Something that runs in the family...

I won't even say how astonishing it is, how little I know about my parents' past.  Let's just put me in a box as a someone who knows nothing about her parents then.  Easier that way.

There is a wealth of stories in them.  Mom is more inclined to sit me down and tell them to me.  Dad is more a be-in-the-present guy.  I call it wealth because I find that I'm interested to know them, more than I knew.  I don't know if it's because I love stories, or because these are my parents' stories.

Or is it because it might give me glimpses into myself - of things I don't yet know about?  I don't know.

Today mom continued with another snippet of her friendships with men from the past.  She started last night over dinner.  There was this man who my dad's friend, his name "Ah Jor".  Mom was going out with dad when she got to know this person.  Ah Jor worked in the hospital.

One time mom had to be admitted into the hospital due to an infection, post minor surgery.  Mom said both dad and Ah Jor had each brought fruits to visit her at the ward.  She said dad brought some old and wrinkly looking apples, while Ah Jor brought grapes and even washed them for her.

She said the nurses at the hospital all looked on as young mom received these male visitors.  They asked her, "So which one of them is your boyfriend?" She asked them to guess, they thought Ah Jor. When asked why, the nurses replied of course they thought Ah Jor, because grapes were more expensive that the fact that he spent on them and washed them for mom meant something to them.

Dad is always in the same room with us when stories like these are shared.  I can't tell if he was listening or not, I can't tell if knowing these stories are shared bothers him.  I don't know.

This guys died of cancer at some point.  We'll never know whether he was in love with mom or not, I guess it doesn't matter...

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Other stories of their past, and of their union in marriage - are the kind of comments uttered by each of their immediate families.  My mom's adoptive family lamented, "Aiya of all people, why choose this man who hasn't got any money to marry!"

And my mom has the story of the counterpart, people from my dad's family said about mom - a lowly girl who did not go to school and was just a maid in a house.  Mom said she was labelled as "leftover" because she has been out with two other guys before my dad.

My mom was adopted into a family of many children, some older and some younger than her.  She was the only non-blood relation.  Her ended up doing housework for them, after she dropped out of school after just a short period. She said she was put in year three class when she started, helpless and no way to catch up with school (she was belittled by teacher and  called stupid all the time), she stopped.

I've heard countless times, the story of how dad had to borrow money for the wedding, the dowry money.  The dowry was shown to mom's family, and promptly taken back.  "The money was just to make a show, but never given to my mom.  He was that poor." Mom recalled.

I guess I feel sorry for them both, and then there is a sense of pride too - for the amount of struggles they've had, they are still around.

There are numerous other tales of their 'past lives', most of them sound almost like plots that jump right of movie scripts and soap operas - to me.  And I know why - because I have lived, and is living such a vastly, dramatically different life, just one generation apart.  The kind of hardship known to them, can only be something I can only imagine.

All the stories that run through our daily meals nowadays, whether it is of my dad's or of my mom's - I seem to listen to them with more emotion than I would with other stories.

So anyway, mom talked about the two ex-boyfriends she had last night.  I asked her to clarify what constitute being in a relationship back in her day, "Did you guys have to officially announce to each other that - OK, you're now my girlfriend, I'm your boyfriend, etc?"

No, you don't do that.  If you're out alone with each other, doing the whole going to movie and walking around at parks and garden, you're dating and having a relationship all right.

I see.

"I think maybe he was warned, about me.  I never found out why it didn't happen.  We did't fight or anything.  It was just over." Mom never said or use terms like 'breaking up' or 'dump' - but it is obvious that she was telling me that the guys left her.

Warned about her?  What about her - what's wrong with who she was?  The stigma of being the "dish-washing" "maid" girl who's not been schooled?

Only now I can truly appreciate on a deeper level, and see for myself, the amount of hurt and self-loathe that my mom carries with her, all her life.

Adopted child, uneducated, did housework as a job.  All these - just facts about a person that say nothing about a person's character - that have swallowed my mom whole.  Her whole life seems like a walking apology.  I was adopted, therefore I am less.  I don't read and write like other, therefore I am less  (mom actually did learn to read and write Chinese on her own)...

Reading books like Freakanomics, More Sex Is Better Sex and , gives me an insight into how things we cannot control in our lives, can affect how our lives pan out, and possibly our behaviour and fate.

In some ways, I see a wry similarity between my mom and myself.

Now more than ever, I recall how I was in school, and now at work place.  Underneath all my flamboyance and vivacious ways of handling people, is my lifelong plague of self-doubt and imposter syndrome.   I have spent far too long thinking that I'm a mediocre, not really smart, out of league with all other amazing people, will likely end up alone, etc etc.

I take great joy in enjoying my achievements, the joy is such sweetness because I'd look back at how low I have come from my beginning.  "Look at this now, I can't believe I get to be here."

It might seem like, with so much inferiority embedded in my system, I should be paying back for my successes and achievements with utmost gratitude and never take anything for granted.

I think I do, I say thank you too frequently, too long.

It just feel like, maybe there is something inside me that wants to pull me down to the pit where I remind myself - "Remember your place, you're still that small, silly little girl who's not really good in anything."

But enough of that - at least I am aware of that.  I have to walk up to this inferiority and sort it out.  And now, with my parents now part of my life finally; I want to honour them by getting the full abundance out of my system.

Be as well as I can be, be good and be kind.

It would be a work in progress, as life is.  Wish me luck.