Love you, An Ma 🕊❤️

Описание: To my beautiful, smart, and strong An Ma… thank you for being my best friend ❤️

It’s easy to see grandparents as just a cheerful elder that you see once in a while, but I’m so thankful to have known An Ma as a human. Before she was my An Ma, she was an energetic young girl who was so excited to go to school for the first time because all she had known was housework. She was a daughter of a mom who loved her, a dad who abandoned her (and both the love and the pain stayed with her until the end), and a younger sister to an older brother whom she respected so much. She was then put in an arranged marriage with a man who checked all her boxes (except he was short hehe sorry An Gong), but she didn’t dare tell him once that she thought he was handsome. She was a young mother who tried her very best for her seven kids, taking them to do the things she never learned how to do. When she became a grandma, she would fly to Australia to take care of her grandkids there, and then fly back to take care of her grandkids back home. She made her own clothes, she cooked amazing feasts, she had a traditional Chinese medicine recipe for every ailment, she went to the temple, and she tended to her beautiful garden.

And when she started to lose her ability to walk and to stand… she wasn’t able to do anything but watch TV. But her mind remained sharp. So we “talked talked talked.” Despite our language barrier, we always understood each other. She was first to know I got into Harvard and when I quit my job, I drove to her house first. Even on her last days when she couldn’t respond to me anymore, she listened as I talked about the upcoming reunion I was hosting. Our savage banter would crack me up and our deep talks would make me cry, but I am so grateful and lucky to have been able to tell her so, so many things and to have brought so much joy and love into each other’s lives.

Watching her decline these past few months has been devastatingly hard.. so although I miss her so much, I’m grateful and relieved she’s no longer suffering. She’s finally walking alongside Buddha and helping him like she always wanted. I love you, An Ma. Please say hi to An Gong and Ma for me 🕊❤️