On Anger

I've never seen myself as an angry person.  In fact, I thought of myself as the opposite -- even keeled, controlled, cool headed.  I don't know if it's still the hormones or this role of being a parent, but I find myself on the edge of anger more often than I had ever been before.  The kind of anger where I clench my teeth and claw my hands.  Where I contain the urge to bash my fist into the wall.

The odd thing is I don't know where it comes from -- this anger.  Stupid little things set it off.  Seeing a stray piece of the dog's fur on my baby's mouth.  Coming back to the car and finding the adjacent car parked so closely that I can't fit in my baby's car seat.  Discovering that my three year old had again rolled and run around in his poopy diaper, so much so that the poop had oozed through the elastic and caked around his little thighs.

In those moments, I literally seethe.  Throw my arms in the air.  And clench my fist.  And release a little Argh.  Or even a God damn it!  Even in front of my three year old who is sure to repeat it with his next breath.

It is easy to forget the anger.  To pretend it hadn't overcome me as it had.  To find my voice of reason and later retell the event to a friend or to Jeff as if it were some humorous or notable episode.  To see it as just a fleeting scene that leaves no mark.

But it isn't quite so easy.  The other day, I saw my three year old -- after I had refused his request for some sugary snack -- throw his hands up in the air, as I sometimes have, and scream out Argh!  They are little video cameras, these little people.  But it's not only their witnessing.  It is also that they can sometimes be the object of my anger.  When I berate a three year old for again failing to announce that he had pooped, how does that information process in his brain?  In my reasonable brain, I know that he is three.  But in my anger, I rail about the conversation we previously had -- about how he should poop in the potty, how he should tell me when he poops, how he should know better -- expecting him to know better than a three year old could.

Everyone experiences anger, I know that.  And it can be a useful emotion -- one that alerts you and others of the gravity of the situation at hand, one that signals that you mean business.  An emotion that can be a crutch for when other emotions seem overpowering.  But what worries me is that my anger arises over such trivial matters.  That my emotions seem out of proportion to the situation at hand.  And it makes me suspect that the anger arises from something other than the immediate situation.  I'm sure if I read some books on the subject, I could educate myself on this subject.  (And if anyone has any recommendations, I'd love to read some.)

It makes me wonder what junk resides in the well of my mind that it should so overpower me.  I've been thinking for a few days that I should just write about every past incident that made me angry -- I mean, really angry -- or upset in the past.  Maybe that's one way to exorcise some of these demons.  I've heard that re-living an emotionally gripping episode from one's past can often take away the power of those events.  So I'm going to try to do that -- find some time to write about those unhappy incidents in my past.  If this blog seems skewed in portraying an angry Asian girl, that's what's going on.

Studying Again

I'm starting to study for the GREs!  In someways, it feels silly to be preparing to go back to school at my age, but in another way, it feels liberating.  I think I decided more than a year ago that I am quitting the practice of law, but I have yet to file for inactive status with the California State Bar.  I have thought about doing the paperwork, but for some reason, I am hesitant to do it.  Maybe because it feels so permanent?   But when I think about studying something else and going back to school to do it, I get so excited!  I am thinking of going for a masters in psychology, as I wrote a while back.  Since I wrote about it back then, I have done really nothing about it.  But I am finally getting to a point where I feel comfortable entrusting my little baby with a baby sitter.  So today, we had a baby sitter come and play with little S while I cracked open my GRE prep book as I paddled away on our elliptical.  I started with the vocabulary section because that is the one section I feel comfortable with.  It is the last section that I need to study, but I am too intimidated to look at the math section.  I don't know how I am going to re-learn all that I need to in order to take a standardized test!  Maybe I have to take some prep course.  Or teach myself on Kahn Academy.  But either way, I am going to ace this damn thing and put myself on the right career path once and for all.   

Vertical Time

For the first time today, the house is silent -- except for the occasional soft purring from my 8 week old who sleeps a few feet away from me. My two year old is nowhere to be heard, at least until he wakes and charges into another day with his shouts, giggles, and stomps.

I wonder how best to use my undisturbed time. Exercising is at the top of my list, especially since I need to lose 30 pounds of this pregnancy fat. until I feel waves of drowsiness from my limited sleep last night. Then sleep seems the next best choice, but I don't want to squander my minutes of freedom. My pile of unopened New Yorkers seems tempting, but then I remember my blog -- and how I've neglected it. And missed it.

I've missed writing. And reading. And talking in more than short spurts between chasing a 2 year old around the house and tending to my newborn. In general, functioning like the kind of grown up I was in my 20s and early 30s.

As much as I love my children, I sometimes miss those days. When I could read a book or a magazine and work out and enjoy a cup of coffee in uninterrupted sips and get a good night's sleep -- all within 24 hours. But most of all, I miss connecting with people on a certain level, which is what writing allows for me -- and having long engaging conversations in a coffee shop -- the kind I indulged in as a college student. Talking and thinking about the grandiose subject of life and how best to live it. I get it in short spurts these days. Or if I do have a conversation, it is about how to potty train or deal with tamper tantrums.

I then vow to figure out a way to make more time for it -- and for me. I think about how best to squeeze it in before my head plunges into the pillow, heavy with all the frenzies of the day. Or to maximize the time during my toddler's nap to have more me-time. How to free myself from the array of menial tasks that dominate my day. How to fit everything in when there are only so many hours available. It's like trying to beat time at its own game. But I usually nod off before I can even formulate any cogent thought.

I then remember my husband's suggestion that life can be segmented vertically. That I don't have to try to fit all in one time frame. I don't have to learn to manage a newborn with a toddler, start a new career, catch up on all of the world's events, learn to cook, and figure out my retirement plan all at once. Or at least not two months after popping out a second kid. I can hold off on starting the new career for another year -- or five. And work on all the self improvement issues that have been on my list for the past decade or two.

I can't help but wonder if I've already used up the time to indulge on myself -- and to ponder life's big questions. That my 20s and early 30s were the times to do that -- and I am now passing through the time to live out the life that I was supposed to have figured out. I hope not.

