Four Years

This is for four years. This is for 1471 days. This is for the fact that it hasn’t gotten easier despite what everyone says.

It’s for when I wake up and have dry eyes and I know the one thing, the only thing that will make me tear is the thought of you. This is for the fact that I still don’t allow myself to wander into that danger zone between quiet mourning and hysterical breakdown. The span is too great and with my small size, I can only run away from everything so fast.

This is for how you always asked me if I was okay. For your muddle headedness that was more endearing than infuriating. For how you always defended me from everyone. How I never defended you enough.

This is for the walk from the subway to the Empire State Building when I thought I should write this, and for the tears that immediately welled up how I still can’t fully be thinking about the topic as I type because I know I’ll just crumble.

This is for how proud you would have been of me. For the fact that I’m working with Lao Gao, who wrote a book that you’d recommended to Mom and Jiujiu years ago. This is for how mad I am I can’t share that with you.

For the pride you instilled in me. For Romance of the Three Kingdoms, and Return of the Condor Heroes. For the multi-hour long discussions I’ve lost along with you. For how much I wish I had known better then. And stayed home.

And how about your strength through two single party systems, a revolution, a great leap forward, a cultural revolution, and then democracy. For the wisdom you gained through all this.

This is for teaching me about Linux, for the copy of Longhorn I found in your CDs 3 years before Vista came out. For Ghost, and RSS feeds. For the fact that you may well have been the biggest pirater on the east coast at the tender age of 79.

This is for repentance. It’s for the 16783 words I’ve written about you that you’ll never read. Every piece of you that seeped into my stories. For your acceptance, for your ignorance, for your traditional thinking, for your progressive support. For love. For forgiveness. For peace.

(and for the simple truth that no matter how much more I write, it all comes back to the same old same old...I wish I could think about how much I missed you without feeling like the whole world is going to fall apart…and once in a while I wish I could be ignorant enough to believe in heaven so that I can fool myself into thinking I’ll see you again)