i lie here, between a pomer on my right under a blanket, and the love of my life on my left, who moved ever closer to me once I retired. I listen to each of them snore. and I imagine the rest of my life in happiness with you. I love you.

Finals: DONE (for me)

And now that I am not in trances of utter despondence and anxiety, I can't wait to frolic you!  Date Saturday, and, who knows, maybe an early Christmas surprise that day too :)

Angst I

I wrote this piece for one of my classes in college.  I wrote a lot of personal pieces like this, that we would then intimately discuss in a group every week.  It was a growth experience for me, to let out angst in front of people who were basically strangers.  I feel like it let me feel more comfortable presenting an honest image of myself to people who matter to me.

My father and I have never been close.  We still aren't, but I still ponder trying to be.  What does it feel like to have that desire to talk to your parent?  What does it feel like to have a "Dad?"

I don't remember a time when my parents were happy together.  I wasn't surprised when my father moved out of the house.  My depressed, semi-schizophrenic mother ended up raising me.

I continued to live with my mother.  My parents were still married.

In the mean time, my father tried to spend time with me, his only son.  I don't think he knew how to interact with me.  I was quiet, introverted, precocious...I'm sure different than his perception of a "boy."

He would take me to Carnegie, a state park where people hill-climbed on their dirt bikes.

I can't tell you exactly how many times he took me there, but I'd say he took me almost every weekend.  Was he just desperate to connect with me?

But, the truth is, I wanted to connect with my father, too.  I wanted him to be my "Dad."  I would willingly go every weekend, hoping that I would find something in my father to connect him to that definition of "Dad," of "Fatherly Love."

But, I never found a "Dad" at Carnegie.  

My father would go off, riding his dirt bike with his friends, and I would stay behind in his gray, 3-seater Nissan truck playing my GameBoy.  I almost considered the Nissan my friend.  I had become very comfortable spending time in its cabin.

Often, I would preoccupy myself by collecting bricks.  Carnegie Park was once the site of a brick-making factory.  I would walk around in the 100 degree plus heat, searching through the rocks for those bricks that had "CARNEGIE" imprinted on them.  Unsurprisingly, I had acquired quite a large collection of bricks in the garage at home. 

But, on one trip to Carnegie, my father introduced me to his girlfriend from Iowa and her kids.  He wanted me to play with them while he hill-climbed.  My parents were still married.  I just wanted to collect bricks.

Sometimes, my father would let me ride on his dirt bike with him.  Sometimes there would be pits of depths of 700, 1000 feet.  I was always so scared.  I would have rather been playing video games.

___

On my eleventh birthday, my father bought me my own dirt bike.  I was scared.  I was scared that I wouldn't be able to ride the bike, scared that I would fail to connect with my father.

I knew there was something about me that would prevent me from being able to ride that bike.  It was something that I had always felt about myself since kindergarten, but not something I could ever put into words because I didn't have those words yet.  

And, I sucked.  I sucked because of fear; I feared because holding the handle bars of a dirt bike didn't evoke the same sense of comfort as holding a game controller in my hands while in the Nissan.  I would have rather been playing video games.

Why was dirt bike riding not for me?  Why did being around my father and all his male friends make me feel uncomfortable?

The truth is that I had no problem balancing on that bike.  I could have ridden it.  But, every time I would get going, I wanted to stop.  And, I did stop.  I never rode the bike for more than a minute without stopping.  I stopped riding all together within a week.  Dirt bike riding signified my ultimate insecurity, but also represented two of my ultimate truths. 

One truth was that I despised my father.  My father abandoned me. 

One day, my father carried a baby into the same house in which he left my sister and me to rot.  He introduced it as our new sister.  I refused to hold it, and, instead, held  my video game controller in my hands while my sister held our new sister in her own.  I tried so hard to block out the the reality that my sister was holding my half-sister in my own bed.

My father hurt me.  A dirt bike couldn't mend that father-son connection.  It was irreparable.  The dirt bike represented the irreparability of that "father-son" relationship.  Dirt bike riding represented that inability to connect with the most important male figure in my life.  There was no need for further effort.  I accompanied my father to Carnegie less and less.

The second truth was that dirt bike riding signified what I felt like I lacked in masculinity.  I am gay.  I had another identity that I didn't know how to reconcile.  My father, his straight male biker friends, my mother, my sister, my video games, nor that dirt bike could teach me how to deal with this realization.

My father loves me.  Unlike a majority of the world, my father doesn't care that I am gay.  Unlike his usual self, my father cried after my valedictory speech.  I know my father loves me, but, to me, my father is often just an obligation.  