When I was pregnant with my first child, a friend advised that the easiest way to be a mother is to give in to the demands of motherhood. That motherhood is so overwhelming that we should give in rather than fighting it. I now see the wisdom of that. To submit to the demands of the day -- at least for the time being -- and not to try to do more than that. To be easy on myself. To give myself the permission to be less ambitious.

The thing to remember is that this is only for a limited amount of time. In just a few years, my little ones will soon be off in school. They will no longer need me in the same way, and I can have back some of the freedom - or burden - of focusing on myself.

I imagine that in my old age, I'll probably look back on these days and think of the afternoons when I held my baby and nuzzled her. When I marveled at the string of words coming out of my little boy's mouth. When I was allowed the time to indulge in my children -- and they were there to be indulged in.

There is a lesson to be learned about the trite maxim of living in the moment. It is a lesson I have yet to learn. But maybe this little break from the day was what I needed to be reminded of all that I have left to learn.

In the meantime, I'm just going to try to refrain from wanting too much. At least for now.

Update

The latest in my life:



A bundle of sweetness.

I've been spending all of my time tending to the little ones. And once in a while, I wonder what I did before their arrival.

NY TImes Article (Notes From a Dragon Mom)

This has to be one of the most moving (and sad) articles I've read in a long time.

Two Years Later...

Earlier this month, we celebrated our little guy's 2d birthday. Hard to believe it's been two years already!

On the Shame of Blogging

A year ago, one evening in July, I received a call from my mother around 9pm PST. She lives on the East Coast, so it was around midnight her time. I picked up the phone, alarmed that something could have happened to her or my father who live alone in a closed-blind suburb of New York.

"Mom, is everything ok?" I asked as soon as I answered.

"Are you writing about our family in a blog?" she asked.

I was too stunned to respond. I had been keeping a blog for the past few years, and I had written liberally about our family. But I had not told any members of my family about it.

"Why are you writing about our family?" she continued. "And why are you doing it in your name? Other people blog anonymously. Why do you have to put your full name on your blog?"

I wondered how she found out about my blog. My mother had recently started to use the computer, mainly to watch Korean dramas on the internet. And as far as I knew, she did not know how to run searches. She navigated between the sites she frequented by going to her favorite links, which had been set up for her by my brother.

"What if someone reads it? Why did you write about your sister-in-law? What if your niece reads it? What are we going to do? How can you do this?"

I had written about my sister-in-law in one of my earlier posts as well as other members of my family. But nothing all too horrible, I thought, nothing to be ashamed about. And in my posts, I thought I had written with some respect for their perspectives and some understanding of their experiences. And then I wondered how she read all these posts - and if she even understood them. Her commands of written English was limited and I've never seen her read anything more than a few words. I had previously shown her my articles published in magazines, and she never even tried to read them.

The phone call ended badly, with me trying to defend my blog and her crying that I was bringing shame onto the family.

The following day, I shut down my blog that had been maintained under my name, moved it to a new site, and started posting anonymously. I didn't know what to do about my Kimchi Mamas posts, since I had been posting under my own name and the site even included a bio along with my photo. I didn't know what to do.

It wasn't that I thought my mother was right. I didn't. I didn't believe that she had done justice to my posts because if she had read them, she would have reacted with a little more understanding than having a knee jerk reaction as she did. And I didn't share her sense of shame, her worries of social stigma. What was shameful to her seemed to be simply a fact of life to me, something worth discussing.

But a part of me wondered if she had a point because I had written about her -- and others in our family without their permission, including conversations they obviously assumed would be private. And I was also a solicitous child, eager to please and to be approved by them. I rarely did anything that merited serious disapproval, and did not know how to handle this rebuke.

So for the following year or so, I stopped writing publicly.

For as long as I remember, as we were growing up, our actions were always controlled by threats of disapproval and shame. What we did could bring shame on our family, and it was our obligation to avoid that at all cost. We lived alone in the US, with no relatives. There were very few people here who knew what we did, or much less even cared enough for us to have felt shame in their eyes. But my parents always reminded us of our relatives back in Korea, those grandparents, uncles, aunts, and cousins, who heard news of our welfare. And it was always they whose eyes reached more than 6500 miles across the sea to our dingy apartment in the US and scrutinized our report cards, our reward certificates at the end of the year, news of our college acceptance, our career choices, and marriage prospects.

Over the years, as our grandparents passed away and our uncles and aunts slowly faded one by one, I have to admit that I felt a slight sense of relief. Those people we hardly knew could no longer have a say in what or how we did. They could no longer look down on my parents and pity them for their children who failed to live up to expectations.

But after my call with my mom, I realized that she did not live in such a world. For her, the world was always full of disapproving eyes, and lurking around her were new candidates, like my niece, who could bear witness to her shame. According to her, our lives had to be kept secret, lest anyone find out the truth about the way we lived, and the information to be released publicly had to be managed, just the way politicians doled out massaged truth for public consumption.

I feel relieved that I do not live in such a socially restricted world. Maybe the system works in Korea, where people understand each others' hardships and can relate to each other, even without having to verbalize them. But that has not been my experience here. Our lives as immigrants in the US has been full of difficulties and heartaches, and I found that many do not understand what we experienced unless I tell them. Once in college, I wrote an essay about our family's immigration experience, and one non-Korean reader came up to me and said that she believed it "had to be true" because it was written so earnestly. I was stunned that she could have believed that it may not have been true. And her reaction made me feel even lonelier than I had ever felt before.

And when I think about that feeling of loneliness, I realize that I should write about my experiences. That we all should. And we should share our stories because without them, we are lost in our own little bubbles, floating aimlessly without perspective and with less understanding. So I post here once again, and look forward to the day when my children are old enough to read what I have written so that they too can understand a little more, care a little more.

