I’ve had a super hectic week since taking days off from work. Surprisingly, my father took my suggestion to reconnect with some old friends. I was thrilled and happily offered to shuttle him around to see them in CA and NV.
After that beotch of a day on Tuesday, dad and I drove up to San Ramon on Wednesday. Mr. Chen was apparently the friend who matched up my mom and dad many years ago at a party in Taipei. This dude was an economics big wig who lived in a gazillion places while serving as a diplomat for the Taiwan government: Panama, Dominican Republic, Taiwan, Italy, England, you name it. What a life, learning a bunch of languages while working and traveling the world! Their two daughters are now in NorCal, so the parents retired in a beautiful community in San Ramon. I had never traveled to that part of North Bay, but shit, pretty swanky new construction haciendas adjacent to a golf course! The house was huge and def a party house with massive gathering rooms, an outdoor courtyard with fireplace, a casita, and a pool. Of course, as soon as we stepped in, the place was freezing cold. I couldn’t even take off my damn coat. As an environmentalist, I am all for energy savings, but shit: don’t be buying a big ass house if you’re not going to heat it! Same with the pool. Seriously, I drank a ton of hot tea, bc I just could not stay warm.
And so the conversations began: talking about their kids’ schooling, jobs, and credentials. I’m sure people are just sharing their lives, but hypersensitive me, I take every little thing as some comment on my failure. These other kids are doing big things with their lives: traveling the world for prestigious firms; opening private dental practices; getting PhDs in whatever fields… And what am I doing? Marketing and communications for some lame private university. I didn’t even have the heart to say I was leaving my job. I already felt loser enough. Ugh, fucking shame: No matter how much I read about building confidence or taking risks or self acceptance, things just never feel good enough. Then my father throws in that he’s moving back to Taiwan bc he “doesn’t have grandkids to care for or babysit,” blah, blah. Maybe he’s just doing the radical honesty thing, explaining why he wants to return to Asia instead of stay Stateside, but I dunno, there are just moments when I read things pretty negatively. Like he’s blaming me for not giving him enough reason to live in the US. Whatever. See? Complicated emotional guilt tripping or no? Hard to say bc to some extent, Chinese parents seem to love the blame game. On the other hand, maybe he just doesn’t want to bother or inconvenience me. Hmm, has that stopped them before? Obviously, my thoughts waver back and forth.
On Thursday, I drove dad to Visalia to visit with other old friends from Taiwan, a physician + dentist couple. Very nice and a little younger than my parents. Again, big house, freezing temps. The lady, on seeing both my dad and me keeping our coats on after stepping inside, asked what temp I set at home. Lady, you don’t even want to know. Her thermostat was set to 66 deg. Are you for fucking real? Unlike the couple the day before, this house was definitely Chinese in its decor: a lot of glass curio cabinets and tables and black lacquer. Slippers as soon as we came in, and a shit ton of takeout containers washed and stacked for re-use in the kitchen. So weird to observe these things and then realize they are part of a pattern, a cultural thing perhaps? The couple was super nice: they showed us around town. Visalia is super agrarian with a mostly Latino population. Interestingly, I learned that this couple spent ten years living apart: the wife practicing as a dentist and raising their two kids in the Bay Area, and the hubby practicing as an internist in Visalia, driving home every weekend. Who does that?? Immigrants, man. The struggle is real.
That evening, the temps dipped low, and the mountains got some snow. The next morning, the couple drove us to Sequoia National Park, but we couldn’t drive very far in, bc we didn’t have snow chains. So, I will have to go back for sure to see the world’s largest living tree. On the way back down the mountain, we hit up a Mexican place. Delish, esp with the bass rellano. Add it to the list!
On the long drive back home, dad talked regrets. Boo hoo central. Maybe he should have sent us to boarding school to better prepare us for Duke. Maybe we should have gone to a state school first, possibly done better academically, and then attended a prestigious grad school afterwards. I admit that one of my greatest disappointments in life was not doing well academically at Duke. That really shattered me, and I don’t think my confidence ever truly recovered since. That said, I hate regret, so I always try to focus on the learning moments.
When I told my dad that things turned out fine and I’m fine, he switched his comment as if to say it only applied to my brother. Th thing is though, my brother always maintained his merit scholarship at Duke. He came close to losing it due to poor grades, but he always pulled through. And for grad school, he went to one of the nation’s top film schools and then to one of the nation’s top teaching schools. So who is my father talking about with his whole public school undergrad and fancy grad school scenario? And is he talking about academic success or professional success or life success? When I press, he’s unclear. This is where I just feel like he continues to believe both his kids are failures, and that makes me feel like utter shit.
If he’s talking academic success, my brother did very well. Professionally, he is in a field that suits him and he is well respected at the university. If dad’s talking about life success, my brother sucks at that, but is he then suggesting that not adapting well at Duke led to being unprepared for life? As for me, I know dad never thought anything about my grad school selection even though I earned a selective fellowship and Florida was the best program for solid waste engineering. He also never thought much of any of my professional tracks: environmental engineering, political advocacy, nonprofit, etc. Life wise, I suppose at best he doesn’t have to worry much about me.
I dunno: the truth is, it’s all moot now. But I still get frustrated bc basically, somewhere I’m either not smart enough to excel in the arena he wants, or compared to the immigrant sacrifices of his generation, I’m not hardworking enough to achieve professional success. Sigh.
Back to the trip. On Saturday, the three of us flew out to Vegas. The plan was to do a quickie weekend meeting with more of dad’s friends (retired in Henderson) and then do some exploring. As it turned out, the flight got delayed and then the rental car took FORever. Fucking Budget. DO NOT RENT FROM THEM. We left our house around 8am and didn’t get to eating anything until 4pm. It was the longest day ever. Fortunately, dad treated us to the buffet at Caeser’s Palace, and our suite at the Signature at MGM was spacious and beautiful.