A place of peace is what we create. Our serenity is made only by us. We are in control of what we let be close to us and what we have to push away. Only we can discover who we really are. Where we belong is not dictated by someone opening a door for us, but rather by us deciding that where we need to be is exactly where we are. Where we want to be can be reached by our own ability to chart and navigate that journey that is ours and only ours.
Seems easy enough...
As much as I know this, as much as I believe this, and as much as I try as hard as I can to practice this, I still struggle...alot. I feel disjointed at times. It's easy to hold on to much anger and not know how to move past it enough so that the same sorts of themes don't keep resurfacing. I think I talk myself into, while acknowledging the baggage I do have, minimizing it in terms of not letting it apply to a new situation. But, this is me! I'm not perfect. I've got issues just like everyone else. Try as I might to not let some things of the past creep into my present, they are still fresh wounds sometimes and are a part of who I am right now.
I dont like feeling unsettled. I dont like feeling angry. I dont like feeling like I am having to deny or minimize what is my reality. I dont like feeling waves of negativity - anger, frustration, hurt - wash over me seemingly out of nowhere. I dont like feeling like it's one-sided even in the slightest. I WANT a compromise or negotiation to feel fair.
...frustrated...
Friday, May 27, 2011
Monday, May 9, 2011
Grandma's House
My grandma lived alone the entire time I knew her in a small two bedroom apartment in a little town in Western Wisconsin. From my little kid perspective, Barron was a whole big town that could fit into a teacup. I was certain that other than my sister, me, and our two cousins, there were no other children that lived in this town - only grandmas and grandpas. Among the favorite places that were explored by adventurous curiosity and an innocent ignorance to fear and danger were the park and pool; the Ben Franklin store where we bought an assortment of small notebooks and tablets, mechanical pencils, and folders; the church during non-service hours (which I swear was haunted); the golf course where we collected hundreds of golf balls we foraged for in the woods that lined the greens and where we had many dirt bike races down the hills; and the local hardware store where we would buy obscure lengths of cable, rope, or chain, and small screw drivers. I'm sure the owners thought we were torturing small animals. After awhile, they quit selling those various artifacts to us.
My grandma's apartment complex was at the end of a dead end street - LaSalle I believe is what it was called. She lived in an end unit. There were 3 or 4 rows of little single story rambler apartments. The concrete sidewalks with cracks every 2 feet or so made perfect straight lines and right angles as they panned out in front of each unit and up and down the buildings in the rear that were perpendicular to the street-facing buildings. The laundry room was behind my grandma's apartment. I remember the small plastic containers she had for her quarters, nickels, and dimes. Each one especially sized for each coin. On the other side of the furthest rambler unit was a dirt hill. My sister, our two cousins, and I used to go over there and make action movies. I'm pretty sure that's the first and only time I was ever on the other side of someone's right hook as my cousin launched a fist into my face. It was an accident of course, but in tears, mostly from being completely insulted by the sucker punch, I bull-rushed him and pushed him off the side. He went tumbling down and burst out crying. We were even - a tear for a tear.
The golf course I had previously mentioned - I remember many times riding our bikes back there. It was part of a private country club. Oops. We would have bike races and skid out contests on the rolling hills. When it was raining or the greens were wet from a fresh watering, that made for the best biking terrain. The water splashed up on us and we'd get soaked. Our bikes sliced through the neatly groomed putting greens leaving tire trails. Our skid outs would ruffle the grass, churning up chunks of brown dirt. I know this is painful for you golfers to read! As someone who has an appreciation for and who has played alot of golf, it's rather painful to write about, but we were kids. What are ya gonna do right?
All of us cousins had this game we always played as kids called "Club." That's what all the aforementioned notebooks, tablets, and random hardware store supplies were for. This game was sort of like playing school or business, but it was almost like we were some kind of underground CIA operatives or something. There was alot of talk of ammo and oozies. I had no idea what an oozie was, but my cousins seemed to think we needed them to keep the enemies at bay, so we eventually constructed some oozies out of wood, empty shell casings, and camo duct tape. They were amazing! Apparently, one day, "Club" took on a different sort of adventure - one we called "Airlines." What we did, and how we got all this string I don't know, but we literally twisted and weaved tons of string all over our grandma's spare bedroom. If you could even get the door open, immediately it was like being sucked into a spiderweb. You couldn't move unless you used your stealth ninja/contortionist moves to get through all of it. Somewhere half under the bed, in the far corner, falling out of the closet, or, and I wouldn't put it passed us to have one of us stuck up to the ceiling or something, but that's where you might find each kid. You couldn't really see us through the mazey web of string. It was pretty cool.
My grandma's house always had a distinct smell. I can't even describe it now. I think I've lost alot of the memory of it in order to describe it, but I remember its distinctness. It smelled good - homey, comforting, and peaceful. She would smell like that too when she came to visit at our house. My grandma always had decks of cards on hand. I remember so many different decks. As an adult looking back, I'm sure that was intentional because if all us kids got a hold of them, well, there would be missing cards in no time. I remember taking all her tablets all the time too for "Club." Each time we came to visit whether it was a week at grandma's in the summer, holidays, or other occasions, her supply of unlined tablets would always be replenished. We'd unplug one of her phones for "Club." She had two phones in her house - both of them rotary phones - a black one in the living room, and a tan one in her bedroom.
My grandma always had a stash of molasses cookies on hand. I thought they were hers - as in she made them and/or invented them. I never remembered seeing them anywhere else but her house. The glasses we used had either spades or clubs all over them. They were clear glass and the pattern of the spades or clubs was black. For some reason, I also remember eating alot of squash - too much squash. Maybe that's why I'm not a huge fan of it straight up as an adult. Hmmm...
