Modern Love revised

My Mom was 80 when the way I saw her radically changed. Mom stayed home to raise my brother and me on the Seattle homefront while my Dad traveled the globe during his storied career at Boeing. Mom’s comfort zone took up a very small radius. I knew Mom to be timid and hesitant. She hasn’t driven in years but when she did it was with one foot on the gas and the other on the brake. I could count her regular destinations on one hand. Any detours away from the familiar would throw her into a panic behind the wheel. As a Chinese woman in 1960s, Mom was defined by her relationships to others as a wife, mother, sister, and daughter. Caring for others was her primary purpose. Dad’s career came first. His booming temper of authority regularly made the walls shake. During his frequent business trips, home was quieter. It felt safer to exhale for all of us. It was during Dad’s absences that Mom would regularly run the vacuum cleaner over the wall-to-wall shag while wailing at the top of her lungs. The first time, my kid brother and I froze in the midst of our squabbling. We did the vacuuming – promising her anything if she’d please stop crying. Yet, even as a kid, I knew it was deeper than anything I could offer. We sure tried for perfection, though. The vacuuming sessions continued while Dad was away, and it became our normal. Working (apologetic) When my brother and I were both in school, Mom started her own career in health care. The thick sadness at home dissipated as she made her own space that was separate from us. To this day, she apologizes to me for “going back to work.” The crying stopped and the relief was palpable. In 1993, Dad’s career relocated them from Seattle to Beijing. Because she considered her work secondary and her kids were grown, Mom retired and followed him to China. She had time to herself. Entering her 60s, Mom started painting. It came as a surprise to all who knew her. Mom doesn’t invite attention. She raises modesty to its own art form – compliments are swiftly deflected, accomplishments dismissed as mere hobby. We lived on different sides of the international dateline. I marveled at her art, but, had never witnessed Mom in the process of creating it. After more than a decade in China, my Dad retired and they moved back to Seattle. She had an easier transition back than my Dad. I researched resources and gifted Mom art classes so Mom continued to paint. During one of those classes, she asked me to join her for a weekend workshop. That is when I met a completely different person. You know the part in the Wizard of Oz where it transforms from black and white to color? That’s the seismic shift I felt with my Mom. The person who moved through the world with caution was fearless before a blank canvas. She is joyful freedom. She is pure expression. She is brave! I had to rethink what I thought to be true. It’s not just her art that is miraculous. It is her owning her agency while she’s creating it. 3 years after returning from their time abroad, my parents lost their home of 5 decades to a house fire. Everything was gone -- except for their garage and storage room where “the junk” was stashed. Photographs and touchstones that had been in our family for generations -- ashes. They rebuilt their home and what was salvageable was returned in boxes that remained unopened in the storage room. It was too exhausting to see what was in those boxes. It was a confirmation of what didn’t survive. Three years ago, when my parents moved to Phoenix where my brother lives, it was up to me to clear out the storage room and garage -- a fortress of boxed up unknowns. I found everything from Costco sized packages of toilet paper to a maternal family history dating back to 1530 BCE. I almost overlooked a box on a dusty shelf in a remote corner of the storage room.I opened it to discover hundreds of Mom’s paintings that we didn’t know existed. She’s prolific - everything from traditional ink and brush to Abstract Expressionism. Damaged by smoke and water, the paintings are largely in tact. They are an apt metaphor for this woman who found her voice in spite of societal norms and lack of self-confidence. Mom is navigating a 2 pronged path of cancer and dementia. But I know she is as deep and fierce as the ocean, The Story of Me 我 Susim Chen Watercolor, 2005 This is my painted autobiography. The Chinese door is me and it is closed for I am a homebody. The checkerboard path weaves together the different parts of my mostly happy life, though there have been darker periods -- World War II, leaving China and friends behind for a new life in the US, and struggles with learning the English language. The iron gate symbolizes my western influence. The many pots of flowers show my love for gardening and that I use my time wisely. image.png