Posts tagged with "family"

I Lost My Job And My Grandma Died

Well, things just can’t get any bet­ter.

Yesterday I found out that my con­tract, which expires in December, will most like­ly not be renewed. This could mean that I will be out of a job when I grad­u­ate, since my posi­tion will be filled by a full-time employ­ee. If things get busier at the office, then I might be asked to come back again. Until then, I might not know. The avail­abil­i­ty of a full-time posi­tion will not be known until next years bud­get­ing comes around, which is usu­al­ly around March.

This after­noon, I also found out that my grand­moth­er passed away. I did­n’t find out any of the details, which is one of the few times that I’m glad of my igno­rance. It sad­dens me that I did­n’t get to see her one last time, to show her that I cared about her, the next oppor­tu­ni­ty being with­in a months time. Yet she did­n’t last the wait, and my chance, twice pass­ing, has been missed. My par­ents will be attend­ing the cer­e­monies by fly­ing to Hong Kong on Tuesday. I haven’t cried yet, and I prob­a­bly won’t.

And appar­ent­ly, accord­ing to some Chinese tra­di­tion, the death of a loved one means that one can­not vis­it any oth­er fam­i­ly mem­bers with­in 49 days of the death. Which means that I won’t be able to go to Hong Kong for Christmas vaca­tion, some­thing which I’ve been look­ing for­ward to with unspeak­able plea­sure. The tra­di­tion is not some­thing that I would gen­er­al­ly hon­our, giv­en the cir­cum­stances, but since it is impor­tant to my oth­er grand­moth­er, I eas­i­ly, sto­ical­ly abide by the rules of the funer­al cer­e­mo­ny.

I will miss the Christmas lights and spir­it, the cool­er, more tol­er­a­ble weath­er. I will miss my chance to pur­chase a much need­ed leather jack­et, to buy presents for my friends, to do some much need­ed relax­ation.

But what can I do? Feel sor­ry for myself? I believe that this is the worst string of news I’ve ever had. There just does­n’t seem to be any act I can accom­plish to make this pain go away, except for talk­ing about it. So many things have fall­en apart with­in the last 24 hours, so many things being changed. There just does­n’t seem to be much to live for right now, since I gen­er­al­ly tend to sim­ply live day-to-day.

A part of me wish­es that some­one tru­ly cared. A part of me wish­es that I felt much, much worse. A part of me wish­es that some­one could under­stand what is going through my mind. Most of me wish­es that some­one would help make the pain go away.

It’s hard for me to under­stand what I should be think­ing or feel­ing right now. Everything just seems so numb. I guess things have just come so sud­den­ly, and caught me by sur­prise.

I’m real­ly at a loss for words.

You Never Know Until It Happens

I believe my grand­moth­er is dying. I don’t have many details, as I haven’t been well informed (though I’m not sure that I want to be). I tried to vis­it about three months ago, but my work and cir­cum­stances pre­vent­ed me from going. I’m going to Hong Kong this Christmas, which should be amaz­ing, and hope­ful­ly I’ll be able to see my grand­moth­er one last time. When I spoke to her on the phone, which is always as awk­ward as ever, she sound­ed very light-head­ed. My moth­er told me that she sound­ed more healthy than before.

I once talked to Ms. Patricia ______ (I can’t believe I for­get her last name) about my grand­par­ents. I told her that I always felt like I loved my grand­par­ents, and that I was always wor­ried about their well-being, even though I nev­er real­ly had a life with them. They briefly raised me when I was too young to remem­ber much. I have always won­dered whether I would cry if they should die. One can always say that one won’t cry, but when the sit­u­a­tion aris­es, things can be quite dif­fer­ent.

I also told her that I hoped that they would die at a time that was con­ve­nient for me. This wor­ried her. I asked myself, “Is this real­ly what I wish? Will I feel dif­fer­ent­ly when the time comes? Have I tru­ly become so cere­bral, so engulfed in a Lermontovian nihilism, that I can say such a thing?”. I’m not even sure if this is some­thing I should be ashamed of. I mean, these are peo­ple that I’m not close to. Is it pos­si­ble to love some­one sim­ply by blood? I believe it is; I know peo­ple who only know how to love by blood. However, it is not pos­si­ble for me. In fact, blood has no bear­ing on what I feel for a per­son. I wish I could even begin to under­stand this. I believe that my grand­par­ents love me. I feel it in the way that they look at me, the way they treat me. I always won­der if any­one else has the same con­fu­sion. Do I love them as they love me?

I can’t tell.