Matters of Approval

When we were growing up, there was usually a right and a wrong answer for almost everything. What is the proper way to read? Sitting upright with the book held at eye level approximately 1.5 feet away. What is the right way to sit? Never with your back hunched over. What is the right amount of rice to serve? Always more than just one scoop. What is the amount of food properly left behind on one's plate? Certainly never just a morsel or a spoonful.

These answers, fed to us in bite-sized aphorisms, ranged from the mundane to the weighty. For some of the more serious issues, the questions were never posed because the right answers were presumed to be understood. For example, our parents never asked us, What kind of a person would you like to marry? They never asked, Do you wish to marry a white person? What about someone of Hispanic background? Or someone black? We understood that we were to marry a Korean.

I'm not sure how we first came to that understanding. Maybe the time when my father consoled his friend whose daughter was dating an Indian. My dad's friend muttered, "An Indian," as he spit on the ground. Or the time I told my mom that my Korean-American friend was married to a Japanese woman, and she exclaimed, "How could he do that to his parents!" I have a vague recollection of my parents taking us aside after these incidents and explaining how Koreans should be married to Koreans.

Later, my mother clarified that a Korean-American -- as opposed to a Korean who grew up in Korea -- would be better for me since I was so head-strong. A couple of years after I started working, she further clarified that he should earn as much as I did -- and have an advanced degree as I did, lest he be humiliated in the eyes of his wife.

We painfully learned the consequences of making the wrong choices. Like the time my brother brought home a wrong girlfriend. She seemed right at first. She was Korean-American from a decent enough family. Seemingly polite enough. But for some unspoken reason, my dad decided that she was not right. Not right for our household, even if my brother had apparently decided that she was right for him and I silently thought she was good for him in many ways. But my father felt otherwise. When she came over, my father refused to acknowledge her, even when she greeted him politely and did all the proper things. Sadly, she did not last long.

This process of making decisions by viewing all variables through the disapproving eyes of our parents wasn't limited to just dating. It dominated almost all decisions in our lives, including school selection, our career choices, where to live. When I was applying to colleges, there were only a handful of colleges that were acceptable to my parents. A wide assortment of Yale, Harvard, or Columbia. That was about it. Maybe they would have been okay with Princeton. When I did not get accepted into any of those, my father insisted that I would have to attend a state school, even though I had been accepted into the University of Chicago, my first choice. It became an uphill battle to try to convince my father -- and perhaps myself -- that I wasn't a complete failure because I had not been accepted into those three or four schools deemed acceptable in his eyes.

Most decisions in our lives seemed to be a matter of approval or disapproval. Either our actions pleased our parents or they did not. As children, I don't think we ever stopped to consider the difference between our actions and our being -- or the difference between approval and love. When they approved of something we did, we beamed in their eyes and felt loved. When they disapproved, we felt spurned and rejected.

I've discussed the notion of unconditional love with some of my Korean-American friends, and we often conclude that we do not believe in such a concept. Maybe because we grew up in households where love was never verbalized. Where the only semblance of love was approval, which peaked and waned with the choices we made.

Focusing so much on my parents' approval often cast a shadow over other factors that we should have considered, either more carefully or in their own light. Most decisions became for or against them -- but we rarely considered the question of were they right for us? Maybe we did ask those questions, but often they were so cluttered with worries and anxieties about our parents' reaction that I wonder if they ever got the attention they deserved.

I think my parents must have grown up in a time and a culture where children did not make decisions. At least not to the degree children do here. I remember my mother once marveling over how American parents stop to ask even toddlers their preferences on things, including what they want to eat or where they want to sit. She rued that she had not done so with us -- that she had always simply told us what to do and how to do it.

I sometimes wonder about this part of my upbringing. Even now, I often find it difficult to make decisions. And the decision making process becomes easier when I have an opposing force -- that kicks me into an emotional and reactive mode. I have been trying to think of ways to extricate myself from this overdeveloped need to gain approval -- or to fight against disapproval. To be a person with more integrity to keep her in balance.

And I think about ways in which I raise my son -- to allow him to be his own person without needing to meet my approval at every turn. To help him to develop the skills to assess and meet his own needs -- without feeling crippled by the needs of others. And to fortify him with the assurance that he stands on solid ground even when we disapprove -- that our love does not peak and wane with the school he attends or the girl he chooses to date.

For my part, I intend to speak clearly when I speak of love -- and softly and sparingly when I disapprove, if I have to disapprove at all.

Wasting time

A few months ago, I transferred my cases to a trial lawyer -- a real trial lawyer, with more than 175 trials under his belt, not a glorified paper pusher like me (and most big law firm partners I worked with over the years).

The transfer came after weeks of overwhelming stress. We have a nanny who comes about 20 hours a week, and I easily had enough work to fill up 40. As a result, Jeff and I had been - for a series of weekends - negotiating how to split the weekends so that we could each get done all that we needed to. The first weekend of February, I worked most of Saturday, and Jeff had most of Sunday, even though we took a break in the middle to go out for lunch and a stroll -- to celebrate my birthday. When he asked me how I wanted to celebrate, my response was, "I really don't have the time to celebrate right now."

I had days when I was so overwhelmed with work that I couldn't work. I never had those before. I would sit down in the front of the computer and my mind would be reeling with the list of tasks in front of me. Unable to focus. Touching this paper and that, piling them up, and then reshuffling them again. When I worked at firms, I remember having a lot to do at times, but I never shut down with stress. A partner once commented what a cool cucumber I was under pressure, and that's how I remember myself. I don't know when she wilted.

Ever since I handed off my cases, I've had the luxury of having free time. Little T goes down for his nap around 2pm these days -- and happily snoozes until 6pm. Four whopping hours. Along with the luxury of free time has come the luxury of wasting them. After I've picked up his toys, thrown the clothes in the laundry, folded the ones in the drier, and filled the dishwasher, I look for other tasks to keep me busy. On some days, I read a book from cover to end in one sitting. On others, I watch a movie - and then immediately start another. There are days when I surf the net and then stare out the window.