Barron was a town that still made good use of the noon whistle every day. The siren would sound, and when I was pretty young and would be up there visiting by myself, my two great uncles would come to my grandma's for lunch. I have no idea where they worked, but they usually had work clothes on that looked like Dickies or Carharts. They brought their lunches in metal lunch boxes with the curved top and beverages in metal thermoses. I would sit on my grandma's lap and eat mandarin oranges out of the small can and the four of us would watch Days of Our Lives.
At night, I remember laying by myself in the big bed in the spare room. I was used to my twin bed at home, and while this one was probably only a double, it felt infinite in size to me. The bed spread was white and heavy for such a thin layer of material. I remember it had small knots or some kind of nubbins all over it - all white as well. When the lights went out, I remembered being scared of the old clock that was in the room on the dresser. I don't know what it was about that little clock. I think it was the shape actually. It reminded me of a cloaked figure. The funny thing is, it was no bigger than a softball maybe. Odd what our little minds can put together. I remember my grandma's apartment being extremely quiet. While it was peaceful, it was unsettling. The quiet was different. The light was different. I was, and still am in alot of ways, a homebody. I did, and again, still do, get homesick pretty easily. I like my things and the comforts of wherever I call home. It was during those nights away at grandma's house that I felt lonely. Sometimes it was scary, sometimes it just made me sad, and sometimes it just felt empty.
I remember going for a walk with my grandma into town one summer day. Town was literally like 5 blocks away. We walked into the local funeral home. There was a visitation in progress. To this day I have no idea if my grandma knew the gentleman who had passed away. I'm assuming so since we waltzed right in and because Barron was such a small town - everyone knew everyone. But, I remember holding my grandma's hand as we walked in right past everyone and up to the casket. She took one look at him and said, "He was a rather funny looking fellow wasn't he?" And then we walked out.
As I got a little bit older, I remember going to my grandma's for my usual week-long visit. Now, my sister was old enough to come with. I remember having alot of anxiety before we even left for her house. I would fake my excitement and eagerness to see grandma and spend a week with her. I mean, I always liked being with her, but this is about the time my anxiety of bad things happening to people close to me was in high gear. Knowing that she was my grandma and thus, older than even my parents, I was terrified that something awful would happen when my sister and I were there and we wouldn't know what to do or how to get back home. One of the last times we went up there for a week, I remember calling my cousins every day that we were there and being gone most of the day with them so that my sister and I didn't have to be alone with her in case something bad happened. I think she felt really bad and maybe hurt that it seemed like we'd rather play all day with our cousins than spend any time with her. I feel guilty about that to this day. I had no idea how to communicate my nervousness, fear, and anxiety to her or to my parent - or to anyone really!
My grandma passed away in January - the day before I turned 13. The last thing I remember was visiting her in her hospital room at the Barron hospital and her singing happy birthday to me as we were getting ready to leave. The next day my mom and I were supposed to go shopping. I waited for what seemed like forever in the car and my mom wasn't coming out. Finally, annoyed, I went stomping into the house. My mom was in tears on the phone. It was the medical staff at the hospital saying that my grandma (my mom's mom) had passed away. They tried for 45 minutes to revive her. For a little while before she died - maybe a year or so - my grandma had a boyfriend - Clarence. He was very much like a grandpa to us. He had a farm in Wisconsin not too far away from Barron. We'd go over there and play in the hayloft and visit the cows. Everyone was deeply saddened when she died, but Clarence never got over her. I remember during the visitation, he shakily made his way up to the casket. He was sobbing. He leaned over and kissed her. He and my mom kept in communication until he passed away just a handful of years ago. Every time they were on the phone, he would bring up my grandma and start crying. He married twice after she died, but he was in love with her and never fell out of love. It was such a beautiful, yet heartbreaking thing. I didn't really pay much attention or understand that kind of love for another person until I became an adult - and it's probably been more of a recent realization too. It makes my heart ache and fills me with fear of getting that close to someone because then they die and I'm left with that constant sadness and loneliness.
These memories of my grandma came rushing forward in the last couple of days. It started from a conversation my mom and I were having on the way home from Duluth the day before Mother's Day. I haven't thought about this stuff in quite awhile and it's been interesting and quite emotional for me to write about this as the stream of memories that came out are some of my fondest memories of my time with my grandma, yet they are still painful in the meaning and reinforcement in my life of being so scared to get close to people because they leave - and usually in some kind of permanent way that is like death, or is death. This is probably one of the biggest sources of fear and anxiety that I have when it comes to engaging in relationships with people. My emotional guardedness is perhaps higher than I like to think it is. I am just unsure of how to connect really emotionally and really intentionally with people when, in my life, all of my significant relationships have had themes of leaving and me being left alone - whether someone dies, leaves me emotionally, or relationships end, it's always so permanent. And if there is ever any kind of reunification, it's always different and it still feels like there are so many gaps, but, none of know how to fill them.
My grandma's apartment complex was at the end of a dead end street - LaSalle I believe is what it was called. She lived in an end unit. There were 3 or 4 rows of little single story rambler apartments. The concrete sidewalks with cracks every 2 feet or so made perfect straight lines and right angles as they panned out in front of each unit and up and down the buildings in the rear that were perpendicular to the street-facing buildings. The laundry room was behind my grandma's apartment. I remember the small plastic containers she had for her quarters, nickels, and dimes. Each one especially sized for each coin. On the other side of the furthest rambler unit was a dirt hill. My sister, our two cousins, and I used to go over there and make action movies. I'm pretty sure that's the first and only time I was ever on the other side of someone's right hook as my cousin launched a fist into my face. It was an accident of course, but in tears, mostly from being completely insulted by the sucker punch, I bull-rushed him and pushed him off the side. He went tumbling down and burst out crying. We were even - a tear for a tear.
