not even going to use it the best way?!

And then I thought, one day, I’m going to clear out this house, and I’m literally going to take everything and dump it into a massive garbage bin. I can feel my blood pressure going up when I see all the clutter that has zero meaning. This house is Marie Kondo’s worst nightmare. She’d get heart palpitations walking through this place.

“Hiking” with family

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The hiking day in Marin kind of turned out the way I expected it, meaning it pretty much got derailed. On our first trail along the Tomales Bay trail in Point Reyes National Seashore, it was quite foggy and cool, meaning that the beautiful seashore I was hoping to see was barely visible from our trail. We did, however, see deer and mule elk, and just smidgens of the ocean. It honestly wasn’t enough to make that trail worth it, though, and I certainly got that message loud and clear when about a third of the way, both my parents insisted they were too tired to continue. They complained and said the dirt path wasn’t good (even though it was extremely flat along 95 percent of it), and my mom complained that she almost fell. We probably made it about 70 percent of the trail before we decided to turn back. I really did not want to elicit the wrath of either parent on the ride to Mount Tamalpais or back into the city in the evening.

But then what really made the trip frustrating was when the gas tank of my dad’s car was about half full, and he said he needed to fill up. It was like my mom’s paranoia radar went off, and she continued to obsess over the gas and running out for the long, windy ride along Highway 1 to the gas station, and finally to the East Peak of Mount Tamalpais. We had no gas problem, but my parents made it into a needless problem to create a problem on this day trip. We took the short cut route by parking in a lot that was 0.3 miles away from the East Peak summit, and about 0.1 miles into it, my parents turned back and said they couldn’t do it anymore. On their way down, my dad loudly complained that he’s just not used to this type of activity. I could hear the complaining on my way up. When Chris and I reached the bottom and we were driving back to San Francisco, my mom insisted that they’re not as young as us, and they cannot go as far and as long. And I said to her, there are people in their 80s who are on this super short trail and they did it just fine. You can do it, too! It’s a useless argument because my mom loves to use the excuse that she’s old, therefore she cannot <fill in the blank>. She is technically 62 years old, and definitely able to walk up a bunch of wooden stairs that she refused to go up.

I would love it if my parents had a grab-life-by-the-balls attitude, if they took life as it came and didn’t complain endlessly about everything that either happened or has the potential to happen (the latter is real in my parents’ house). Why are we doing this hiking? my mom said. Because I want us to do an activity together and so we can see some good views! I respond. That was a bad response on my part, though, because my parents don’t really care much about views, and the only activity we successfully do together is eat.

Chris noticed that on the way back to the car along the trailhead, my mom was walking about twice as fast as she walked when we first started. This is how we know my mom is 120 percent capable, but she just wants to be perceived as not because she doesn’t like going outside and walking on anything that is not paved cement.

Embarrassment

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I think everyone, once we become adults, has at some point felt embarrassed publicly by their parents. It’s inevitable, right, that they will do something, anything, that will annoy you and make you feel awkward to be seen with them in public. Well for me, that happens almost any time I’m in a place with my parents where something is “all you can eat” or “all you can grab,” and they make sure to take advantage of that to no end.

Yesterday, I took them to the hotel lounge at the Marriott Marquis in San Francisco, where Chris and I will be staying this week, and they were wide-eyed when they saw all the snacks, full dinner spread, and fresh cut up fruit neatly laid out for guests to take. Needless to say, they wanted to take advantage of it, even if that meant stuffing a few bags of potato chips and a handful of apples into my mom’s reusable shopping bag. My dad took the liberty of filling a plate of food with pork loin, Israeli couscous, and sautéed spinach, and eating it, even though we had dinner plans at a Vietnamese restaurant just an hour later with Chris. “Why are we going out to eat if there’s free food to eat here?” my dad mumbled between bites.

I feel bad about my embarrassment. Really, I do. I was reminded countless times growing up (and still occasionally, now) that my dad grew up in a Chinatown ghetto with barely enough food to eat, which meant he oftentimes ate leftover spoiled food and got sick. My mom grew up in rural, poor central Vietnam with mostly rice and only rice to eat — not many vegetables, and meat was a luxury item rarely seen or even smelled. I’ve never had to worry about having enough food to eat, or a variety of dishes to eat, and now, I get to stay at hotels where the food and variety overfloweth, and my parents only get to experience this when they’re with Chris and me. I get why they would want to take as much as they’d like. To them, the world could end any second, all their life savings could diminish tomorrow (that’s what happens when you don’t trust the world at all), and so they want to take as much as they can and save everything “just in case.” Granted, my parents are financially comfortable enough to travel at their leisure; they just have zero desire to do so and find travel and enjoying life’s pleasures wasteful. They live like paupers, and when they see a lot to take, they will take as much as they can get.

My mom is aware of my feelings of embarrassment. That’s why she scolded my dad when he suggested getting a few more bags of potato chips. I overheard her say, “Don’t do that. Yvonne doesn’t like it.” I feel conflicted about it, but I guess this is probably what will happen with every subsequent generation to some degree. Maybe we’ll just never understand each other, or worse, maybe they’ll never really know me the way I wish they could. I just don’t think they have the capacity to know me and what I’m really about.

And that makes me sad because then I think: what if my future kids end up feeling the exact same way about me?