We’re spending the weekend in Detroit, and we started the day at the Ford Rouge Factory and ended it with a walk around the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor campus and drinks in the area. As we walked around the campus, I thought about the way I looked at the world before leaving San Francisco to go to school in the Boston area and thought about how narrow-minded I was before.

The truth is that I think that in general, all of us see ourselves as being “open-minded” people, even when perhaps none of us really are. I’m not saying that we’re each individually to blame for our narrow-mindedness because a lot of it is based on lack of experience, which is only gained with time, and also exposure (or lack thereof) to things that are outside of our comfort zone and familiar haunts. Before 18, that’s mostly controlled by your parents and where you live. By default, your exposure is limited. But post-18, and especially post-college, we do have to accept responsibility for our actions and the way we think (to a degree with the latter… I suppose).

These are just some embarrassing examples of things I was not aware of or thought pre-Wellesley. Some seem like they are trivial or not deal breakers in terms of judging “level of intelligence,” but when I look back on these things, I can feel my face grow hot:

1. Cantonese food is not the only Chinese food there is. That applies to one province, which in the grand scheme of China, though it’s taken seriously as a top Chinese cuisine, is not the center of China.

2. Vietnamese refugees ended up all over the United States after the Vietnam War, not just California. Minority populations started popping up in places I never would have guessed before, like Texas, Minnesota, Louisiana, and Arkansas. I made friends with Vietnamese women from all of these states.

3. A Boston accent exists, as does a Bronx, Staten Island, Queens, and Long Island accent. Not just people in the South and Midwest have “accents.” I have an accent, too, apparently.

4. Burritos are not really Mexican. They are a Mexican/American/fusion-type dish. No burritos exist in Mexico unless for some reason, someone thought they’d bring it from the U.S. into Mexico.

5. The world does not revolve around San Francisco or any other place I might choose to live in. San Francisco is not representative of the rest of the country and sure as hell not the world. The Chinese population is not as big, the Korean population is not as small, and almost no other place I will ever go to will be as politically correct 24/7. There’s are great benefits to living in a city as diverse as San Francisco, but the danger behind that is that we may end up thinking it’s like that everywhere else. I’ve had colleagues in LA who did not believe me when I told them how few Asians there were in cities like St. Louis.

6. I’m going to wait until marriage to have sex, and I think most other people should, too (yes, really).

If I never left San Francisco (or California for that matter) and met people from around the country and world at the college I went to, I may not have realized a lot of these things. Yes, it’s great to have a place to call home, but it’s not great or healthy to live in my old glass menagerie thinking that what is immediately around me is the same as what everyone else has or experiences.

My mom called me at 9:45 this morning, and I immediately got a dreaded feeling when I saw her caller ID pop up on my phone. Why would she call so early – was it an emergency?

Apparently, one of her Bible study students has to give up her cute little dog for contentious reasons. It’s a dog that my mom has been in love with since she met the little guy about a year ago. My mom called because she’s eager to take this dog home as her own, but she’s not sure she’s making the best decision. What do you think? she asked me worriedly.

Well, my dad loves dogs but hates the idea of animals in the house, and of course, the other things to think about are the costs, both in terms of time *and* money, that owning a dog would mean. My parents already rarely take trips, but now if they got this dog, they’d have to either find a dog sitter or a doggie hotel, which would be a huge inconvenience. Their schedules would need to revolve around this dog, and I could imagine arguments happening over it.

As much as I’d love for my mom to have an animal companion, especially given how much joy she gets playing with this friend’s dog… and her despondency over losing Ed last year, I had to tell her to pass on it. I think it’s in the best interests of each of their sanities, as well as their marriage. We’re all dealing with losing Ed, but I am fully sure nothing, dog or human, could ever replace what he meant to us.

Yesterday was my last visit to my therapist’s office. She’s moving on since her program at this hospital has ended, and she’s graduating this month. I still have her number and contact information; she said that I can call her to reach out or meet randomly whenever I wanted, which was really nice and generous of her.