The golf course I had previously mentioned - I remember many times riding our bikes back there. It was part of a private country club. Oops. We would have bike races and skid out contests on the rolling hills. When it was raining or the greens were wet from a fresh watering, that made for the best biking terrain. The water splashed up on us and we'd get soaked. Our bikes sliced through the neatly groomed putting greens leaving tire trails. Our skid outs would ruffle the grass, churning up chunks of brown dirt. I know this is painful for you golfers to read! As someone who has an appreciation for and who has played alot of golf, it's rather painful to write about, but we were kids. What are ya gonna do right?
All of us cousins had this game we always played as kids called "Club." That's what all the aforementioned notebooks, tablets, and random hardware store supplies were for. This game was sort of like playing school or business, but it was almost like we were some kind of underground CIA operatives or something. There was alot of talk of ammo and oozies. I had no idea what an oozie was, but my cousins seemed to think we needed them to keep the enemies at bay, so we eventually constructed some oozies out of wood, empty shell casings, and camo duct tape. They were amazing! Apparently, one day, "Club" took on a different sort of adventure - one we called "Airlines." What we did, and how we got all this string I don't know, but we literally twisted and weaved tons of string all over our grandma's spare bedroom. If you could even get the door open, immediately it was like being sucked into a spiderweb. You couldn't move unless you used your stealth ninja/contortionist moves to get through all of it. Somewhere half under the bed, in the far corner, falling out of the closet, or, and I wouldn't put it passed us to have one of us stuck up to the ceiling or something, but that's where you might find each kid. You couldn't really see us through the mazey web of string. It was pretty cool.
My grandma's house always had a distinct smell. I can't even describe it now. I think I've lost alot of the memory of it in order to describe it, but I remember its distinctness. It smelled good - homey, comforting, and peaceful. She would smell like that too when she came to visit at our house. My grandma always had decks of cards on hand. I remember so many different decks. As an adult looking back, I'm sure that was intentional because if all us kids got a hold of them, well, there would be missing cards in no time. I remember taking all her tablets all the time too for "Club." Each time we came to visit whether it was a week at grandma's in the summer, holidays, or other occasions, her supply of unlined tablets would always be replenished. We'd unplug one of her phones for "Club." She had two phones in her house - both of them rotary phones - a black one in the living room, and a tan one in her bedroom.
My grandma always had a stash of molasses cookies on hand. I thought they were hers - as in she made them and/or invented them. I never remembered seeing them anywhere else but her house. The glasses we used had either spades or clubs all over them. They were clear glass and the pattern of the spades or clubs was black. For some reason, I also remember eating alot of squash - too much squash. Maybe that's why I'm not a huge fan of it straight up as an adult. Hmmm...
Barron was a town that still made good use of the noon whistle every day. The siren would sound, and when I was pretty young and would be up there visiting by myself, my two great uncles would come to my grandma's for lunch. I have no idea where they worked, but they usually had work clothes on that looked like Dickies or Carharts. They brought their lunches in metal lunch boxes with the curved top and beverages in metal thermoses. I would sit on my grandma's lap and eat mandarin oranges out of the small can and the four of us would watch Days of Our Lives.
At night, I remember laying by myself in the big bed in the spare room. I was used to my twin bed at home, and while this one was probably only a double, it felt infinite in size to me. The bed spread was white and heavy for such a thin layer of material. I remember it had small knots or some kind of nubbins all over it - all white as well. When the lights went out, I remembered being scared of the old clock that was in the room on the dresser. I don't know what it was about that little clock. I think it was the shape actually. It reminded me of a cloaked figure. The funny thing is, it was no bigger than a softball maybe. Odd what our little minds can put together. I remember my grandma's apartment being extremely quiet. While it was peaceful, it was unsettling. The quiet was different. The light was different. I was, and still am in alot of ways, a homebody. I did, and again, still do, get homesick pretty easily. I like my things and the comforts of wherever I call home. It was during those nights away at grandma's house that I felt lonely. Sometimes it was scary, sometimes it just made me sad, and sometimes it just felt empty.
I remember going for a walk with my grandma into town one summer day. Town was literally like 5 blocks away. We walked into the local funeral home. There was a visitation in progress. To this day I have no idea if my grandma knew the gentleman who had passed away. I'm assuming so since we waltzed right in and because Barron was such a small town - everyone knew everyone. But, I remember holding my grandma's hand as we walked in right past everyone and up to the casket. She took one look at him and said, "He was a rather funny looking fellow wasn't he?" And then we walked out.
As I got a little bit older, I remember going to my grandma's for my usual week-long visit. Now, my sister was old enough to come with. I remember having alot of anxiety before we even left for her house. I would fake my excitement and eagerness to see grandma and spend a week with her. I mean, I always liked being with her, but this is about the time my anxiety of bad things happening to people close to me was in high gear. Knowing that she was my grandma and thus, older than even my parents, I was terrified that something awful would happen when my sister and I were there and we wouldn't know what to do or how to get back home. One of the last times we went up there for a week, I remember calling my cousins every day that we were there and being gone most of the day with them so that my sister and I didn't have to be alone with her in case something bad happened. I think she felt really bad and maybe hurt that it seemed like we'd rather play all day with our cousins than spend any time with her. I feel guilty about that to this day. I had no idea how to communicate my nervousness, fear, and anxiety to her or to my parent - or to anyone really!
My grandma passed away in January - the day before I turned 13. The last thing I remember was visiting her in her hospital room at the Barron hospital and her singing happy birthday to me as we were getting ready to leave. The next day my mom and I were supposed to go shopping. I waited for what seemed like forever in the car and my mom wasn't coming out. Finally, annoyed, I went stomping into the house. My mom was in tears on the phone. It was the medical staff at the hospital saying that my grandma (my mom's mom) had passed away. They tried for 45 minutes to revive her. For a little while before she died - maybe a year or so - my grandma had a boyfriend - Clarence. He was very much like a grandpa to us. He had a farm in Wisconsin not too far away from Barron. We'd go over there and play in the hayloft and visit the cows. Everyone was deeply saddened when she died, but Clarence never got over her. I remember during the visitation, he shakily made his way up to the casket. He was sobbing. He leaned over and kissed her. He and my mom kept in communication until he passed away just a handful of years ago. Every time they were on the phone, he would bring up my grandma and start crying. He married twice after she died, but he was in love with her and never fell out of love. It was such a beautiful, yet heartbreaking thing. I didn't really pay much attention or understand that kind of love for another person until I became an adult - and it's probably been more of a recent realization too. It makes my heart ache and fills me with fear of getting that close to someone because then they die and I'm left with that constant sadness and loneliness.
