My mother & I

When I first decided to write, Brian got me a Masterclass subscription. He thought it would help me learn about writing.

I listened to Neil Gaiman, Amy Tan, deadmau5 among others. Amy Tan was my favourite. She gave this advice: if you don’t want to anyone to know, don’t write about them.

I didn’t know many writers then, but I knew Amy Tan. I remember seeing her books on my sister’s bookshelf as a child. There was the Joy Luck Club, The Kitchen God’s Wife and the illustrations of Chinese tea cups and dragons on its cover. What I knew about her work was anecdotal and biased. On the Joy Luck Club, my sister told me about a daughter slicing off a chunk of flesh from her arm and cooking it for her dying mother to eat — and then her mother ate it. That was the only part she told me about and from then on, I’d always thought the Joy Luck Club was about cannibalism.

The Joy Luck Club turned out to be one of the first books I read through a writer’s lens, paying attention to the craft. I realized that it was a story about a daughter and her mother. And in sorts, of unrequited love.

***

This year I stepped into my late 30’s. Because I’m approaching the end of a decade, the number felt serious. I didn’t feel ready, but once I got here, all has been well.

An old friend told me once that she didn’t celebrate her birthday much. Because her birthday was more about her mom. I was born but she gave birth, so it’s a lot more about her than it is about me. I kept her words in my heart.

It occurred to me to reach out to my mother on my birthday. I tried to come up with a way to acknowledge her part in birthing me into existence without making it sound cringe-y. I’ve never been so thankful for emojis.

She replied with a heartful smile, conveyed in text and emojis. And told me that I’m now the same age she was when she immigrated with us — four kids — by herself. She didn’t need to say more. I knew that it was a pivotal point in all of our lives, especially hers. And who’d have known then, that she’d carry me in her arms to this place that would remain foreign to her, but I would eventually call home.

For many years my parents travelled back and forth between Toronto and Hong Kong. Judging by the constant flights, I didn’t get the sense that my mother wanted to stay here with me. Obligation though, made it hard to leave.

She used to lament that I would not know Cantonese like my siblings. They were much older and were already in high school by the time we immigrated, and I was barely speaking. I was destined to understand only English, she said. But somehow her prophecy didn’t come true. I became fluent in both languages and it was critical that I did, because my parents never learned English. My mother would say that she never knew how I did it.

She was right about not knowing. Because knowing someone, requires paying attention.

***

Amy Tan talked about her relationship with her mother, that it was a turbulent one, and that her darkest memories with her mother fuelled her writing. She also talked about reconciliation. When she learned that her mother had suffered a heart attack but didn’t die from it, she promised from then on that she would listen, she would ask questions, and that she would pay attention.

I read somewhere that our personality is the result of how we are loved and not loved. And as children, we first look to our parents for love. If I were to write a story about my mother and I, it would be one of misunderstanding and unrequited love. I would describe the heart wrenching moments that shaped my personality.

Or would it go the other way?

Maybe it was my personality that shaped those heart wrenching moments. If I pay attention, maybe I’ll find that I’d misunderstood all along, mistaking another love story for cannibalism.