In Memoriam: A Dumpling Eulogy

I've been trying to think of the best way to start this post, because there is just so much that I need to say, and I don't want to forget anything.

Perhaps that's just the point... not forgetting.

A week ago yesterday, someone who was very special to me passed away. Her name was Chunyu Chan, and she was my husband's grandmother. Some people may wonder how someone who grew up in a poor Chinese village a gazillion miles away, who spoke an entirely different language from myself, and who wasn't even my own grandmother, could mean so much to me. And though I am not second guessing my feelings for her, I did wonder a little about it, too. It got me thinking... why do we love who we love? What is it that makes them so special to us?

I found I could have honestly cared less about the Why of it all, because there was a hole in my heart that ached every time I thought of her. That was proof enough of love for me.

Plus, there is no such thing as not loving Chunyu. It's entirely impossible.

Back in 1998 when I was a teen and started working at the family's Chinese restaurant, I met her for the first time. I can't really remember the official introduction. She was just always there, putting away the dishes, tending the garden, skewering the teriyaki and getting after the rebels who weren't doing their jobs right. But I can tell you that she used her grandmotherly magic on me right away from the start. If my shirt was too short, or my pants cropped too low, or if I skipped dinner, she would be on me like white on rice to let me know this wasn't acceptable! Back then, I had found it annoying. Who was she to tell me what I could or could not do? But of course, this was my teenage brain doing the thinking. It didn't realize she did this all out of love. That's exactly what Chunyu did best... love others.

Chunyu and Fuk Wing Chan, circa 1940's

I had known this already about her, but it wasn't until just recently when the family was typing up notes for her eulogy that I found she truly lived her life loving others. I found out that when she lived in China, she helped out the less fortunate as much as she could. She gave them money, gave them food, bought them gifts. She did what she could so that others wouldn't have to do without. I learned that her husband moved from mainland China to Hong Kong, and worked there for twelve years apart from the family, before finally moving to the United States where he worked for an additional ten years, also without his family. Chunyu raised her family on her own so that her husband could establish a new life for everyone in America. I can't imagine how hard that was for them. I learned that she not only raised her own children, but she also raised her grandchildren so that their parents could get to work each day. And when the family was finally reunited twenty two years later, and established in Rhode Island, Chunyu began working in the local restaurants. I learned that she was loved by all her coworkers and employers because of her can-do attitude and her smile.

Chunyu with her children, and her mother.

The happy lady in the middle is Chunyu. :)

Years later, when her son established his own restaurant, despite her friends begging her to work for them, she chose to support her family and remained working for him until she retired. That's where I started my first job, how I came to know her, and how I met my future husband.

When my husband and I were dating, I got to know Chunyu as "Lai Lai," the name my husband called her in Cantonese. Traditionally it means "mother-in-law," but somehow it stuck as meaning Grandma in our family. Anyway, that was just the beginning of my getting to know her. We used to visit Lai Lai and her husband, grandfather Yeh Yeh, on a weekly basis. Lai Lai was the restaurant's official dumpling maker and we would often deliver the ingredients she needed to make them. Many times, we would stop by just so my husband (still boyfriend then) could help Yeh Yeh change the settings on his cable box when he got too pushy with his remote, or to wriggle the satellite dish so the Chinese channel would come back on. Or sometimes, we would visit, just to visit.

Lai Lai in her late working years.

I was eventually given the job of driving Lai Lai home from work, which wasn't a very far drive, but it sure became awkward. She'd speak to me in Cantonese all the way there, and I had no idea what she was saying! I knew there was no way she would start learning English just for me, so instead I decided to try to learn Cantonese. Our rides in the car soon became far more interesting. I pointed out colors and said the words in Cantonese, and Lai Lai would laugh and nod, and teach me new words. This bridge to our conversational gap became a pivotal point in our relationship. She could now tell me not to wear blue elastics in my hair, because that color was reserved for mourning. That my wet hair would cause "fung sup," (also known as rheumatism due to cold/wind/air), and that ginseng root soup was good for my skin, and how she preffered me in red. She could, to my horror, plop the roasted chicken's butt on my plate with a laugh and tell me it was the best part, though I never truly believed her. And she could ask when our "git fun" (wedding) would be one day, and tell me our kids would be beautiful.