Why haven't I been writing more? Well, the last couple of months, I've been blissfully napping. Overtaken by overwhelming drowsiness that comes with pregnancy. I'm about to start my 20th week of pregnancy -- and so thrilled with the news that this one is a girl. The last three pregnancies, including two miscarriages, have all been boys, and I assumed that we were only capable of making little men. I was almost ready to tuck away my dream of shopping for little dresses, adorning a little one with frilly hats, and making time for girl to girl talks. It never felt so much better to have beaten the odds.

The Short Visit

We returned late Wednesday night, or rather early Thursday morning, from a 15 hour visit to San Francisco. The visit was wedged between two 9+ hours of driving - from San Diego and back. It was meant to be a normal visit - a 1.5 hour flight in the morning and a 1.5 hour return that night with a short deposition in the middle of the day. That is until Jeff found out that he had to be in the Bay Area as well on the same day for his work. We realized it was more complicated when I remembered that I had to be in Los Angeles the day before, and we couldn't figure out how I could be back in San Diego in time for Jeff to make the last flight out of San Diego (a woefully early flight of 6:50 p.m.). We have a part time nanny, but she goes to school in the evenings, and we are not together enough to have lined up a back-up babysitter for such emergency situations. Hence this brilliant idea of driving 18 hours in a 34 hour span.

So on Tuesday morning, I boarded Amtrak's Surfliner for Los Angeles at 6:45 a.m. with my suitcase of exhibits for my deposition. That afternoon, at approximately 3:00 p.m., as I bombarded my witness with my endless list of tedious questions, Jeff left San Diego to pick me up in LA with our little guy strapped in his carseat in the back. After wading through LA traffic, he found me waiting at a Starbucks after my depo. I greeted him with a big cup of coffee for his driving, and we continued to drive and drive and drive -- with a quick stop at In-n-Out after the Grapevine -- until we found ourselves in our familiar terrain, our home that no longer was home. But it still felt like home, even the East Bay, where we had hardly spent any time except to visit our close friends and for the occasional visit to Ikea -- but the signs leading to Berkeley, the lights on the Bay Bridge, and even the potholes on the roads felt like they were mine in some way.

When we checked in at the Hyatt Regency at 1:00 a.m., the guy asked if we needed directions around the city. Oh, no, we said. We used to live here - until we moved away four months ago. He, a native of some unmemorable state like Arkansas or Idaho, raved about the Chinese food in San Francisco. And suddenly, I couldn't stop thinking about the Chinese food in San Francisco.

I stayed up to finish preparing for my next deposition and made the mistake of sitting in front of a mirror with lighting that worked far too well. I noticed all my gray strands as I sat typing in my questions -- and vanity required that I spend at least 30 minutes at 3 in the morning pulling out all my unwanted signs of aging.

At 7:00 a.m., Jeff left for his meeting in Silicon Valley. After showering and getting dressed, I hung out with little T at Starbuck's across the street where I had spent many mornings before work in my days before little T. As we sat there, me in my suit and he in his stroller, he munching on a blueberry scone, me sipping my grande latte, I felt conspicuous -- a mom with a baby in the midst of all those careerists.

Suddenly, I thought of all my friends who must be on their way to work at that very moment and perhaps even passing the very Starbuck's we were sitting in. I regretted the short visit and wished we had set aside some time to see our dear friends that we missed. I impulsively left messages with a few who worked within a 2 block radius, knowing how busy they must be and knowing they would not likely be able to see us on such short notice. At 8:25, we rushed back to the hotel room when little T pooped and waited for my friend who had agreed to watch him while I took the deposition.

At around 9am, as I tried to finish preparing for the deposition, I was surprised by an email from one of the friends I had pinged, and half an hour later, she was knocking on the hotel room door. These visits after a long stretch are never as satisfying as they are meant to be because there is never enough time to say all that you wanted to say or to give as firm as hug as you meant to give. But they are good enough placeholders for the next visit, the next hug.

Seven hours later, after the deposition, after the other meetings, and after talking on the phone with friends who were sick with a cold or couldn't make it to the city that day, we packed our stuff back into the car and started the drive out of SF. It was a mad rush to beat the rush hour traffic, to be ahead of the onslaught of cars pouring out of the feeder ramps. And that was our focus until we were well past Livermore, and miles away from our old home and the friends we didn't get a chance to see.

Our House With a View

Here is the ridiculously amazing sunset I saw tonight from our balcony:



And another photo I took about a month ago:



Before we moved to San Diego, Jeff and I talked about the adjustment period we'd have to go through. We had both lived in the Bay Area for over a decade and had built up so many friendships during that period. That was the hardest part about moving away. We adored our friends out there. But we also talked about the kind of life we'd like to have long term and the unlikelihood that we'd be able to live in San Francisco long term given the bad public schools out there. We also thought about the draw of retiring in a place like San Diego, instead of somewhere in Silicon Valley, which would probably have been where we would have ended up had we not moved down here. And we agreed that if we had to make a move and go through the difficult transition of making new friends and growing our roots, we might as well do it now in our relative youth than doing it right upon retirement.

So that's what we are doing now. Trying to find some softness in the earth where we can put down our roots. And it will take a little time to find that. And to start feeling like this place is home. It's hard not to love this land when we are surrounded by such beauty. Almost everyday, we say to each other how lucky we are to live this privileged life as we do. With the kind of view that we have.

And I know in time, I'll make some new friends out here. Apart from Jeff's parents, I know five people out here. I'm sure in time, that number will grow. I remember how it felt when I first had little T and I didn't know any other moms in my neighborhood. By the time we left, we knew most of the new moms in the neighborhood and would often run into them wherever we went. I'm hoping we can build that kind of life out here.

Home Alone

Jeff is out of town for a few weeks, and I'm at home alone with little T. Our nanny worked until 3pm today, and as soon as she was done, we rushed to T's music class down on La Jolla Boulevard. Only one other mom/kid showed up, but the class was delightful just the same.

