I started this essay after reading "The Paper Menagerie". Unsurprisingly, this essay contains spoilers. I highly recommend reading it; it moved me to act, something that doesn't happen often.
This essay is intensely personal to me, my upbringing, and my relationship with my parents.
When I was in university, I knew some students that talked to their parents every few days; others, maybe every week or two. I didn't talk to my parents nearly as often. Even now, my calls with my parents are sporadic. A month or two could pass in-between as I threw myself into school or recruiting or work and just embraced my newfound independence.
It's not that we don't love each other; I love my parents and I know that they love me too. We just aren't that close. We just don't really talk.
~
Ever since I moved out, I've been focused on self-sufficiency. In that push toward my independent future, it was easy to keep my thoughts and my gaze on what lies ahead. It was easy to leave things behind, to not look back.
I understood that over 90% of the time that I'll ever spend with my parents is probably gone. I knew that the amount of time left with them is uncertain.
Feeling it was something else. What a cliche, right? I suspect that many young people have this same revelation, but that the catalysts vary.
For me, it was a short story.
~
Of the many possible catalysts, nothing resonated with me quite like “The Paper Menagerie”.
The story touched me in part because it is heartbreaking. It hurts reading about how the narrator's relationship with his mother deteriorated so completely. It's a beautiful and compelling depiction of resolution never reached.
Of course, Liu's award-winning work doesn't just depict a relationship between mother and son. It weaves fantasy elements into a story of racial identity and coming-of-age; my descriptions could never do it justice.
~
While in college, the narrator visits his dying mother. He's physically in the hospital, but his mind is elsewhere.
When I was 19, recruiting season and interviewing and internships seemed so important. The pressure and the culture and my naiveté kept them stuck at the front of my mind.
When the narrator confessed the same, a part of me cried and screamed but a small part of me just understood.
~
The last time I initiated a phone call with my parents, it was January. I had just broken my wrist while snowboarding.
After finishing the story, 10 pm on a weekend, I called them.
We chatted about benign family things: my job, my diet, my mom's new job, my brother's first semester in college.
I told them how much I appreciated all of the ways they built me and my brother a better life than they had. I told them I loved them and missed them and think about them even though I've moved away.
They told me that they were surprised to hear from me.
They told me that they loved me too, that they're proud of me.
They told me that this call meant a lot to them.
~
At the end of “entry points”, Ava writes:
In high school I volunteered for a couple years at a care home for people with dementia. All anyone there ever talked about was their children (I think their spouses were mostly already dead). The ones who had children who visited were happy and the ones who didn't weren't. Everything I needed to know about life was revealed to me right there, though it would take me a long time to see it.
I think about this paragraph a lot. Mostly because it's an incredibly powerful closer to a great essay, but also because of the literal image it renders in my mind.
It takes so little effort to make your parents' day, and even if I can't convince you of it, I promise it will make your day too.
<3