After six months of seeing her, I’d say that my anger has greatly diminished; some of it will always continue to linger when it comes to my family members’ attitude and treatment of Ed, but that’s probably impossible to completely get rid of. I’m never going to be the person who advocates for everyone to have a therapist or not to have a therapist; sweeping statements like that are just stupid to make because while none of us is “special,” each of our life circumstances is different, so it’s really up to each person to make that judgment. Time always helps, but it also helped for me to talk to an impartial third party about what I’ve been through my whole life. It’s helped validate my feelings and allowed me to continue moving forward with my life instead of futilely holding onto the past and all the terrible, negative feelings and memories.

Part of adulthood is about letting go of bad experiences you’ve had in your life; holding grudges doesn’t hurt anyone but ourselves. The sad thing is that I can’t say anyone in my family has achieved this other than my dad’s older brother’s wife. It’s the least true of my dad and his two living siblings. I don’t want to be like that, and I owe it to Ed to not repeat the stupid, pointless ways of the generations before us.

After I spend a few hours last night thinking about the concept of suicide and how it affects people’s lives, Ed comes to me in my dreams. Well, wasn’t that great timing. Go ahead and come when the topic is related to you.

So as usual, I’m home at our cold, miserable house in San Francisco, and I’m standing in front of the bathroom about to get in. Ed seems down and has a sad face. I ask him what’s wrong, and he says he doesn’t know what to do. “I don’t know, Yvonne… I just don’t know what to do.” It’s like what he said to me and how he said to me in the days leading up to his death. I’m at loss for words, but suddenly I smile at him and say, “Want to make cookies? Let’s make cookies together!” I expect him to decline, but instead, his eyes actually light up, and he says, okay! Let’s do it. So we go into the kitchen and start getting all of the ingredients and utensils ready.

I guess you’re at peace, Ed. You finally want to bake with me, and you never liked baking when you were alive. You had all those opportunities to do it with me, and you never wanted to. And now you do.

A few days ago, Chris’s brother Ben was Whatsapp messaging me about a speech he will be making for Toastmasters on introverts vs. extroverts. He asked me what I thought I was. My response? I suppose I’m somewhere in between, but if I had to slide myself on the scale, I’d probably say I’m more introverted. Contrary to most people’s beliefs, being introverted doesn’t necessarily mean you are shy, are anti-social, or find being around people draining. It really just means that you enjoy thinking, crave alone time to think through thoughts and feelings, and actually feel energized when being alone.

I am certainly not shy or socially awkward. I love being around people, given that they are intelligent and not small-minded. 🙂 I love being the center of attention sometimes, but not all the time. I greatly enjoy being in small groups, but strongly dislike large groups, as I find them impersonal and at times even superficial. I loathe small talk and weather discussions and would prefer to chat about passions and ideas.

And as I look at my 2014 goals list and go to the Books section, I realize I’ve already managed to somehow finish reading seven books, and we’re only in the fourth month of the year. I suppose only an introvert could get through that many books in such a short amount of time.

Today is tax day here in the States. It’s the one glorious day of the year when after spending the last year having taxes taken out of your paycheck automatically, you may have to cut a check to the IRS for even more money! That was me this year, and it was a very miserable moment dropping those into the mail. Little people have to pay big taxes. I automatically hit “delete” on any Tax Day sales emails in my inbox this morning.

As I was writing out the envelopes for the tax vouchers yesterday, I remembered that last year, I e-filed and paid everything online using Tax Slayer, and I told my parents that for the first time, I would not need their CPA’s help (and he would not be getting my fee). Ed was concerned as always and asked what program I would be using. When I told him Tax Slayer, he immediately started doing all these Google searches and found a site that tore Tax Slayer apart with all its harsh criticisms. “You should have used Turbo Tax like I did,” he admonished. I sent him back the same domain with a different page that basically had the same critiques of Turbo Tax. He didn’t say anything in response.