As we were leaving, I got that dreaded feeling inside as I thought of returning to an empty house. A little taste of those panic attacks I've had a couple of times in the past, where the emptiness of the house feels overwhelming, the looming hours frightening. I strolled little T down the street in the direction of the park we usually walk to. As we neared a frozen yogurt shop, I saw a mom with a stroller seated in front, and I dropped in, hoping that she may be up for a chit chat. But no such luck. As we approached, she started packing up her two little boys and rolled away. I still got my frozen yogurt, which I shared with little T and thought about where to go next. But it was already nearing 5pm, and the sun would go down soon. And the little guy needed his bath, having missed it last night. He was already showing signs of fatigue, so I reluctantly strolled us home.

When I walked in, the closed windows felt stifling, the silence, too thick. I busied myself getting T ready for his bath. As I did, I turned on my iTunes, and Elvis' cooing filled the silence. Bathing T, feeding him, and then chasing him around for a bit filled the following couple of hours. As soon as he went down, I busied myself folding the laundry and then sat myself down with a glass of red wine and my computer.

The Roomba is buzzing downstairs, and Sherlock is already conked out on his pad. I'm in my glasses, with my make-up wiped off. I'm ready for bed, and it's only 7:30pm. I usually don't stay up late anyway, but I don't know if I can fall asleep this early. It's ridiculous because I have a shit load of things to get done, and I'm not sure how I'll finish everything by their deadlines next week. But right now, I can't seem to care very much. I feel immobilized.

I don't know what is wrong with me. I'm guessing that at the heart of this pseudo-panic is a fear of being alone. I had always thought that solitude was something that never bothered me. If anything, I used to relish it and often felt that I didn't have enough of it. I remember how in college and in the years after, I wanted to be left alone more so that I could have more time to read. And now, I can't seem to spend a night alone without feeling panicked.

I imagine at the root of it is some deep-seeded fear. Something I am aware of, but haven't really pieced together. Loneliness has always been a central theme in our family. Growing up, my parents repeatedly mentioned that we were alone in this country, that we had no one we could rely on for help. We had no relatives here, very few family friends. No one we could call if some tragedy befell our family. We had to rely on ourselves and no one else. It was a call to attention. A warning to stay on the alert, lest we let our guards down and suffer.

To prove the case, our family lived a lonely existence. On Christmas and New Year's eves, we often stayed late at our parents' dry cleaners, watching others pick up their evening gowns and tuxedos for the parties they were planning to attend. When we turned off the neon sign and locked the front door after 7pm, the streets were usually empty and the other stores around us closed except for the lone liquor store down the street.

On the holidays we celebrated, we never celebrated with anyone else. Who is there to invite, my parents asked. Besides, they would say, it's just extra money to spend. Why spend more money to feed others?

For several years, I worried about who would attend my parents' funerals. Who could we call? No relatives. Very few friends. No church members. No neighbors. Just our small nuclear family. Who would stand with us to remember their lives? Make note of them and mark their existence on earth?

My dad always admonished that all we had were each other. There's no one else, he would say. We're all we have.

Despite his admonishments, we have done a poor job of staying cohesive as a family. And I wonder if my panic attacks didn't start after my fight started with my sister, the person I always relied on to be there for me.

In some moments, this world seems like a fragile little place, where all I have are Jeff, my little T, and my parents. These four people out of all the people in this world. Who can we really rely on to be there in times of need? But not just times of need, because I'm sure I have friends I can call on if something dire came up. People whose lives don't turn on a different axle, who don't live separate lives except for occasions when our lives intersect for this or that social gathering.

Sometimes I wished we lived in a small village, where everyone knew everyone else's business, when you can amble down the road to find a kin. I must be longing for more meaningful human contact, something I have had less of since we moved down to San Diego. It's just not enough to post some tidbit on Facebook every now and then.

Happy holidays

It has been a relief to be caught up with holiday planning for the past week or so. To have a list of things to accomplish, to focus on what to give to others, to think about all the people to remember. And I always love planning for get togethers and pouring over cookbooks. We had Jeff's family over today, and we made a bunch of new dishes that I'm adding to my keeper list - along with some all time favorites, like hot crab dip. My favorite new recipe was a potato and swiss chard gratin from the NYTimes. We also made a chocolate pecan pie, which turned out absolutely yummy. Our main course turned out so-so (black cod with oyster mushroom ragout), but we had enough other tasty dishes that it hardly mattered.

Our little T received so many incredible presents from his relatives. It is heart-warming to see how he is doted on -- and how he's getting indulged as much as any child could. He is one lucky child, and I hope he grows up appreciating all the sweet love flowing in his direction.

I hope all of you out there had a wonderful day with your loved ones. Happy holidays.

Big Shoes to Fill

Of course we hope our little T won't be burdened with having to fill the shoes of all of our hopes/expectations if he turns out to be an only child, but we think he can rise to the occasion. Not to say we won't be trying again sometime soon...

This time

I had a feeling about it. I told Jeff a couple of nights ago. I don't think it's good.

He told me not to worry, we've had these little scares before. Don't you remember when we saw Dr. Moon? That turned out to be nothing. Maybe it's nothing again.

Maybe, I said.

But I sensed it, in the way my body felt less weighted and more alert, as if I had taken claritin for head to toe.

In the morning, I called the doctor's office. They asked if I could come in that morning, but having a brief to finish, I made the first available appointment for the morning after.

Then I went about the day as any other. I bounced along to circus music with little T as he played and replayed the ball popper we had recently purchased for him. I clapped along with him each time he applauded after feeding himself a spoonful of apple sauce. And cautioned him with my no, no, no's after he tried to mount Sherlock reclining in the sun.

When little T went down for his nap, I scrambled to finish my brief and prepare it for filing. In 45 minutes, I was done, just as little T screamed awake from his bedroom. It is always the days when I need him to nap when he naps the least.

After, we trudged over to the post office and stood in a line that stretched out the door to mail my brief to the Court and the service copy to opposing counsel. In that time, I chatted with a lady who was expecting her four grandchildren for Christmas as little T prattled away to a girl waiting in line behind us with her mother.