One of our last complete family photos.

Then the unimaginable happened, and Lai Lai became a widow.

That was a very hard time for all of us. Just like it is now. Lai Lai wasn't the same after she lost her husband. She couldn't live on her own, so she had to move out of the apartment that she and her husband had shared for years. She had to give up her independence, and move in with us, and retire. Loss affects the loved ones left behind in hard ways. It was also hard on my husband (still boyfriend then) and I, who weren't used to having another person as a responsibility, and we weren't always the best at keeping a good eye on her. I always wonder how we could have handled it better. But we were younger, and we had work and plans and college to worry about.

Eventually we realized Lai Lai needed a home care assistant, which was out of the question here where we live. There is no such thing as a Cantonese speaking home care medical professional within budget in our state. So Lai Lai moved in with her daughter and two grandchildren in New York. This turned out to be a blessing in some ways for their family, because they got a chance to have some really good years with her that they wouldn't otherwise have shared.

It was great when we had the opportunity to spend a solid three weeks with her and the family in China. I learned a lot about the Chinese culture, where she and Yeh Yeh met, and about the little village many of them grew up in. It was an experience I'll never forget.

Celebrating my 24th birthday in China.

And we got to visit her every time we went to New York, which turned out to be quite a bit when we started planning our Chinese American wedding!

My new hubby and I doing the traditional Chinese Tea Ceremony,
serving Lai Lai her tea.

These more recent years were the times I could almost have an entire conversation with her without anyone's help. (I've been told I even sound Chinese when I speak!) I could tell her about school, and my art, and ask her how she's doing. I also learned Lai Lai had a HUGE sense of humor! She loved playing tricks on us kids, like spitting in our hands if/when we asked for money (which we did jokingly), passing gas in front of friends then blaming it on one of us, or simply just teasing one of the Chinese-born grand kids about their poor Cantonese skills. One of her favorite hobbies was popping bubble wrap. BUBBLE WRAP! We all saved sheets of the stuff for her. She was hilarious. When my husband and I visited New York, she'd tell us funny stories, complain about how weird her home care assistant was, and kept us awake with the noise of her late night Mahjong games. Though I always managed to find an extra blanket on me when I woke up the next morning, because she had worried I was cold.

In Autumn of last year, I wrote a story for her. It's the picture book, "Dumpling Day," that I've mentioned here on my blog before. It's about family love, and loss, and the Chinese culture. Oh, and how to make dumplings, just the way she used to make them. I had wanted to translate the story into Chinese for her, so I could read it to her. And I wanted to include her real dumpling recipe in the back of the book. I feared I wouldn't be able to share it with her before it was too late. It's been waiting for an entire year, and I never found that time. I never even submitted it to a publisher yet, because I didn't want to rush it. It wasn't ready. I was waiting for a sign, of some sorts, for when I should send it out.

It was the first Monday of this month that Lai Lai fell ill. August had just barely ended- we hadn't even flipped the calendar over to September yet. I won't get into details; it's for the family to know and there is no need to broadcast our suffering. But it was definitely a long month, a hard road to travel for all of us. And while all of this was happening, the family was staying in Boston, including my in-laws who run the restaurant. So it was up to my husband and myself to step in and keep the place running. This, of course, was the reason why I haven't been able to draw or paint or post for a while. It's no matter, really. I would do it all over again, if it would have helped her. But, my point is, it was during this time that I got thinking about the signs I asked for, because after we learned Lai Lai was ill, I turned the page of my illustration calendar to find the art I painted just for Lai Lai's story. And I knew. I got that dreaded, icy feeling in my gut. She was going to leave us.