These memories of my grandma came rushing forward in the last couple of days. It started from a conversation my mom and I were having on the way home from Duluth the day before Mother's Day. I haven't thought about this stuff in quite awhile and it's been interesting and quite emotional for me to write about this as the stream of memories that came out are some of my fondest memories of my time with my grandma, yet they are still painful in the meaning and reinforcement in my life of being so scared to get close to people because they leave - and usually in some kind of permanent way that is like death, or is death. This is probably one of the biggest sources of fear and anxiety that I have when it comes to engaging in relationships with people. My emotional guardedness is perhaps higher than I like to think it is. I am just unsure of how to connect really emotionally and really intentionally with people when, in my life, all of my significant relationships have had themes of leaving and me being left alone - whether someone dies, leaves me emotionally, or relationships end, it's always so permanent. And if there is ever any kind of reunification, it's always different and it still feels like there are so many gaps, but, none of know how to fill them.
Sunday, May 8, 2011
Finding Authenticity
The other day I went to an event called "The Other Side of Korean Adoption." Of all the talking I have done about adoption, my own adoptee identity and experiences, and hearing others speak on the topic in various forms, I appreciated the different perspective, at least from what I've been used to, that this event took. What has stuck with me most from this event was the side of Korean adoption from the unwed mothers' experiences. It's heartbreaking to say the least. I could go on and on with all sorts of commentary on the injustices and confining cultural paradigms that continue to oppress and abuse unwed mothers, but I'll save that for another time when my mental capacity is tuned into that frequency.
What I was so moved by were the personal stories told of birth searches and reunifications. Now, I know not all reunifications have "happy" endings per se, but ever since going to Korea last August, I have been thinking about doing a birth family search. Most days it's a distant thought that is barely simmering on some far back burner, but lately, it's coming rushing forward and I can't seem to shake it. I'm 33. My birth mother would be 56 or 57. I feel the pressure of time closing in on me. I feel that childish curiosity of sorts taking control. I feel a yearning to fill in the gaps of my life that are still there. Mostly, I just feel that this is a connection that I am supposed to have in my life - even if it doesn't amount to much. It's a piece of me that's missing and likely always will be unless I do something about it. I have struggled with the thought of drastically changing someone or some peoples' lives by doing this if I were to locate my birth mother. Given the necessity of secrecy and overwhelming shame if the secret were to be revealed (among so many other challenges), the last thing I want to do is have my presence in someone's life cause pain. At the same time, what about me? When does my pain get to stop?
Many things are on my mind these days. My body is starting to react to this stress and anxiety. I feel it. I feel my heart starting to beat irregularly like it used to about a year ago when it was so bad I was put on a heart monitor for over 2 weeks to make sure it wasn't something more serious. I've never had a panic attack. My body hasn't ever really harshly reacted to stress. But, my heart palpitations were the scariest. I think there's alot that has come up with all sorts of adoptee stuff, more memories from my childhood, a need for some kind of stability today, and planning for the kind of future I really want to have, but am doubtful it can happen at this point in my life. Sometimes making it through one day is such a chore. The only thing that offers any kind of relief is working out - now, if I could only do that for 10-12 hours a day, I think I'd be fine.
As I sit and type this, in between thoughts, I look up and see the print my best friend gave to me of the famous Japanese wave. I think about this in a metaphorical sense - it's nothing new - but the waves of life and how things move in waves, or so it seems to me. I feel like not long ago, I was at the top of that wave. So many things were lining up in my favor and it felt great! But, for the past few months, I feel like I've been sort of bumbling around in the rough waters beneath those high waves. Sometimes I just bob up and down, sometimes I'm tossed to and fro, occasionally I get sucked under and struggle to find the surface, and every once in a while, I come hurtling onto shore with a bone jarring crash. Always though - always - is it noisy and chaotic. I'm in search of calmer seas.
I write tonight with a feeling of great uneasiness and a tremendous feeling of being unsettled. I could list out about 400 reasons as to why. I know it's up to me and only me to move on to calmer waters. It's my responsibility to take care of myself and do the things I need and want to do. The decisions are incredibly challenging and emotional. No one can do them for me. No one can hold my hand. And, I cant be passive aggressive in hopes of getting out of making some potentially difficult decisions. In the end, however, I know that I will be better off and my mind and my heart especially, will feel better. I suppose life would be pretty boring if we never came across those kinds of challenges that test our limits. I am pretty burnt out of tests at this point though.
In a previous blog I wrote about my intentions to ride my bike around Lake Superior. Most days I wish I were leaving for that adventure tomorrow. I think I am in desperate need for one of those amazing-ass-kicking-find-yourself experiences. I need that time to be in my head, in my body, and in my heart. I need that time to live presently and as authentically as I can - something I feel I have not been doing a very good job of lately. My shadow grows longer every day because it's harboring so many things that are keeping me from being as true to myself as I want to be. The weight of what is haunting me is suffocating. Instead of being able to shed some of it before more piles on, it's just continued to pile.
So, the solution: quit whining about all of it in this blog entry and do something about it! *Deep breath* here goes nothin'...
