No, this is not my pregnancy announcement. That is what the pill is for.

We just found out last night that Chris’s cousin, the one closest in age to him who was married five months before us in France, is now expecting a baby in August with his wife. It’s crazy to think about it because she and I spoke, and she seemed completely against having kids for a few years and even considered freezing her eggs. The pregnancy was unplanned and came as a complete surprise. She was experiencing nausea when we were with her in late December, but we just assumed it was because of something bad she could have eaten, and her pregnancy was confirmed when she visited a clinic a couple days before New Year’s Eve.

As soon as I found out they were pregnant, I immediately thought… I wonder what Chris’s mother is probably saying. Ben already filled me in. The conversation went a little something like this:

Ben: Did Andy call you?

Susan: Yes – what great news! Hopefully this spurs your brother into action!

Ben: You know that those two things are completely mutually exclusive, right?

Susan: Yes, but there is no better time than the present! It makes no sense to wait until the “stars align” — every generation has to juggle many things – work, travel, children – including yours! And my urgency is also because it would be best to get help from younger grandparents.

So… the first thing I will say is that neither of us ever made any comment about “stars aligning” — that phrase is empty and is the type of thing bullshitters say when they are feeling non-committal. The second thing is that — she doesn’t really think she and Chris’s dad are going to move here and help take care of these potential children, does she?

Granted, none of this was said to me, but I would certainly respond if she did urge me to have children soon. I’ve already flat out said it won’t be happening for at least a couple of years as long as I am in charge of my own body.

My mom wasn’t happy to hear this from me, either. She made sure to remind me of this last week. “I’m sorry to remind you, but I want to see my grandchildren. I am getting older. Don’t you want me to see my grandchildren before I die? You never know when I will go. It could be any day now.” Well, by that logic, if I got pregnant tomorrow, she’d have to stick around for at least another nine months.

It was always a great decision when people got guilted into their parents’ selfishness to make decisions about their lives and bodies.

It’s rare to wake up in my parents’ house and feel warm. Because the house is old and has no insulation, it’s constantly at least 10 degrees below what we consider “room temperature,” if even that. My parents have gotten so used to it that when a room actually is 68 degrees, they think it’s hot. But what has changed over the last year is that my mom has actually felt more and more cold, so they’ve finally been taking advantage of the central heat they installed years ago. I’ve been waking up the last two days feeling warm and cozy, even after I remove my bed covers and expose my arms to the world outside my bed. This felt very unusual and not “normal” for this house.

This momentarily made me angry this morning, though, as I remember Ed used to complain constantly about how cold the house was. Ed’s needs were never taken seriously, so our dad would reject it when Ed would say he wanted to turn the heat on. “Go put on a sweater!” our dad would yell. Then there would be the passive aggressive turn-on, turn-off battle between Ed and my dad. It really was so childish that it was embarrassing to witness. Ed would turn the heat on. Dad would complain and say no heat was needed (mainly because he didn’t want to spend the money on the heat. Isn’t money the main reason to not do most things in life?) and flip the switch off. Ed would go back and turn it on. The battle would ensue for as long as the two of them were home together. Or, occasionally I would insist the heat should be on, as I usually tried to side with Ed, and our dad would begrudgingly leave it on until he felt the house was warm enough, and then switch it off. Unfortunately, that never worked out because this house refuses to retain heat, so the house would just get cold again.

If you cannot be warm and comfortable in your own home, where are you supposed to be comfortable? Or in this case, Ed was never treated like he was a true, worthy part of this house, so his comfort was disregarded and ignored. And now because he’s dead, he’s never coming back to enjoy this warmth that I now have a chance to wake up to here.

In the late morning today, I sat in the Intercontinental hotel lounge while working, waiting for my parents to pick me up. My mom was hell bent on taking me to one of her favorite Vietnamese restaurants in the Tenderloin, which I admit is good, but is on the dodgiest street and has questionable sanitation based on the latest San Francisco health violations report. Then, we’d eventually go home to that cold house on the hill in the Richmond which I have so many negative associations with; “home sweet home,” as some would call it.

This is what I am used to now, as my friend marveled yesterday, a life of four- to five-star hotels, travel, and most importantly… freedom; freedom from having every action I do get scrutinized and criticized, freedom from being told that my showers are too long or that I’m using too much toilet paper or that the brownies I made are too sweet and bad for my parents’ health (even when they asked me to make them). Life now is a strong contrast to what it used to be while living under their roof and their senseless, suffocating, and irrational rules. My “normal” now is vastly different from my “normal” as a child growing up in this house.

That’s why it’s always so frustrating and embarrassing every time I come home and get reminded endlessly of all the insipid things that happen in this house: the constant food waste because they both insist on cooking enough food for 6-8 people when it’s just the two of them; the shower head that won’t adjust to pull down because my dad is too cheap to get a removable shower head installed, the kitchen that was technically expanded but never fully finished because he decided to put the project on hold.. for the last seven years; the piles of junk he’s accumulated from ex-tenants who never cleared out their apartments (that he insists on bringing home) and the hoarding from Craigslist; the constant sorting of “compost waste” from paper from plastic as what appears to be a daily hobby, or in my eyes, a complete and stupid waste of time; my parents eating dinner “together” while my father sits at his computer like a child and watches YouTube videos while my mother actually sits at the table eating by herself. Other than the carpet that my mother had installed 17 years ago and some cheap plastic “dressers” in the two bedrooms, this house is almost exactly like what it was when my dad was a teenager; slightly dilapidated, completely free from renovation, and freezing as hell. He never moved out of his parents’ house. This house is pretty much exactly the same as then.

But this is what is “normal” to them. It’s “normal” for them to sit like that at the dinner table. It’s normal to have a peeling kitchen counter when they could afford to have it replaced. It’s normal for them to hoard junk so that beds and chairs are no longer places where you can sit or lie down without clearing everything off them for five minutes.

My version of “normal” was once that, but even as a young child, I knew so many things here were not normal. I know that the “normal” I have in my mind now will never, ever be achievable in this house with them. Ed tried to believe he could somehow get there, and he realized at the end of his life it was impossible. The only way to have a “normal” life is to separate myself from all this as much as possible.

Thank God Chris comes here for work, otherwise I’d have zero buffer and zero normalcy.