i'm lost in translation

Okay so I'm not so great with the updates....

It has been so cold and awful in New York lately that it's taken all my strength to simply get out of bed in the morning and not call in sick to the world. Just the thought of staying in my warm happy cocoon of warmth and hibernating the day away starts a mental battle that takes about a half hour in the morning. Then the hunched over trudging and all day shivering and shuffling tends to exhaust me. This is my lame excuse.

On with my trials and tribulations.

So, somewhere in my high school years my aunt ran off with my mother's once boyfriend/fiance. And somewhere in my high school years was when I gained my freedom. You see, I grew up in a bubble. Through the years my upbringing was very strict. I was to focus on my studies and be a "good" girl. I was actually nagged to be a "good Chinese" girl - but it was hard being that I didn't live in China or Taiwan and didn't know anyone who was Chinese outside of my own family. I didn't sleep over at other little girls houses, I rarely even went to other families homes. If anyone wanted to play with me they had to come to my house. My mother knew what I was doing with my time or at least where I was spending my time. I rebelled as much as I could during that period. I listened to alternative music and tried to fit in as best as I could. But my time after school was usually spent working at my mother's store - so I didn't have too much time to be a wild child.

When my aunt ran off - it all changed. My mother became more distant and drifted away into work. Unfortunately, her business started unraveling and eventually went bankrupt. She sadly picked herself up and started working for a business associate that was starting a bakery and she ran the restaurant supply end of it. My grandmother, who had lived with us since my birth, left to help her other children in Taiwan. My mother began to work nights at the bakery she now worked at and soon a new world opened up to me. Now I didn't go all nutty like the girls in Thirteen but I definitely tried to "find myself" in those years. I made friends that were more wild than me. I went to parties. I stayed out all night and started to smoke cigarettes and marijuana. I still had to make everything appear the same to my mother. She caught me sneaking in at 5am one night and tried to throw me out of the house. I quickly blamed my aunt' leaving for my behavior and all was resolved in minutes with my mother. Before the family fell apart, my mother had a network of people to constantly watch me and make sure I was being "good". Now I began making my own rules. I was able to manipulate my mother slightly into making my life a little more of my own - though I wasn't able to fully gain control of the reins, I was able to sometimes pick the path. I managed to quit working at the bakery that she also worked for. For the first time in my life, I had a legitimate job and my mother didn't work with me.

The world moved on for a while. My grandmother moved back to the US because she didn't get along with her daughter-in-law's. I went to the local Community College and tried to stay out of the house as much as possible. I started working at an animal hospital and I started considering working with animals. The world seemed to be working with me instead of against me.

Oh boy, I have to attend to my actual job for a while. I will continue the saga later.

posted by Jin @ 2:24 PM