So here I am, wondering how I should end this post. I truly never want to. The end of this post means the end of my goodbyes, the end of a life well-lived...the end of a relationship that helped to create the person I am today. The end of an amazing story.

I've made a few promises to myself, to honor Lai Lai. I've renewed my quest to learn as much Cantonese as possible, so if we have children one day, I'll be able to teach it to them. I can tell them all about Lai Lai and Yeh Yeh, and how special they were. I even have some new grammar books and cd's to listen to so I might really understand the language better.

I'm going to prepare "Dumpling Day" for submission to the agent I've had my eyes on for some time. It still isn't in Book Dummy form, but I'm not going to let that hold me back. It's a good story, and I've got some great art to go with it. I'm not going to wait another year. I'm going to submit it now.

My husband and I will continue the Chinese tradition of the Spring cleaning of the graves, and we'll not only visit his uncle and grandfather like we've done before, but now we'll also visit Lai Lai there, too. I will burn paper (fake) money and incense, and bow three times for her. And I won't miss a single Spring. (With the exception of the rule that expecting mothers cannot attend, should that ever happen.)

Lai Lai and Yeh Yeh, I'm not going to say goodbye. Instead, I'm saying THANK YOU. Thank you for choosing the hard roads in life that eventually led to intersecting my own. Thank you for giving me the husband I had always wanted, and for teaching me everything you could, given the time we had together. Thank you for loving me, even though I'm not what you might have expected for a granddaughter.

And Thank You, Lai Lai, for putting all those chicken butts on my plate. I recently learned that actually was your favorite part of the bird. And now it will always be mine.

New #owl Sketches!

As the summer is coming to a close, it suddenly hit me that the holidays will soon be upon us, and I thought, "UH OH."

Because it was in my plans to have a calendar full of new art for 2013! I haven't created anything frame-worthy for a while due to working on Little Raindrop's book, so it sort of feels like I haven't accomplished much this year. 

Now I'm scrambling to get twelve new pieces done in time...and hopefully done well! 

In the meantime, I've been ordering mats and prints of my work so I can sell them starting in November. I'll be getting my Society6 store ready for online orders as well. I'm not good with the shipping/post office thing, so I'll leave that up to them. And I should probably clean up my CafePress shop, too...

Here are some of the sketches I've done so far, (the good, the bad, and the ehhhh):

There is a theme to this new calendar... but I won't tell you what it is! It's going to be a surprise! (And I don't mean the obvious!)

ttfn!

Lessons From a Mouse (a famous one!)

Hello hello!

As you've probably noticed...I've been away for a couple of weeks. Hubs and I were stocking up on rest and relaxation, good food, good company, and good fun in sunny California. We visited family in San Francisco, friends in Santa Barbara, drove through horrid traffic in LA, and hung out with a mouse in Anaheim! It was a fantastic trip, but I didn't leave without getting a lesson about making my dreams come true. (Good 'ol Walt pulls it off every time!)

You know it... we went to Disneyland!

We not only got to visit THE Disneyland, the place where Walt Disney actually walked and took a chance on his dreams, be we also visited the Walt Disney Family Museum in San Francisco, where we learned all about Walt's many successes, and many failures.

Failures?!? Yep. Failures. And LOTS of hard work.

You see, Walt Disney started working when he was about 7 years old (or maybe 8? I'm bad at remembering numbers...) where he trudged through the snow on his father's paper route. He sold his drawings to friends and neighbors. He worked for a cannery, boxing up jams and things. He worked on a train selling food and the news to passengers. He worked for the Red Cross, because he wasn't able to get into the military. And he worked hard enough to earn himself a scholarship at the Kansas City Art institute. This all happened before he turned twenty! (And there is plenty more I'm forgetting to tell you about!)