From there, we headed to Pho Time, where I ordered a seafood pho and little T waved at all customers who walked past our table. While I sat, I felt the little rumblings in my belly -- a slight tightness with a sense of bloating. And I wondered, but tried not to. I told myself it was only because I was focused on it so much that it felt different.

When we returned home, I wondered why my belly felt flatter than it had a few days ago. Maybe just my imagination. Maybe.

When I went to bed, I hoped that I wouldn't start cramping. I fell asleep in fetal position, cradling my belly, protecting it from some unknown force.

In the morning, Jeff asked me, how are you feeling?

No cramps, so maybe it's ok?

But when I went to pee, I knew. It was not ok. And after I showered and put on my make-up, I went back to bed and let Jeff hold me.

So we went through the routine again. Going to the doctor's office to be told what we already knew. I told the ultrasound technician -- apologetically as if I were wasting her time.

Well, let's see how it looks in there, she responded.

And the few seconds of searching, searching for that faint bleep on the gray screen -- the faint bleep we had seen just ten days earlier. As she moved the device over my belly, the image of the baby appeared -- the fuzzy head, the glob of torso and limbs. Still in there, in tact. As if it were still alive.

Seeing the little body made me break down, even though I had not planned to. I had planned to be ok this time.

And I was ok -- more ok than I had been before. Because this time, we came home to little T, who now waddles all over our house, opening this door and that. Who makes baby signs of the elephant, crocodile, and monkey. And asks for all sorts of food with grunts and little fingers. And plants big open mouth kisses on our cheeks, our foreheads, our noses, wherever his mouth happens to land.

For the past couple of days, I've had fleeting moments of resentment. Why can't I have it easy for a change? Why does it have to be some god damn trial each time? Why do some women just breeze though, but I have to have the worst always befall us?

But then I caught myself. It hasn't always been the worst. We have little T, and that wasn't the worst. By any measure. And seeing him waddle around makes me realize how much of a miracle he is. Me, with my decrepit eggs, being lucky enough to have landed at least one good one, one good enough to produce a perfect little being like him.

Jeff and I talked about how we would be ok without another. With just little T. How he fills us each day with so much pride, wonder, love, and a bunch of other feelings that have no name but cram our chests up to our necks.

As Jeff trailed behind little T as he picked up this and that in our walk-in closet, Jeff said, "Oh, little T, do you know how happy you make mommy and daddy? Do you know how much we love you?" And I thought about all the people who grow up in this world questioning the extent of their parents' love, and I wondered how that is possible. How is it possible to be a parent and not express the love you have for your child on a daily basis? Do people stop expressing their love for their children when they turn surly twelve? Do parents run out of time to hug their children and cover them with kisses when they have more than one child? What happens out there that so many children grow up yearning for their parents' love?

My D&C is scheduled for tomorrow morning. We plan to wake up at 5:15 to leave the house by 5:45 to get to the hospital by 6:30 for the 8:30 procedure. What a pain in the ass. If someone can come up with a procedure to sort out the bad eggs from the good, I'm sure he'll have investors lined up out the door. I guess at some point, I'll be too old to even worry about whether I have any good eggs left. And then I'll have to reserve all my smothering kisses for little T, who I'm sure will be perfectly grossed out by my behavior when he enters his teens. But there are worse things in life, right?

Changing Directions

I'm thinking of changing careers. Well, I have been thinking about it. For the past ten years, in fact.

I've always wanted to write, so about a year ago, I dabbled in some magazine writing for a few months. It was a decent experience. I got to meet and talk to a bunch of notable people and see my name in print. It was hard to justify the time I put into it, though, for the pay I received. ($200 for an article I spent 2 weeks interviewing, organizing, and writing.) And writing about other people didn't feel as satisfying as writing about my own life. Not that I'm so self-absorbed, but I think writing is a very personal process for me. It helps me to sort out my thoughts, see aspects of my life in a different light, find the words and definition for some of my experiences. Magazine writing just didn't do those things for me -- and why should it? I'm starting to think that I don't need to write professionally -- not full time anyway -- at least not right now. I'm very content with the writing I do on this blog (when I do write, that is). And even though I sometimes feel the angst to do something bigger with it, I'm not quite sure what that is yet. So with my writing, I think I may just keep it at this level for now -- without the pressure to make it into something bigger than it needs to be.

I've considered the idea of doing litigation part time -- which is more or less what I've been doing for the past two years. It's not a bad career. The pay can be quite generous and I can work somewhat flexible hours. I also work from home without a secretary or a paralegal, and have found it to be much more manageable than I had expected. The problem, I'm finding, is that it really cuts into the state of mind I want to have to be a mom. Because it's so adversarial, I sometimes get nasty emails or letters in the middle of my day when I'm playing with little T. It casts a dark shadow over me -- even if it's for thirty minutes -- and I resent the emotional intrusion into my time with my little guy. I never minded before I became a mom, but now I feel the need to protect my state of mind so that I can be the kind of mom I want to be.

Lately -- maybe because I had such a great experience with my therapist -- I've been thinking about going to get a masters in psychology and doing some kind of counseling. I understand that it's a two year program, and I may have to spend an extra year doing some type of internship. In part, I'm drawn to the idea because I think it would help me personally to study some of those subjects and to understand it -- and myself -- better. I think it would also help me to be a better mom and wife. But I also like the idea of talking to people in a very meaningful way and helping them see themselves or their lives from a different -- and more constructive -- angle. I'm not sure if I'm equipped to do something like that. My therapist was just so amazing at keeping track of all the details that I just spewed out to her -- and so generous in speaking to me from a position of warmth. With my background in litigation, I'm more equipped to be confrontational and rule-driven, rather than supportive and warm.