It hurts to remember it now. I never thought then that 2013 would be the last year that my brother would ever do his own taxes, and even worse, that it would be the last year of his life. Ed worried about everything, even the little things like what tax program I was using, even when he was suffering so deeply inside.

It’s like his death is a part of me now – it’s not a devastating shock or even a past tragic event to me anymore; it’s like his death has become a huge part of my identity and how I perceive the world and look toward the future. Not everyone (or maybe anyone) notices it or can see it, but I feel it every single day.

I wish he were here today to scold me about not using Turbo Tax again.

Three days later, I’m still in travel withdrawal. So I’ve been spending bits of free time researching the next place we will be visiting for pleasure – the Adirondacks in upstate New York, and more specifically, Lake Placid. I have TripAdvisor links for hiking trails bookmarked and even have a Yelp list of restaurants that sound promising in the area. Thinking about other things seems so dull in comparison.

I’ve even started thinking about the next trip I want to take my parents on – something that could span three to four days, include good food and cultural sights, and not be too long of a flight from San Francisco since my dad hates flying. Vancouver might be an idea for next year for all of us. Chris and I have never been there, and my parents have never even set foot across the border. And it also helps that Vancouver has lots of Asians, so my parents would feel right at home. 🙂

So today was the big day that my parents, Chris, and I went to Sedona and the Grand Canyon on a long 14-hour day tour trip. We traveled in a group of ten to see the South Rim of the Grand Canyon. Like I’ve been told, it’s an astounding sight to see, even if you are well traveled and have seen lots of beauty, natural and man-made. At our first stop along the canyon, as I got close to the edge and observed the layers of colored rock, got a vertigo feeling when looking all the way down, and heard everyone else “wowing” at the depth, for the first time in my life I actually felt proud to be an American.

I’ve never been patriotic; in fact, I’ve spent most of my life being embarrassed by being American given how poorly our K-12 system does against other nations, how map-stupid we are, and how little we know about the world compared to how much the rest of the world knows about us and other nations. I get angry about how we make a big stink over pro-choice vs. pro-life and make it about morals, when the rest of the world shakes their head and thinks, what the hell is that about – It’s a medical procedure! I want to crawl into a hole when my crazy aunt and uncle get all NRA on me and compare the danger of guns to the dangers of pencils – if you ban guns, why not ban pencils, too?

So, it’s a big step for me to actually admit out loud that I was so stunned by the sight of the Grand Canyon and reveled in the fact that yes, it’s in the United States; yes, I was born here; and yes, I’m actually proud and happy for once to call myself American and be a part of this incredible country. I’ve admitted it.

I finally went to visit my therapist today after over a month of not seeing her. It’s been difficult to see her regularly given work has gotten so much busier. Having flown out of the state twice for three to eight day spans in the last month didn’t really help that, either.

But I was sad to learn that she is actually leaving in five weeks. She’s not actually a “therapist,” per se – she’s a social work intern who’s finally graduating and moving on to the next big thing in her life. I guess we all have to move on at some point.

So before we began talking about what I came to talk about, she asked me to spend some time in the next week thinking about what I have been getting out of seeing her, what I am taking away, and then compare that to what I thought I would accomplish by seeing her. I can’t honestly say I am better off just because I have seen her – time heals a lot of pain in itself, even if we secretly may not want it to. I do think it has helped to have someone who doesn’t know me personally to reassure me that I’m not becoming a mad woman, and that what I am thinking and feeling is normal. It’s helped having someone non-judgmental. All my friends are judgmental whether they want to admit it or not. They’re human beings who know me. That by default makes them judgmental.

She asked me if I might want to consider continuing to see one of her colleagues. I think the answer to that is definitely not. I don’t want to have to go through my life story with yet another stranger all over again. I will miss her when she leaves.