This summer, my father had a brain aneurysm.  I felt indifferent, but hundreds or thousands of my hair follicles might contest otherwise.  He survived.  He survived without any loss of brain function or physical movement.  One could call this a miracle.  I believe I am indifferent.  But, my lost hair follicles say I'm fairly indifferent.

I drove him back from the hospital.  From Stanford to Tracy--a route with which we were both unfamiliar.  

We got lost.  We were driving up in the mountains, along windy, one-lane roads, and ended up along the same back road that took us to Carnegie.

As a child, I always hated this back road.  I was always scared we'd turn a corner and fall into a ditch at whose bottom remained a ghostly, abandoned van for as long as I can remember.  

I've been driving for four years, but this was the first time in eight (as rider or passenger) that I had been on this road.  The roles were switched:  I was the one driving my father along the windy back road I once feard as a child.  I wasn't scared to drive it, though.  I drove like a natural--cutting across the lane divider in order to ease the effects of inertia as if I had been driving on the road for years.  

Then, I noticed that the van had finally been removed.

Maybe I felt comfortable driving on that road because I left a part of myself on it.  (To this day, I still feel like this.  Since my Gramma moved to Tracy, the freeway entrance is just along the road that leads to Carnegie maybe 5-6 miles down, and I always feel like I'm sort of called forward onto that road).  Unlike the van, my hope could never be removed from that ditch, although it still existed.  

He was still my father to me--not my Dad.  I would have cried had I lost my father this summer, though, those tears would be tears of completely losing the opportunity to have a "Dad" and not tears mourning the loss of love.  

My father and I never dirt-biked together.  My father and I never connected.  Still, though, how do I make my father my Dad.  What does it feel like to have a "Dad?"

---

Partly thanks to you, my father is becoming less of a strictly father and more of a Dad.  Your talk with me allowed me to open my heart to him somewhat, and ever since I've felt a slowly growing spark of what may be love for him.  And, it's easier to accept him as my "Dad."

Thanksgiving with the Le Family

On the way over to your cousin's (using Waze :), I was so worried that I couldn't let myself think about how anxious I was going to feel, b/c if I did, it would make me fall apart.  (This is actually a mechanism of how I control my anxiety--let's call it "ignoring anticipations").

I never really realized how tough it would be to integrate into a family whose race and ethnicity aren't of my own.  Although my family is traditional in some of their views, more established American families, like my own, come to respect you when you command respect from them, too, so long as they don't have their heads blinded by too much tradition.  I know it's different in Asian families:  you feel as though you need to respect your family's beliefs that being gay is wrong because you do not want to upset that value, but I dream to be able to one day be a part of your family nonetheless.

Therefore, Thanksgiving was small big deal to me.  It felt like my first step into trying to integrate with the younger people in your family.  

It was very awkward.  You did not (re)introduce me to everyone as your boyfriend, which would have made me feel much more comfortable b/c not doing so made me worry more about being a new person, who is white, and Thien's BOYfriend.  I think you didn't b/c you were nervous of having me there yourself.  I had no idea how any one felt about my being there b/c I did not know my social definition in their eyes. Maybe they already know?  Even if they already know, I wouldn't know that they know b/c I felt as if I was sort of treated as an additional person there rather than as a person who is likely to become a part of the family.  I was sitting at the table, wondering how I was being classified by each person, (and whether they even knew my name).  I needed to know this so that I could know how to interact with everyone else, b/c my goal was to try to get to know some of your family better.  I felt particularly awkward when Tam introduced his girlfriend (of, was it, 3 weeks?) as his girlfriend, and then introduced me to his girlfriend only as "C.J." (your boyfriend of 3 years).  I do not blame him for his discomfort, though.  

I do not blame you either.  This is something I hope we can accomplish together through, well, some strategy at these get-togethers.  All of this was just the experience of, "Welcome to being in a GAY INTERRACIAL relationship."  I hope that gradually, (even in up to two decades, since we have to go to school still) I can be accepted as part of the family b/c if we have a family, they deserve to know your side of the family, too.  Heck, they'll NEED your side of the family b/c mine will be so small by that time:  if my Dad is not alive anymore, it will just be my sister.  (Maybe Karissa?  And, maybe my Mom, but that is not a person to whom we would send our kids for a "weekend with Grandma)."  Maybe you do not plan to integrate our possible future family into your family, but it is my hope that you will.  And, maybe, when we have careers and will be able to build a family, your family will respect us more as a unit FIRST for our hard work and accomplishments together, and from there accept us as lovers despite being gay.  Who knows, maybe you have thought about none of these things?  I only recently started thinking about them b/c, like I said, what is now motivating me through school is a future career and family with you.