What I was so moved by were the personal stories told of birth searches and reunifications. Now, I know not all reunifications have "happy" endings per se, but ever since going to Korea last August, I have been thinking about doing a birth family search. Most days it's a distant thought that is barely simmering on some far back burner, but lately, it's coming rushing forward and I can't seem to shake it. I'm 33. My birth mother would be 56 or 57. I feel the pressure of time closing in on me. I feel that childish curiosity of sorts taking control. I feel a yearning to fill in the gaps of my life that are still there. Mostly, I just feel that this is a connection that I am supposed to have in my life - even if it doesn't amount to much. It's a piece of me that's missing and likely always will be unless I do something about it. I have struggled with the thought of drastically changing someone or some peoples' lives by doing this if I were to locate my birth mother. Given the necessity of secrecy and overwhelming shame if the secret were to be revealed (among so many other challenges), the last thing I want to do is have my presence in someone's life cause pain. At the same time, what about me? When does my pain get to stop?
Many things are on my mind these days. My body is starting to react to this stress and anxiety. I feel it. I feel my heart starting to beat irregularly like it used to about a year ago when it was so bad I was put on a heart monitor for over 2 weeks to make sure it wasn't something more serious. I've never had a panic attack. My body hasn't ever really harshly reacted to stress. But, my heart palpitations were the scariest. I think there's alot that has come up with all sorts of adoptee stuff, more memories from my childhood, a need for some kind of stability today, and planning for the kind of future I really want to have, but am doubtful it can happen at this point in my life. Sometimes making it through one day is such a chore. The only thing that offers any kind of relief is working out - now, if I could only do that for 10-12 hours a day, I think I'd be fine.
As I sit and type this, in between thoughts, I look up and see the print my best friend gave to me of the famous Japanese wave. I think about this in a metaphorical sense - it's nothing new - but the waves of life and how things move in waves, or so it seems to me. I feel like not long ago, I was at the top of that wave. So many things were lining up in my favor and it felt great! But, for the past few months, I feel like I've been sort of bumbling around in the rough waters beneath those high waves. Sometimes I just bob up and down, sometimes I'm tossed to and fro, occasionally I get sucked under and struggle to find the surface, and every once in a while, I come hurtling onto shore with a bone jarring crash. Always though - always - is it noisy and chaotic. I'm in search of calmer seas.
I write tonight with a feeling of great uneasiness and a tremendous feeling of being unsettled. I could list out about 400 reasons as to why. I know it's up to me and only me to move on to calmer waters. It's my responsibility to take care of myself and do the things I need and want to do. The decisions are incredibly challenging and emotional. No one can do them for me. No one can hold my hand. And, I cant be passive aggressive in hopes of getting out of making some potentially difficult decisions. In the end, however, I know that I will be better off and my mind and my heart especially, will feel better. I suppose life would be pretty boring if we never came across those kinds of challenges that test our limits. I am pretty burnt out of tests at this point though.
In a previous blog I wrote about my intentions to ride my bike around Lake Superior. Most days I wish I were leaving for that adventure tomorrow. I think I am in desperate need for one of those amazing-ass-kicking-find-yourself experiences. I need that time to be in my head, in my body, and in my heart. I need that time to live presently and as authentically as I can - something I feel I have not been doing a very good job of lately. My shadow grows longer every day because it's harboring so many things that are keeping me from being as true to myself as I want to be. The weight of what is haunting me is suffocating. Instead of being able to shed some of it before more piles on, it's just continued to pile.
So, the solution: quit whining about all of it in this blog entry and do something about it! *Deep breath* here goes nothin'...
Tuesday, April 12, 2011
Biking the Big Lake
In 4 months I will be embarking on a journey I have wanted to do for quite some time - years really. I made a promise to myself a long time ago that one day, I would bike around Lake Superior and I would do it before I turned 35. Well, this summer - August to be exact - will be my opportunity. From the 12th - 26th, my friend Lisa and I will head out on the 1300+ mile trip, averaging about 100 miles per day on our bikes for 14 days, regardless of weather conditions. We'll start and end in Duluth, camping most nights - perhaps indulging in some crusty roadside motel a couple of those nights just for a bed that isn't the ground. This is the last summer I have before I start my doctorate program, and I have been feeling the itch to do something big before school once again consumes my life.
For those who know me well, you know my love of biking. I have been seriously biking since I was 17 years old. Most of my rides have been on my own terms. What started out as a way to lose weight and get in shape back in high school has morphed into something that is my meditation. Biking has become so much more than a fitness activity. It has become a necessity for the maintenance of my own well-being, centeredness, and calm. I push myself to bike year round and explore new routes and bike trails whenever possible. May 1, 2011 will mark my 5th consecutive year riding the 100 mile route in the Minnesota Ironman Bike Ride. I just signed up for another 100 mile ride on June 4th, and this Friday (4/15) I'm actually riding with Lisa from Hinckley to Duluth (about 75 miles). We did the Cannon Valley Trail last weekend (40 miles) in the cold, rain, hail, and lightening. Hard core!
Biking Lake Superior will be the most challenging biking adventure I've ever taken. I've got 4 months to train and in addition to adding more distance training in, I am also running longer routes for cross training purposes and plan to run some 5Ks with my sister (first one being the Fitger's 5K this Saturday [4/16]), and upping my weight lifting regime. Lisa and I decided that we need to figure out how much extra weight we'll be carrying on our bikes, and do our best to lose those pounds off our bodies before we go. In addition, we'll need to outfit our bikes with racks and paneer bags, and purchase lightweight tents, food, and other necessary gear. As much as I am looking forward to this trip, and also being moderately terrified of it, I continue to see through the trip to the other side when we roll across our proverbial finish line in Duluth. I imagine the conversations we will have with people on down the road when our trip is done talking about what we did - that we actually accomplished this! That thought alone is enough to make me feel invincible - like I could bike it 5 times around! It's so energizing and amazing and will be a true testament to how I roll when I set a goal for myself.
In a "find myself" sort of inner reflective trip doing one of the things I love the most (biking) in a place that has always held incredible significance to me (Lake Superior), I have no doubt this will be a life-changing journey. I think it will mark an end to alot of things for me (this is a good thing) and the beginning of many wonderful things yet to come. I will definitely be maintaining this blog as much as I can during this trip as well as during the months leading up to it.