Of course, I am also concerned about starting a new career when I am almost 40. It will take me a few months to prepare for the GREs and apply to schools. Once I apply, I think I have to wait until the following fall to start. So I will most likely start my program when I am almost 42. That seems quite old -- but then I think of people who were in law school with me -- people who had full careers before. Walter Pincus - the journalist for the Washington Post - was in the evening program at Georgetown when I was there, and I believe he was in his 60s at the time. And then I also think about continuing with law simply because I started in it, and it seems like a horrible waste of time. I tend to think of my last 12 years practicing law as a waste of time. I've justified it to myself, and it hasn't all been negative -- but on the whole, I feel that I have very little to show for my time being a lawyer.

I think it would be horrible to have lived my whole life being just a lawyer. I don't want that to be my obituary. Somewhere inside, there is a part of me that is very ambitious. To do something meaningful with my life. Not to discount being a mother or a wife, but to do something in a larger sense. Sometimes when I read other people's wikipedia entries, I think, I could have done that. And then I tell myself that I still can.

In my case, I think being a mom and now being pregnant with no. 2 heightens my sense of urgency in figuring out my career. I don't want to fall into the trap of being so bogged down with child care -- and prioritizing my children's needs ahead of all else -- that I forget to think about this before it feels too late.

It's hard to pinpoint exactly what it is that I would like to accomplish in my life. A part of it is driven by a fear of living meaninglessly -- something I thought my parents did when they worked day in and day out in a dry cleaners, without any humor or acceptance -- simply for the sake of making a living. And it is hard to pinpoint exactly how one goes about finding meaning in one's work. Maybe it's about finding something that aligns with one's values.

I've decided to take Jeff's suggestion, though, and talk to any many people as I can who are therapists -- and see whether they enjoy their work, and what they like about it. If anyone out there is a therapist, I would love to pick your brain!

Crossing My Fingers

Strangest turn of events. I am pregnant again. This time, after hardly trying. We had talked about trying for no. 2 -- and after much deliberation, mapped out the best time to start trying. When the little guy is 8 months old? No, that's too soon. How about at 10 months. Maybe that's better. You think that's good? Don't you? You don't think that may be a little too late? I'll be almost 40 by then. Maybe 8 months is better. Yeah, maybe that's better.

Little T's eighth month came and went. And we weren't really doing much about it. Work was busy, and I wasn't looking forward to being bogged down with pregnancy slumber. Three months later, we still weren't trying. Which seemed to matter little at the time. Except that I missed the pounds that came off from breast feeding.

Now, a month after T turned one, I find myself pregnant. I hardly even kept track of my periods -- and the other day, I suddenly realized that I hadn't had my period the whole time we've been in San Diego. And we've been in San Diego for exactly one month.

So I rushed out and bought some pregnancy test sticks. And tested myself -- and was amazed to find myself pregnant. Not that I had such difficulty getting pregnant the first time around. I had more difficulty staying pregnant. But here I am -- pregnant once again.

The first thought that ran through my mind was how horribly I've been eating for the past months. Hot dogs. Daily cups of coffee. Occasional glasses of wine. Hardly any vegetables -- except bits of olives, mushrooms, and onions on my pizza. And not a single vitamin. For some reason, my diet had been worse than usual. I'll blame it on the move and my hectic schedule.

I remember reading about how spina bifida is determined during the first few weeks of gestation. And how I am low on my folic acid.

I started popping my vitamins again like an addict. I made a big vat of creamed broccoli soup -- for me, little T, and No. 2 -- which I downed along with celery sticks and carrots. I stopped the coffee cold turkey, and caught myself as I started shoving soft cheese and crackers down my throat. And warned Jeff that I would no longer be picking up bottles of pinot noir on my trips to Whole Foods.

It's time to get back on the regimen -- whatever it takes to ensure the well being of this little person growing inside of me. And cross my fingers that this one is a keeper.

Heading South

A month ago, we celebrated our little guy's one year birthday. We rented a hall along the Bay, invited our friends, decorated the place with paper lanterns and custom made posters of the little guy's past 12 months, and laid out enough food and cake to feed all the smiling faces. We put the little guy in a hanbok and made him pick from an assortment of objects - following in a Korean tradition that I know little about -- more for kicks than anything else. When he picked the piggy bank, symbolizing a life of wealth, and the crowd broke out in laughter, we knew we have an entertainer on our hands.

The day after, we loaded our station wagon with our luggage, bottles of water and leftover cake, an umbrella stroller, and enough toys to last the upcoming drive. I packed our little guy in his car seat, and my parents piled in. We left Jeff behind to deal with the moving company - and all the leftovers in the fridge until he was ready to follow suit a couple of days later.

Around 11am, we started driving. Away from the home I had known for the past six years, away from the city I had loved for the past eleven. We drove straight down 280 and then to 101, past Daly City where I had regularly stopped for Hawaiian plate lunches, past the airport I had often hovered over before landing, past all the exits that led to houses of our friends and acquaintances. We stopped in Paso Robles for lunch and proceeded to Santa Barbara for the night. The next day, we kept driving, until we reached La Jolla.

For the past month, I have been calling La Jolla home -- from a rental that we have for the next six months while we try to figure out whether to become Southern Californians for good. Out of our master bedroom upstairs, we overlook the Pacific -- a view more stunning than any I have ever known. We are surrounded by palm trees and people in flip flops. Guys and gals tote surf boards, as casually as if they were carrying laptops. On the freeway, we drive past convertibles -- and monster trucks.

To try to fit in, we have made a concerted effort not to wear any foot gear other than flip flops. I have yet to tuck a surf board under my arm, but Jeff has been going to work regularly with a boogie board and a beach towel in his trunk. We have strolled up and down the streets of Bird Rock, a little enclave of La Jolla, and hit many of the take-out joints in Pacific Beach - but have yet to brave the bars where we see women clad in bikinis and men in cut offs partying as if they were in a John Cusack film.

The past month has passed in a blur. The first few days were dedicated to unpacking and sorting out our material possessions to approximate some state of stability even as our two car garage remains filled with unpacked boxes and plastic bins. Then the dam of work I had put up while our lives took their course broke and I have been drowning in it since. Even though we hired a part time nanny to help us, we don't know what we would have done if my parents hadn't put their own lives on hold to help us with the transition.

