Choose Strong
For Tim.
"You should've brought your son."
Perching on a ladder and a paintbrush in hand, Bill looked to his right and saw
the lanky figure of Peter Tan, who lived next-door, at the other side of the
boxwood by the lawn.
The houses in this quiet residential area on the bay side of freeway 880 were
built in the late 60s with half a dozen layouts for low-income families. Except
for one side of an end unit on a block, each shared walls with its neighbors to
the left, right and back.
In his seventies, Peter was wearing hearing aids and a few age spots decorated his
dark yellow face. But he moved well. A full-head of well-groomed hair dyed pitch-
black made him look much younger. He bought his home in 1992, two years after
leaving HongKong for the U.S., and had lived here ever since. Before retiring, he
and his wife, Jane, worked for Apple and raised two kids.
They spoke Cantonese and went to church. Bill was a mandarian atheist from
Beijing. They didn't talk much over the years until after Bill had moved to the
Peninsula. Winter rains could gather on flat roofs above a blocked gutter. Tree
branches could snap under severe winds. One day last summer, Peter alerted him
with a picture showing a tile missing above his living room. One nail turned too
loose to fix the heavy piece of concrete to the pitched frame. It could take
Bill a year to discover by himself while rain water would leak through the
opening and damage the plywood underneath. After this, the neighbors would chat
every time they met. Nature beat fictions in bringing people together.
"He could help dad." Peter added.
That would've been nice, Bill thought. He sure would like to pass on the benefit
of physical labor. But the teenager didn't seem to miss his childhood home and
and besides, Tim had his hands full already. Books and study materials piled up
in his room. Unlike his vacationing friends, he volunteered to mentor robotics
summer camps and meanwhile studied hard for the ACT.
Mom had subscribed to the familiar old Chinese success story for her son,
putting fear into the boy's head, throwing money at the perceived threat (that
he would turn out average), and taking him to tour east coast ivies.
Bill had known all about studying hard and passing tests, didn't miss them, and
didn't want it for his son. Earlier, he tried to encourage him to try sports.
That lasted until high-school when it became clear that keeping both robotics
and jiu-jitsu was impossible. Unlike Amy, he worried more that the kid had to
struggle to support himself as an adult and, as a result, suffer damage in
self-esteem, or disappear into the maelstrom of the rat-race.
Being ordinary, as he believed in the extraordinary in everyone, was out of the
question and therefore didn't bother Bill an iota. In fact, he found that idea
laughable at best and more often harmful and stupid. For years, he wore a
T-shirt that said "Lake Woebegon: where all the women are strong, all the men
are good-looking, and all the children are above average." People would smile at
him but few seemed to take the words seriously enough to comment.
Tim seemed closer to mom but often he didn't agree with either of his parents.
Mom used an electric kettle, dad insisted on boiling water on the gas range, Tim
thought they were both weird: "What do we keep a water dispenser for?"
The kid had grown and obviously wanted space. He didn't need adults to arrange
his days. Mom was pushy but had little time for him. Dad was pushy in his own
way for different things and, now laid off, could bother him 24/7. Hearing dad's
climbing up to the 2nd floor kitchen, the kid would hurry back to his room above
like a hermit crab to its shell. Bill got his cue and rarely intrude, practicing
"teaching without words" as he rationalized.
"I wish! He's too busy with games. I can't just drag him up here. I'm his dad
but it's not China. Plus, he's much bigger than me now." Bill smiled and shook
his head.
He respected the kid's privacy and his wish to stay away. After all, the boy had
to figure out things for himself and live his life on a land to which the father
had been struggling to adapt. In general, Bill did not envy the young. In his
mind, the poor boys and girls were just so confused, insecure, and sometimes
paralyzed by fear that they couldn't appreciate the truly valuable or honestly
express themselves. With Tim, he had only tried to empathize.
No matter what happened, Bill made sure they share a meal at the end of the day.
This was one of his unconditionals on account of which he used to have run-ins
with managers at work.
"Is he in 9th grade now?" Peter smiled back with a knowing nod.
"11th this fall."
"Wow! Time sure flies! I remember him when he was little. Which school does he
go to?"
"The B, by the airport." Bill said and added: "A Jesuit school."
"My daughter too went to private schools on the Peninsula. I drove her 12 years.
That was, oh, decades ago. But it felt like yesterday."
Peter drove a white beat-up Toyota Tercel and his daughter a black BMW x7 which
often parked on his driveway during weekends. That was the Asian definition of
success in America, Bill thought. What would Tim's car be? He wondered.
I had a young colleague who didn't own a car. It was so un-American but the guy,
native and white by the way, did it. I couldn't stop admiring him.
There is the counter-argument that for the sacrifice Asian parents demand or
indeed in my dad's case, exact payback. I met second-gen Asians on the jiu-jitsu
mat that had horrible stories about the ways they were brought up. I don't blame
them if they didn't like me :-)
I invoked the Lake Woebegon quote and imagined it as an antidote to the
widespread insecurity and FOMO in society, especially for kids. As for the 'Lake
Wobegon Effect,' I never knew it existed until you brought it up.
Thanks for your comments and have a great week.
Love this piece too! Like the way the story unfolds.
Asian parents' images are somehow tarnished in the social media. One thing that is likely to be forgotten about Asian parents is their incomparable sacrifice for the kids.
I googled online for this "Lake Wobegon effect". Is it about overestimation of oneself? Still not clear. Thanks for sharing Bill's stories. Best wishes for Tim's new 11th grade!