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January 18, 2001 |
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It's my mom's birthday today. Happy birthday, Mom! Not that she would be
reading my page, since she doesn't really read English. She is the type of
person who will catch the occasional phrase, but generally she doesn't
really speak it per se. I suppose my metric for being functional is
whether or not you could feasibly ask for directions if you were to get
lost. She can't not in English. To our (my sisters and I) dismay, she
even has a tough time distinguishing between diet and regular food items at
the grocery.
However, I'm not writing today to diss my mom. On the contrary, I'd like
to point out how wonderful she really is. I'm ashamed to say that I had
nearly forgotten her birthday. On one hand, I'm an awful son for
forgetting her birthday; on the other hand, I'm somewhat justified since we
never celebrated her birthday as I was growing up. It's a bit like trying
to remember when is Ash Wednesday… and no I don't have any idea. I was
talking briefly to my sister, Aileen,
when it dawned on me that I should call my mom.
Unfortunately, I also realized that I had forgotten Fred's birthday. Bummer.
I talk to my mom briefly and wish her a happy birthday. We always seem to digress into talking about other folks… like Terry for instance. Not that I mind talking about Terry, which is almost certainly a better fate than talking to Terry. However, the fact still remains that we're not talking about us. Though if we were talking about me, we would almost certainly be talking about my relationship with Pam, and I'm sure that I don't want to talk to my mom about that. We quietly compromise to talking about other folks, which always feels like gossip to me.
I do manage to talk to Terry briefly, and she only sucked out minimal life force over the phone line today. The process of chatting with her bears a striking resemblance to being shackled to an anvil with only slightly more freedom of movement. I'd say that she is pessimistic, but that doesn't accurately begin to describe it. The instrumental problem lies in the fact that she leads you expectedly through her hardship to gain your sympathy, but refuses to listen when you make suggestions for her to empower herself. The only thing that may be more irritating that her starting most of her sentences with the words, "I can't", is the fact that she does not give any logical reason as to why "she can't". A conversation with Terry is a bit like French kissing a vampire… not that I've done this, mind you.
I came home to find that I had gotten a package in the mail. Although it was my cousin, Ling that put it in the mail, the package was from my mom. It was intended to be a Christmas present, though they had a tough time tracking it down, so I'm getting it now… on her birthday.
The book was, If You Could See What I Hear by Tom Sullivan. I saw this auto-biographical movie by the same name when I was in my teens and although it didn't really speak to me back then, it made an impression that has lasted years. In fact, it is now one of my favorite movies. Tom is talented, angry, wise, musical, and blind. I remember one of the reasons why this story appealed to me so much is that Tom is an Atheist. There weren't many Atheist among the folks that I grew up and found this a bit endearing. I've always wanted to know more about this amazing man, and now I have his autobiography.
The book is out of print, and thus was difficult to find. I've tried looking for it myself a number of times with little success, though admittedly I wasn't trying very hard. I can't imagine how my mom managed to track it down, since she really cannot speak English. I suppose that Terry might have helped her, but she didn't seem that resourceful. The face value of the book is $1.50, although I'm sure that my mom paid far more than that… I heard maybe as much as $20.
I know that pained her; my mom is frugal. She is the type of person who loves to bargain at flea markets with incredibly absurd prices… "I'll give you $5 for that VCR." In this case, spending more for something like this is a bit like pulling teeth… through her navel. She paid it though, and did so happily. She talked about the way she wanted something that I would remember her by. She's right; I'll never forget it.
Books are the teller stories. This one will always tell yet another tale, not the one contained within its pages, but the one that I shall always carry with me when remembering my mom. You might say it's only a book; one that originally cost $1.50. It'll never be just a book.
I remember when I was about eleven or twelve… when my mom had gotten me a new bookshelf for my bedroom. Shortly after having assembled the bookcase, I had filled it with toys, being my most priced possessions. I remember a comment my mom had made back then, about how she longed for the days when those shelves will be filled with books rather than toys. That bookshelf is long gone now, as are most of my toys from my childhood. As I look around me now, I'm surrounded by towers of books. I can't place the transition point from one point to the next; I just look up at the bookshelves and smile. Inevitably, I'm my mother's son… and proud of it.
January 18, 2001