Yesterday, I took the day off. We piled in the car and drove one exit over to Sea World. Once there, we pressed our palms against the glass panes and marveled at the orca whales swimming past us. We lathered sun screen on the little guy and braved the sun to watch the dolphin show. And giggled at the sea lions barking for more food. Later, we gobbled up ice cream bars shaped like Shamu.

I purchased an annual membership to the place - and the second year is for free. So until little T turns three -- and if we find ourselves lucky enough to make this our new home -- we'll be there regularly, befriending the whales, the dolphins, the sea lions, and the sea otters. Maybe even the moray eels.

I think about how life must look to a little person like our T, who has suddenly been transported 500 miles and planted in a new home that is three times the size of the only home he has ever known. Who is now showered with overwhelming attention -- and incessant feeding -- by his grandparents from 2500 miles away. Who suddenly finds himself exposed to humongous creatures he has never seen in his one year of existence -- dolphins and orca whales that jump out of the water and crash dive back in.

What else does life have in store for him -- and for us?

Moving!

I am embarrassed that I haven't posted in almost 6 weeks! I feel like such a delinquent. Work has been very busy, and trying to fit that in, even on a part time basis, while taking care of the little guy seems to squeeze away all the free time I might otherwise have. On top of that, I have been obsessed with planning for little T's first birthday party coming up in early October. But perhaps the better excuse may be that we're preparing for a move to San Diego! We're moving in just two weeks, and we still have a lot of packing left to do.

A part of me is apprehensive about the move. I never thought I'd live in Southern California, and I really love the Bay Area. Even though I am not an extreme liberal, I appreciate all that San Francisco stands for, with its hippie backbone and room for outliers. It has also been my home for the past 11 years, more than a quarter of my life. I have so many friends here that it's hard to imagine just picking up and moving away from them.

I'll start posting again once things calm down. Probably in about three weeks. Please check back in then!

Along the Divide

We're already thinking about no. 2. Little T is only 10 months old, but I've hit my 474th (you do the math), and I'm not about to challenge mother nature's patience after my experience the first time around.

My hope, as I've explained repeatedly to Jeff, is that if no. 2 is a girl (if we're lucky enough to have a second, knock wood), then we call it a day and settle into a family of four. If no. 2 turns out to be a boy, then we keep plugging along to no. 3. If no. 3 turns out to be a boy, we can all pat ourselves on the back for trying and find complacency in our life of mini van and baseball bats.

Jeff hasn't yet bought into my insistence that we keep trying until we welcome a girl into the family. What's the difference, he asks with one eyebrow cocked. Well, I respond, I don't want to be the only girl in the house with you, Sherlock, and our sons. I want to have a daughter, if we can.

When I make my case to Jeff, I feel a little on edge. As if my wish for a daughter is coming from a place of fear rather than desire. A fear that I do not completely understand.

I'm sure a lot of it has to do with the way we grew up, like most other things. The way my sister and I chattered away in the kitchen as we chopped this and that for our mother, even as we sometimes bickered or complained, while my dad sat on the couch clutching his newspaper and my brother flittered in and out of the kitchen, unsure of where to land. The way my dad never learned how to talk to his children. The way my mother filled my ear with her complaints, sorrows, and longings unmet by her husband. The way my brother and I have never had a meaningful conversation our whole lives. It seems strange even to me as I write it.

In our family, alliances were forged often along gender lines. Not intentionally, but perhaps because that's how we understood or didn't understand each other. I never understood my brother's penchant for Ozzy Osbourne or Led Zepplin, even though I could easily understand why my sister loved Les Miserables. I could never understand my father's stoicism and reticence even though I could identify with my mother's need for empathy and yearning to be heard.

But these leanings probably weren't coincidences. Our gender divide was established for us from the beginning. For the first 14 years of my life, my dad went to work, and my mom stayed home. As the older girl, I was relegated the job of helping my mother. When my mother cooked, I was her sous chef. When she did the laundry, I folded. I was always called on as her assistant and raised in her shadow. I don't know if I ever saw my brother do the dishes. Or fold the laundry.

We were a traditional family -- with roles meted out to women and men along conventional lines. And it was in the kitchen where my sister and I often found ourselves, helping our mother prepare the many dishes that she cooked. With our sleeves rolled up, our hair pulled back in pony tails. Flour or grease smeared on our arms or faces. My mom's many appliances hooked in here and there, as we stood over the kitchen table with a turner in hand. Or stationed above the stove, manning the skillet. And in the many hours while we cooked, we talked. Not just about the cooking, with my mother spouting out instructions here and there, but also about the things happening in our lives. Our friends. Our teachers. Whatever was on our mind. And it is here where my father and brother never found a place to belong.

Now that I look back on our childhood, I can see how the men in our family must have felt left out as my mom, my sister, and I chattered away in the kitchen. How they couldn't find a way into our conversations. Sometimes, they hovered over us, but only to grab a glass of water or to poke their heads in the fridge. Or to sample whatever we were cooking. But they never grabbed a spatula and said, "How can I help?" Or sidled up to our mom to say, "What do you need me to do?"

Instead, they sat in the living room. My dad with his newspaper. And my brother with his eyes on the TV. But not together. Without talking.

I wonder if they felt lonely. I'm sure they must have. But I never asked. And they never expressed it.

I suspect my wish for a daughter is my fear of feeling left out. Of being that odd person out. In my own family. I remember that scene from A River Runs Through It, where the father and his two sons go off fly fishing -- and the mother waves them good-bye as she takes a break from doing the laundry. I don't want to be that mother.

I know my fear isn't rational. I won't have the same family that my parents had. Jeff and I aren't my parents. So obvious. If only someone could impress that into my loopy brain.

The funny thing is when I imagine our family these days, it doesn't necessarily include a daughter. Before we had little T, I pictured a daughter, but ever since he showed up, it's hard to imagine a child of ours other than him. These days, when I think of our family, I see me and Jeff with little T. Or with three little boys who look just like T. All giggling and climbing all over us. Both of us.