With my family, my Dad will gradually grow used to you.  And, my Gramma is trying to come to terms still.  I always correct her when she classifies you as my "friend" rather than my "boyfriend" b/c I believe that our relationship deserves more respect than do socially constructed, wrong attitudes.  Powerful people, not passive people, create change anyway.  I also do not worry b/c my Dad and Gramma love me no matter what.  If there's one principle I hold dearly from the socialization of my childhood, it is that I always felt unconditionally loved by one person, my Gramma, and that feeling was so powerful for me that it helped shield me from as much volatility in my childhood as it could to keep me pressing forward.  Therefore, my heart is made to mostly unconditionally love, and you are one of those people I entrust with that feeling, and it is something that I want to teach to my own children b/c even if your life is hard in this already very complicated and difficult world, unconditional love grounds you in some small framework of happiness to prevent utter despondency.  I want to raise a family to love deeply and fight hard, and I want it to be big and with you!

The Day We Became a Spitz-Human Family

Oh my God, I couldn't believe that you wanted a dog.  A Siberian Husky!  Yes, so adorable, but...a SIBERIAN HUSKY!?!  It was very characteristic of you--wanting something (expensive) on an impulse--but I loved you, and you loved me, and this is something you wanted out of love.  So, I did too.

Unfortunately, our first "Husky," Corey, had a heart defect.  He was a cute little guy, but it was hard for me to love him immediately.  I think I could sense that something was wrong with him, so I unconsciously distanced myself from him from the beginning--something very characteristic of me, a defense-mechanism.  Lethargically, he lay at the foot of our bed on the ground, and rarely moved.  I felt very sad for him, and you did, too.

We almost didn't even end up getting Venus.  Remember how difficult it was to find the ranch and how much trouble I had understanding the man on the phone?  It makes you wonder what things you miss out on in life when you aren't able to follow-through completely.

Finally, we found the ranch.  Three little Huskies ran around with their mama in the kennel.  I don't know if the other sisters did the same, but I do remember that little furry Husk putting her snow paws up against the chain-link fence to greet us from the inside before running back off to mama and sisters to play.  Although you were debating between the blue-eyed sister and the long-haired, fiercely-countenanced Husk, my mind was already made up; I had been watching Venus Husky in the kennel the most, but didn't consciously realize this at that moment.  In decisions that do not involve pragmatism, I often sit back and let you make the decision with little input from me, b/c you need to feel in power of your own choices sometimes.  You chose Venus, and, immediately, I knew it was the right decision.  (Or perhaps my memory is skewed by hindsight bias--Venus-Husky turned out to be the cutest, most gentle, well-behaved Husky, after all.)

I couldn't believe that you, Princess Cute Cute, so willingly embraced that dirty girl, but looking over at you holding that stinky on your lap on the drive home made me love you even more that day.  I hope one day we will be able to have a couple Huskies and a big yard for them.  I just want them to jump on me and kiss me all over while I'm on my back in the grass (while you sit on the outdoor furniture playing "punch" with a pomer).

And, although it may make me a little jealous, I love how Kuma is your best friend.  There's something about her that brought out a certain something in you, something that I can only describe in abstract terms: a small life spark, I would call it.  We could all use as many "small life sparks" as we can collect throughout our lives.

In the end, although the baby animal enhances our lives with her Husky magic, she (and Kuma) improved our relationship, too.  They proved that we can argue about responsibilities, which then results in an adult sense of equilibrium instead of stagnation of a continuing problem.  To me, you continue to do this in other realms of our life.  We are becoming adults, and this small Spitz-human family is our first major step into our journey forward.

and ever since the first day to this day, she prefers to sleep squashed in her crate. I just want to kiss her snow paws right now.

After lunch with you at Starbucks...

...you sent me this text:  I love you and it will be a great new year with you :)  And, I started to cry a bit, for my second time today.  I love that feeling of crying from happiness.  Even though a discomforting lump may develop in your throat, your face tingles with happiness, and the tears slowly stream down, as if washed out of your eyes by the building pressure of the tingling sensation.

I knew you were going to text me this after I had gone home.  Whenever we have a good talk about us, I know there are some endearing or romantic things that you want to say, but you do not.  It's just because you aren't as readily expressive as a person, and maybe it's also because of my aura of hardness.  But, I'm very soft for you, and the more you say you love me, the more soft I will become, and love you even more.

The first time I cried today was because I thought about losing my gramma.  I've been thinking about it a lot more lately.  Time keeps moving, she's getting older, and I'm not up there to spend time with her.  So, I called her tonight to tell her I miss her.  Of course, our conversations aren't as enjoyable anymore b/c she's set in her ways as am I (I try to hold my tongue more though!)  But, she's still my silly gramma, who is always telling me not to worry so much--an irony since her own worriworti-ness was definitely passed on to me.  She worries about me, and I worry about her.