I am so sad and so tired today.

I cried three times.

LIFE IS HARD.

Vietnamese American Catholic depressed parental expectations are the worst.

"We spent so much money and time and energy on your Catholic education, the least you could do is live exactly the way we want you to..." is the worst kind of guilt trip. Especially when accompanied by crying and sighing and side comments.

Ergh. I just want to eat pizza and sleep.

current goals = think small:

1. Continue to pack things in lots of paper so they don't break 
2. Transfer all bills/utilities over to new place
3. Tell brother about living situation -- ask him to help with move 
4. Learn how to breathe so that panic attacks stop coming multiple times per day 
5. Stop sitting there and Googling in seriousness: 'disownment,' 'anxiety attacks,' and 'emotional asthma attack' 
6. Stay on top of grooming (seriously, shaving legs over the summer is hard and constant work)
7. Keep writing 
8. Keep talking to the people who matter
9. Move forward
10. Never go backwards. Never. Never. Never. 

stream of consciousness - on my mind right now

It's been a long time since I've put pen to paper like this. It feels nice :).

----

 

I used to be afraid of working, but now I am not. I think for a long time I associated work – the steady, clocking-in-clocking-out motions of employment a stand-in for the home I grew up in. The repetition, the closed off walls, the insistence that you must stay here forever, and you must love it. I was afraid that I’d have the same panic attacks I did when I was at home, trying to envision a life rife with possibility. Reading books about girls who travel, girls who get married late or never get married, girls who eat and drink whatever they want, I would cry at the impossibility of it.

My parents are pilgrims and immigrants. They believe wholeheartedly in a plan that God has set out for us. The plan for me – as dictated by heaven, as decreed by our ancestors and our homeland – is that I will remain docile. I will marry the man that God has chosen for me and I will have children. This will happen soon. I will finally make my parents proud.

I fear this alternate reality more than anything.

Do you know what it’s like growing up with parents who make you feel emotionally responsible for everything that happens to them? Who see you as an extension of themselves – as a physical representation of their successes and failures, as dictated by their moral code? When I was four, I almost died in the hospital, my ovary and fallopian tubes twisted and throbbing. Malignant tumors festering in my miniature body. And when I was two, six, thirteen, sixteen (by now, I’ve lost count), my mother bled again and again, weeping for the children she would never have. I, the one who survived against all odds am supposed to live up to the expectations of all these non-siblings, these ghost children. Sometimes my mother says that without me she would die.

Some poet or artist or writer once said that her life philosophy was to find the things that scared her – and to do them. I’m on the precipice of that. There is a chasm between my reality and what I want – the life that speaks to me, the one that doesn’t make me feel dead inside. I will have the things I want. I will have friends, and stimulation, and books, and joy, and sadness, and growth, and love. I will have that which makes me a full person, and it is mine for the taking if I just reach out – across this chasm borne of fear and anxiety – and take it.

My mother once told me that a relative of mine was her worst nightmare as a mother. I think of him and I see nothing but someone who has built personal success and happiness based off of his creative endeavors. I see someone who still treats our family with love and respect, but who lives his own life – keeping his geographic distance and his privacy. He is not married, but someday he might be. Whenever that happens, it will be of his own accord, and not because his family pressured him. My mother’s worst nightmare – the possibility that keeps her up at night – is someone who I admire immensely.

The interesting things in life happen when you act out of bravery. I know that, and now I must internalize it. Here are the things I must come to terms with: I was raised to believe that you could make no mistakes, and I grew up in a family that encouraged unhealthy co-dependence. But independent decisions must be made. And if they turn out to be mistakes, then so be it. We grow from our mistakes. They make us better, wiser, stronger people.

I’ve lived in a place of fear for a long time. I see my parents – in particular my mother – still dragged down by this overwhelming sense of terror. But I am so tired of being scared of everything. Fear is exhausting, and I’ve seen what it can do to you firsthand – I’ve seen the effects of the hiding, of the life partially-lived.

Here is the next chapter. This is where the hard work happens – and I am ready for it.  

I am at an odd and wonderful juncture in my life right now. Here comes the next move -- it will take me to a new job, a new city, a new place to call home.

my father is the ultimate asian dad:

transcript of a conversation we had about my new job

dad: so mai linh, you know, you have to build your career now. you have to work hard and prove yourself.
me: i know. i will.
dad: so your mom tells me they'll let you work from home. i don't think you should work from home at first. you have to prove yourself at the beginning.
me: yeah, i wasn't planning on working from home right away. i was thinking that for the first few months --
dad: *makes face* i think that for at least the first two years you should not work from home. that is what i think.

Today's to-do list is simple:

• Eat something
• Chip away at latest freelance project (hopefully getting to at least page 50 of my module, urgh) 
• Do some yoga (optional)
• Get dressed
• Drive into Oakland to get my drank on

Woot woot! :) 

I'm starting to get some new job jitters now that my start date is literally five days away. It seems very surreal -- these past few months have kind of whooshed by and I don't know how it happened. After all, I've been job hunting aggressively, freelancing, mulling around in random personal issues, and reading a whole lot. It really feels like no time has passed at all, like I've just been working and carrying on as normal, and now oops, three months have suddenly passed and I am starting a new job!

It still doesn't feel real at all to me, though I've been filling out forms for parking and for my shirt size this week, so obviously some arrangements are being made on the other end of things. I'm sure it'll all sink in when I step through those office doors, but in the meantime, it still feels like one weird, boring grown-up life dream.