It's funny, I began this blog about 3 weeks before I left on a life-changing trip back to my beginnings as I traveled back to Korea. I'll be wrapping up a little over a year of blogging with another major trip of self-discovery. Hmmm...yet another full circle will soon be complete!
Tuesday, March 15, 2011
Connections
My recent blogs have been heavy and full of emotion. I have found that writing affords me a space to emote in ways that feel relieving and safe. I am able to convey what's truly inside in ways that I can't in talking it out. It has been extremely therapeutic and every now and then I laugh to myself because while I am extremely picky and guarded about who I talk to and how much I tell them, I can write my whole life in such intricate and descriptive detail for anyone...ANYONE...to read, and feel relatively at peace with this.
I've made some big changes in my life recently. In recent weeks - or week even, I made yet another change that I feel truly closed the door on a very challenging series of moments I was enduring. Closing this door has given me my freedom back. It's given me my full range of happiness and calm back. It's given me my own sense of self back. With a change in jobs, a new place to live, acceptance into a PhD program, my professional and academic life have been wonderful and new and exciting opportunities await. The new space I now call home is wonderful and is filled with such positive and peaceful energy. Just what I need! And I've cleaned up my personal life alot, and as a result, I think I've tuned into myself more. I've been talking more openly and honestly with a few people close to me about all of this and I have realized alot about myself and my patterns. It's helped reconnect me with me - a constant work in progress, but rather than just going through the steps somewhat disassociated, I am actually completely present as I move through them. I actually feel like this is the happiest I have been in a long time. And while these changes that have been happening in my life are positive, I think it's because I feel much more deeply connected to myself right now than I ever have before.
I am reminded of one of my most favorite movie quotes: "My life as I knew it capsized, and then strangely enough, righted itself."
I am getting ready to travel to San Francisco this weekend for work. I'll be gone for a week. It just struck me today how I will be going back to the place that marked my first re-entry back into the US from Korea back in August. I never got to explore the town, I just had a 3 hour layover at the airport. I am excited to see all that San Francisco has to offer. Having never been outside the airport, it is a place that feels familiar to me. I never thought for a moment about the connection and meaning of this place with my travels back from Korea. It surprised me a bit of how it just popped into my head. Right now my thoughts on this sound like a constant buzzing or whirring. I can't quite pull out the various pieces. I just know that something's stirring. I think it will be interesting to see how things unfold while I am there.
As I've been moving into a more centered place in my life, it's allowed me to think more about my Korea trip, my adoptee identity, and I've let myself ask questions to the Universe. I don't find any solid answers of course, but the curious side of me is coming out and I feel strong enough to actually wonder, aloud at times, the wonders I have about these connections in my life. It feels good to tune in to me. I also have had some pretty incredible support - support that has been right in front of my face for a long time - I just never tuned into that frequency.
Onward I go.
I've made some big changes in my life recently. In recent weeks - or week even, I made yet another change that I feel truly closed the door on a very challenging series of moments I was enduring. Closing this door has given me my freedom back. It's given me my full range of happiness and calm back. It's given me my own sense of self back. With a change in jobs, a new place to live, acceptance into a PhD program, my professional and academic life have been wonderful and new and exciting opportunities await. The new space I now call home is wonderful and is filled with such positive and peaceful energy. Just what I need! And I've cleaned up my personal life alot, and as a result, I think I've tuned into myself more. I've been talking more openly and honestly with a few people close to me about all of this and I have realized alot about myself and my patterns. It's helped reconnect me with me - a constant work in progress, but rather than just going through the steps somewhat disassociated, I am actually completely present as I move through them. I actually feel like this is the happiest I have been in a long time. And while these changes that have been happening in my life are positive, I think it's because I feel much more deeply connected to myself right now than I ever have before.
I am reminded of one of my most favorite movie quotes: "My life as I knew it capsized, and then strangely enough, righted itself."
I am getting ready to travel to San Francisco this weekend for work. I'll be gone for a week. It just struck me today how I will be going back to the place that marked my first re-entry back into the US from Korea back in August. I never got to explore the town, I just had a 3 hour layover at the airport. I am excited to see all that San Francisco has to offer. Having never been outside the airport, it is a place that feels familiar to me. I never thought for a moment about the connection and meaning of this place with my travels back from Korea. It surprised me a bit of how it just popped into my head. Right now my thoughts on this sound like a constant buzzing or whirring. I can't quite pull out the various pieces. I just know that something's stirring. I think it will be interesting to see how things unfold while I am there.
As I've been moving into a more centered place in my life, it's allowed me to think more about my Korea trip, my adoptee identity, and I've let myself ask questions to the Universe. I don't find any solid answers of course, but the curious side of me is coming out and I feel strong enough to actually wonder, aloud at times, the wonders I have about these connections in my life. It feels good to tune in to me. I also have had some pretty incredible support - support that has been right in front of my face for a long time - I just never tuned into that frequency.
Onward I go.
Monday, March 7, 2011
Truth Through the Lens of an Old Camera
Neatly perched atop a dusty shelf on my desk in my home office are 6 old cameras. As I sit and stare at them, it's hard to believe anyone ever knew how to properly work them with all their manual dials, knobs, slots, and winders. Today our ability to capture images requires a media card and the ability to push a button. Machines and computer programs that get easier and easier to use allow us to manipulate that moment in life. No longer are we freezing these moments in time. Rather, we are continually re-shaping, re-molding, and re-designing what was supposed to be.
What have these old cameras seen? Have they captured monumental pieces of history? Did they witness new beginnings or endings we can only hope were filled with accomplishment and peace? Have they seen the landscape before it was decimated and forever scarred with highways, industrial sites, and buried toxins that poison the life around it? What truths have these cameras captured?