After graduation, Walt and his college buddy Ub Iwerks then started a small animation company (yay!) that ended up going bankrupt (boo!). So they moved to Hollywood and worked on the "Alice Comedies" instead, (yay!) which eventually died off (boo). Then he invented a character called Oswald the Lucky Rabbit, who was successful (yay!) but the rights were stolen from Walt (boo!).

And you know what he had to say about that?

Walt decided that they could KEEP Oswald...he was going to make something BETTER. He was going to show them who was boss!

And then came along Mickey Mouse! (You tell 'em, Walt!)

Fast forward to many successful years later when Walt sat down on a park bench with his children, and decided he wanted his own theme park. A CLEAN one, mind you, where people could go for some serious fun. And thus began his quest to build Disneyland.

After the completion of the park, though, Walt soon realized it wasn't enough. Maybe it had been for the guests, but not for Walt. He wanted to block out the sounds of traffic, the city skyline, and create a bigger separation from the World and Reality. He wanted a place where guests could truly get away from work and lost in another world. So he moved on, kept improving, and he started building Disney World.

Unfortunately, he didn't get to see that dream to completion. Walt passed away before Disney World opened. But he sure did change the world, didn't he? Take these quotes, for example:

There are far more up and downs in Walt's crazy, amazing life history. I'm not going to get into them all. But the biggest lesson here is to always be striving for the best, for the next big step, for moving forward and not looking back. No matter how many trips or falls we have, just dust off your pants and keep moving along.

Just like Mickey Mouse does!

I wanna be like Mickey... can't you tell?

Operation Work Office/Studio Space!

Hello!

Two weeks ago, I talked about making some new goals for organizing my life. One of those goals includes organizing my life when I'm at work, off the clock, but working on other stuff. AKA "Work Studio Time."

Normally, I hide in the smallest dining room in our little restaurant, ear buds full of music, and work on Little Raindrop... whether it be editing, drawing, or researching. But a lot of the time, regular customers will come in and ask for me, or family or friends will stop by, or even co-workers who should know better, and I'm constantly getting interrupted!

Not that I'm being ungrateful for the company, but really... I'm trying to work!

Many ask, "Why are you even THERE at your job when you should be at home in your studio?!" Because, most importantly, I prefer to be sure that Hubs gets to and from work in one piece. When he's really tired, he'll fall asleep at the wheel. The forty five minute drive from home to work is one straight line with a few lights, and at night there are hardly any streetlamps and there are tons of deer and other wildlife that we are constantly swerving around. It's better to have four eyes than two, and we both know this from experience. How many times have one of us not seen the animal, but the other one did, and just in time? Too many.

My other reason is this: when no one bothers me, I actually get a TON of work done! I'm not distracted by laundry or television or napping. The only other thing to do there is more work...but of a different kind. And I'm sure as heck not going to go wait on tables when I could be making a book.

So I got an idea last week. There was a private party coming in, and they were going to use the small room where I usually work, so I needed a quiet spot for myself. I went snooping around and found a cozy spot in the storage room behind the bar...

This room needs some organization!
Follow the chair...

...to my new spot!

Not a lot of working space, and the view's pretty rotten,
but it's SO quiet back here!

It worked like a charm, being in that cozy storage space. Much like a Cupboard Under the Stairs, I could live in my own little bubble, get what I needed done, then step out into the real world and I'm out of my working zone!

Then I realized how dysfunctional my working space was. I needed more space, more boundaries from the alcohol, and holy heck was this room a mess. So I took it upon myself to tidy up, and make my space a nice little nest!

Behind that wall of soda cans is my cardboard barrier...

I covered the splintery shelves with cardboard...
and now there's a cozy little nook!

Just add some books... and...
VOILA!

Close up shop with a cardboard flap!

Now I know it's rough around the edges, but it works for me! And Hubs is going to be making it so I have access to a plug, and some lighting! And little by little, I'll make it feel more at home. :)

I've already worked in here for a few hours, so the space is fully functional for my needs! Finally, a way to check "out" of the real world so I can dive into Little Raindrop's world!