I only realised now that parts of me were dying; and had died. I had died. I am dead. As those died, I had to remember what other pieces existed, that I had. So a few weeks ago I felt the sloughing off. In the middle of a poetry reading, in the middle of a trip to Yantai. These were all practices and helped and healed me— that integrated me into a whole. They created in me something that felt supple and strong, that was able to bend rather than break. Through all the memories I have of my family, of every gift and every present that I got from every journey just to give it to them, there was that part. I really like the line is The Four Quartets where you always return to the same place; the same soil. I knew that she had been a pillar to me, and that my life had been a monument to her.
She was the bright light, the point for home. I didn’t know who I was or am after she died. Who was I, if I had constructed who I was to align another for 36 years? She was the point that I was aiming for, and now that she’s gone, I had to point that energy somewhere else.
After I felt her energy exit me I started to focus on the other people in my life, who were still alive; my parents, especially my mum but my dad too. The only place where my parents were happy was China. It didn’t matter which country I took them to in Europe, they just preferred that way, the way it had always worked. In this respect my parents and I couldn’t be further apart from each other, emotionally and mentally. We didn’t know who the other person is, we were always so far apart. Every immigrants journey is, what could have been? What might have been if I had stayed? The immigrants’ way is always to wonder if something else could have worked out better, such as staying home. It’s strange, because by my generation we no longer feel like immigrants, just people. The fact is, it makes people uncomfortable when you’re somewhere in between. And if feels like a constant state of undoing, where your best efforts are constantly being undone, because you’re in a new country, a new place. These new people were no longer supposed to fit into a qipao.
The problem was always their issue of the UK was still conjured up from the Chinese media and the things that they imbibed and still imbibe, a version of the UK that was theirs. It must have been weird for them to have raised a foreigner. Bringing in stuff they would never have dreamed of. I feel sometimes I’ve had enough chaos to last a lifetime, and I don’t need any more of this. That I want to live a clean, bright, beautiful life without the drama. To let things fall into their place. As soon as I saw the Hindi on the Elizabeth Line in London and remembered that Siddiq Khan was the Mayor, my shoulders dropped and relaxed.
We would buy things from discount stores like Argos until I realised it wasn’t good enough for me anymore. Even though I no longer look like I’m from here, all of the blood and contours inside were and are made in England. And so what if so many of the people I had loved or still love are white? I think I had been meaning to search out more and more white people to love, because I knew I had the traumatic experience of loving them. Did I secretly hate white people? Did I openly hate white people? I had to look into this when I was in Durham recently, and into my own darkness, when I said openly that I was done with white people. Then I looked up. I looked up and saw all the white people who had loved me into being, who had supported and nourished my growth and made me who I am, and how bigoted I was to say that.
And yet, I felt the sadness of her death with me the whole time.