Truth. The older I get, the more foreign of a concept this seems to be. What is the truth? How do we actually know it's the truth? What was the origination of the meaning of something? How do we ever know that this is truly how it was meant to be or that this is what truly is? Most of the time it seems we course through our lives in such a haphazard way that we have evolved to think is systematic and smooth. My truth is that I am constantly trying to dodge bullets, but sometimes I get shot. I am trying to maneuver through the crowded noise that is the chaos in my head that keeps me up at night when I am beyond the point of exhaustion, but sometimes I am swallowed up. I whip around corners so fast holding the wheel with all my might so as to not fly off the road, but sometimes I lose control and find myself flipping end over end, most of the time landing upside down beaten and bloodied. I get the best running start I can to jump over the holes scattered throughout life or to be able to mount a seemingly insurmountable wall, but sometimes I fall through the holes or I go barreling into those walls at full speed. Yet with each knock down, each scrape, each cut, each bruise, each broken bone or broken heart, I continue to get up and move on. How is this possible? My body hurts, my heart hurts, and my core feels as if it's got nothing left. But, it's as if there is something inside me that I cannot see, touch, or even feel on any recognizable level that fuels my quest for happiness and fulfillment. And for some reason, I need to endure such horrendous battles in hopes...HOPES...of finding that place of peace and fulfillment - even when I just want to lie down and dissolve into the air.
From the day I was born, or at least two days after when I know I arrived at the receiving home in Korea, I have been lied to. I have been lied to about the most important and crucial things that life is built upon - a stable foundation of love, caring, safety, and belonging. I do not know the story of why I was given up, or even taken for that matter. I know that everything that it took to take care of me as a newborn was someone's job and that I just became something to check off on a list. I was a procedure, a schedule, a routine to earn a paycheck and to provide money to my own birth country who allowed for me to be sold. I was set aside or ignored for convenience or lack of ability to pay attention to me.Growing up I was told lies, my whole adoptive family was told these same lies, about who I was and how I came to belong in their home now. This precious little child with no one who wanted her because they loved her and cared for her. This precious little child who didnt have the comfort of a mother's arms for the first part of her life. This precious little child who spent those early months with strangers knowing nothing else but to instinctually trust, but having that trust repeatedly violated or not returned. This precious little child whose life and well-being were thrown up to the Universe to take care of. She had no control and she had no say of her own.
As I moved through my life, this trust issue has always plagued me. The lies continue today as I search for the missing pieces of my life. I am still not given answers by those I have allowed myself to trust and given my whole heart to. I am still lied to and ignored because it's convenient for someone else or they have decided I take up too much space in their lives. I'm still tossed aside and in some cases, given up or thrown away. I continually assess myself and ask, "is it me?" Why do these foundational things in life that create those feelings of healthy dependency, security, trust, honesty, belonging, and love come as such hard painful lessons for me? I have a relationship with someone - any kind of relationship - friendship, familial, romantic - and something always happens as soon as I allow these people to be close to me. There's always some kind of violation of trust through lying and leaving that results in a loss that cuts so deep that the wounds have never healed. I'm 33 years old and still mourning my infancy!
It will take me a long time to open up and let someone in. I spent alot of my life disassociating from my feelings because I didnt like what was in there. I didnt know how to feel them. Instead, I got angry. I'm good at being angry. The primitive part of my brain, that has learned since I was an infant that people will undoubtedly lie to you and leave you, kicks into overdrive and goes into self-protection mode. I get angry and live there for awhile because then I dont have to feel helpless, vulnerable, and insecure. I dont have to feel 33 years worth of pain from the lies and the abandonment. If I do eventually open up, and there have been only a few times where this has actually happened - so few I could count them on less than one hand - without fail it always ends horribly and my heart is crushed. Why I keep putting it out there is beyond me. A person can only have this kind of bad luck so many times. It must be me!
I've never claimed perfection in my life. I am far from it. I am a continually evolving work in progress. I've visited and revisited, for many years, the trauma of my early moments of life and some of the major devastating and tragic experiences I have had. Healing has been a slow painful process and while I am not by any means completely healed, I have opened alot of doors into my own emotional realm and my memory that were so long sealed shut I had forgotten about them. Once opened, literally, it was like the flood gates had collapsed and there was no holding back. Yet still, I am left asking why? Why do I continually get doors slammed in my face and dropped when I have made myself vulnerable and opened my heart and my emotions to trust and love? Is it all connected? If so, how? More importantly, how do I fix it?
So what is really true I ask? Where in my life can I say I have actually had anything built from a place of original honesty and love? With the kind of shaky, inaccurate, and untrustworthy foundation I have been put upon, is there really any hope for me or will I just always crash through my life with tumbles, spills, and wipe outs that will always leave me bruised and bloodied? Will my heart ever find the kind of pure honesty and peace that it deserved when it was just beginning or will my quest always come up short because that's all I have known? If I trust and love, I will be dropped, left, abandoned. If I reinstate the keep-everyone-at-an-arm's-length-away rule I will never feel that biting, stinging, stabbing, relentless pain, but I will also never feel those beautiful moments, however fleeting, of what I think are brief tastes of what that kind of honesty, trust, and love can feel like. It's a hard decision.
As I stare into the lenses of these old cameras collecting more dust while they sit in silence, retired long ago from their functionality and purpose, I wonder what they see when they look at me. If they could snap a picture now, what would my moment in my life right now look like? And how do I move on from this place of doubt and hurt knowing that while I most certainly will, without fail, likely find myself here once again asking the same questions? It's a weird mix of optimism and pessimism that I can't quite make sense of. I think I need to work on adopting the philosophy of these old cameras - capturing the moment for what it is and nothing more - no interpretation, no manipulation - just what it is in that exact moment.
Saturday, March 5, 2011
Message in a Bottle
Inspired by my friend's play "Lost and Found" about various experiences and identity intersections of Korean adoptees.
