Chris has been waking up at unGodly hours the last week or so. This morning, he decided to wake up early and include a morning chat (or late evening chat in Melbourne) with his parents. I joined the conversation when Chris put the phone on speaker at some point. We discussed our apartment search and how it resulted in us staying here, my desire for potted plants, recent work related events, and my rasgulla making project. It was jovial and fun, with the much-anticipated “Tried any good reds?” question from Chris’s dad.

“Why can’t you tell (insert annoying name that Chris calls my mom) about how the rasgulla turned out?” he said jokingly. He loves to do this.

“Because she isn’t going to care!” I shot back.

My parents don’t really care about these things unless they know what the food is. And they definitely should not be told that we were looking for a new and more expensive apartment because my parents have no real knowledge when it comes to renting property; they’ve never rented in their lives and just think everything is too expensive. These are the realities of conversations with my in-laws vs. own parents.

My aunt has e-mailed me a couple of times while we’ve been in Korea mainly to ask me how we’re doing, let us know that she went down to LA for her daughter-in-law’s father’s funeral, and to let me know that she will be cancelling her planned Hong Kong/China trip in August in favor of time spent in Southern California and Oregon for her JW conventions. She sent me some photos from when she was down in LA, and it reminded me of the times she’s been a bit exacerbated by my dad. “I always e-mail your dad when I am away and send him photos, but he never responds,” she said to me with an annoyed look on her face. “Your mom tells me to e-mail and send pictures, but never even one response I get back! How am I supposed to know if he receives them?”

I responded the only way I knew how to: “He gets them; he just doesn’t want to respond. He has nothing to say back.”

The reason I thought about this was that while I am abroad, my mom asks me to e-mail my dad once a day so they know I am safe. I actually do this most of the time, but like my aunt, I never tend to receive a response. It’s always a one-way communication street with my dad. I even mentioned the San Tung noodles to my dad yesterday, and still that even elicited no response.

I was on a crowded train going home this early evening, standing in front of a grandma and her granddaughter, sitting down and talking in Cantonese. It was clear that the grandma had picked up the little girl either from school or some after-school program, and the girl was explaining to her grandma what her little pez dispenser was and how you get candy to pop out of it. The grandma laughed when she watched the girl dispense candy out of it, and she tousled the girl’s hair affectionately while commenting how interesting toys are these days (never mind that pez candies have been around forever).

I thought about my own grandma and how I lost her in October 1995. I was only nine years old, probably just a little older than this little girl I was observing. Rarely was she so interested in things I brought home from school, nor was she ever affectionate or touched me kindly, with the exception of holding my hand when I was very young while crossing the street. I think about how pretty much all of my friends have living grandparents, and it made me wistful and wonder what it would be like if she were still around. If she were alive today, she’d be 100 years old this September.

It’s a good thing she isn’t still here, though. It’s sad to say that, but too many terrible and destructive things have happened in this family since her passing. I don’t know how she would have handled knowing her youngest grandson committed suicide. She loved my brother very much and was often accused by my parents of spoiling him rotten (hardly the case). She wouldn’t have accepted a daughter in law fleeing to Boston.

On the side of things that aren’t “bad” but in her eyes would be horrendous, she wouldn’t have liked that two of her grandsons married non-Chinese women, nor would she have been a fan of my new brown husband, or the fact that he is from Australia. I also think she would have screamed endlessly at the idea of my going to college in Boston, and then again at my moving to New York after graduation and not moving back home immediately. I guess it’s all timing.

I wonder if she is screaming at Ed in heaven or wherever they are. If she is, poor Ed.

It is my father-in-law’s birthday today, so Chris and I gave him a call this early evening to send him birthday wishes. They are currently in Sydney celebrating with Ben and have been doing a number of fun things, such as taking a cruise along the harbour, visiting the famous Taronga Zoo, and having what looked like a delicious Malaysian dinner complete with wine along Darling Harbour with Chris’s cousin and boyfriend. We chatted about what they were doing in Sydney and what they were eating and drinking, and they asked what we had been up to. I told them about our banana coconut pancakes, our massage and our wonton noodle dinner in Chinatown earlier, and Chris told them that Ben should be using a FitBit and not some exercise tracker of Garmin, which would be going out of business at some point soon. All in all, it was a pretty standard Jacob family conversation.

The one thing I will never really understand but will always respect about Chris’s parents is that they really expect nothing of their children. They don’t get all angry if a gift doesn’t arrive on Mother’s Day or their birthday. They don’t yell if Chris or Ben calls the day after a birthday and not on the day of. They never seem to get mad about anything, actually. There is never a need for them to pull Chris or Ben aside when I am there and have some private “chat” where they are getting scolded at. Everything is out in the open. Nothing is a secret at all.

I wish that was the way it was with my family.

Today, two dozen yellow roses were delivered to my mother at her house. The last time I had flowers delivered to her three months ago, a massive fail happened, as the FedEx delivery guy decided that since no one answered the ringing doorbell that he would take the liberty of throwing the flower box over the gate. Needless to say, my parents came home to a dented cardboard box, and when they opened it, at least six of the 24 pink cymbidium orchid blossoms had been destroyed. I called the Bouqs to complain, and they issued me the full credit back to my account. I guess we can say that today’s delivery was “free.”

I called her after work, and she said, “What do you think you are, some millionaire? Why did you send me flowers again! It’s such a waste of money!” I know she loves them, as yellow is her favorite color, and few things put a bigger smile on my mother’s face than a vase filled with yellow roses. I told her that they were technically free, and then she got all excited, probably valuing her flowers even more now that she knew her daughter didn’t spend a hundred bucks on them.

“Stop and smell the roses.” Sadly, this is something my mother doesn’t know how to do.