Dear Korea,
My life journey over the past 30-some years has ranged from smooth, hill-less-ness, and straight, to meandering - wandering even - to seemingly impossible climbs and insurmountable walls. I've walked through parts of my life with relative ease. I've run into open arms sometimes and away from frightening arms other times. Sometimes I've even run from myself. I've crawled slowly through many complexities and over fragile ground. And I've even dragged myself through some of the sharpest of thorns, reaching desperately for something solid and stable to cling to. In some ways I have been given incredible opportunities to have new experiences and expand my life. In some ways I have felt slowed down, halted, and even stunned and hurt by painful and agonizing experiences and truths. It's been a long haul of glorious moments and many hurdles. In those moments that I am the most exhausted, the most miserable, and the most defeated, something wills me to continue to put one foot in front of the other and press on.
Returning to you has been one of the most, if not the most, significant experiences of my life so far. In the month and a half that encapsulates my preparation leading up to my return, the two week time period I was embraced by you, and the couple of weeks back in Minnesota, my entire being went through such a barrage of emotions it's hard to even be able to comprehend them. Some days I wonder how I am even still standing! Since I've been back I have searched and searched and tried to reconcile various components of who I was, who I am, and who I want to be all within the confines of understanding that at my core, there is you, Korea, and there always will be.
I cant step outside and take you in anytime I want to. I know practically nothing about you other than my body and my emotions yearn to once again touch your soil, breathe in your air, and be embraced by that which I consider to be my home home. Trying to figure out my place here when I constantly feel so displaced and trapped in that displacement is difficult. I try my best to do the things that remind me of you in ways that I know how - finding Korean community here, expanding on my research on identity intersections in Korean adoptees, eating and cooking Korean food, and never letting go of what it was like to be held within you for two weeks back in August when I felt truly at home. Yet, without actually being home home, I still feel such a gap - a gaping hole really.
It was on your soil I was born and it was to your soil I returned 32 years later, only to have to leave again. One day I will be back. I will come back to the land, the people, and the culture where I, for once in my life, felt whole and complete in all of my un-wholeness and incompleteness. I felt fully assembled in my disassembled ways. Parts of my life I have never been able to understand or even think about suddenly made sense in ways that I didn't and couldn't understand at the time, but in hindsight, what I do know is that my mind and my body knew where home home was. I knew where I was created and where I touched first. I constantly feel your pull and your presence in my life since returning to Minnesota, and it only grows stronger and stronger.
I had forgotten about you for so much of my life only because I never knew you. How could I remember something I never knew? But in not knowing you and in forgetting you, I never knew that part of who I was and have always been. Day after day, moment after moment, I continually forgot about my own self. Just as I was removed from Korea, Korea was also removed from me. I've spent the last couple of years slowly beginning to find my way back. I will spend the rest of my life continuing to find that confluence in me of the two rivers - the River Han in South Korea and the Mississippi River in Minnesota - and my life will never be separate from where it all began and what has always been a part of me.
Dear Korea,
My life journey over the past 30-some years has ranged from smooth, hill-less-ness, and straight, to meandering - wandering even - to seemingly impossible climbs and insurmountable walls. I've walked through parts of my life with relative ease. I've run into open arms sometimes and away from frightening arms other times. Sometimes I've even run from myself. I've crawled slowly through many complexities and over fragile ground. And I've even dragged myself through some of the sharpest of thorns, reaching desperately for something solid and stable to cling to. In some ways I have been given incredible opportunities to have new experiences and expand my life. In some ways I have felt slowed down, halted, and even stunned and hurt by painful and agonizing experiences and truths. It's been a long haul of glorious moments and many hurdles. In those moments that I am the most exhausted, the most miserable, and the most defeated, something wills me to continue to put one foot in front of the other and press on.
Returning to you has been one of the most, if not the most, significant experiences of my life so far. In the month and a half that encapsulates my preparation leading up to my return, the two week time period I was embraced by you, and the couple of weeks back in Minnesota, my entire being went through such a barrage of emotions it's hard to even be able to comprehend them. Some days I wonder how I am even still standing! Since I've been back I have searched and searched and tried to reconcile various components of who I was, who I am, and who I want to be all within the confines of understanding that at my core, there is you, Korea, and there always will be.
I cant step outside and take you in anytime I want to. I know practically nothing about you other than my body and my emotions yearn to once again touch your soil, breathe in your air, and be embraced by that which I consider to be my home home. Trying to figure out my place here when I constantly feel so displaced and trapped in that displacement is difficult. I try my best to do the things that remind me of you in ways that I know how - finding Korean community here, expanding on my research on identity intersections in Korean adoptees, eating and cooking Korean food, and never letting go of what it was like to be held within you for two weeks back in August when I felt truly at home. Yet, without actually being home home, I still feel such a gap - a gaping hole really.
It was on your soil I was born and it was to your soil I returned 32 years later, only to have to leave again. One day I will be back. I will come back to the land, the people, and the culture where I, for once in my life, felt whole and complete in all of my un-wholeness and incompleteness. I felt fully assembled in my disassembled ways. Parts of my life I have never been able to understand or even think about suddenly made sense in ways that I didn't and couldn't understand at the time, but in hindsight, what I do know is that my mind and my body knew where home home was. I knew where I was created and where I touched first. I constantly feel your pull and your presence in my life since returning to Minnesota, and it only grows stronger and stronger.
I had forgotten about you for so much of my life only because I never knew you. How could I remember something I never knew? But in not knowing you and in forgetting you, I never knew that part of who I was and have always been. Day after day, moment after moment, I continually forgot about my own self. Just as I was removed from Korea, Korea was also removed from me. I've spent the last couple of years slowly beginning to find my way back. I will spend the rest of my life continuing to find that confluence in me of the two rivers - the River Han in South Korea and the Mississippi River in Minnesota - and my life will never be separate from where it all began and what has always been a part of me.
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