You could say that I grew up in a dysfunctional family. My father was an immigrant from China who moved to the USA. My mom met him in a piano store in Orange County, in California. At the time, my dad's self-adopted English name was "Herby". My mom and my dad started going out, and my dad asked her for a large favor. He wanted to marry her for a green card. My mom agreed to it, and they both eventually fell in love. They were married for 15 years.
My father was a genius. He was extremely creative and artistic, and as he put it, he could "piss melodies". He was the most charismatic person you could meet. He could get anyone to do anything for him. When he came to America, he didn't know anything. My mom told me about the time she took him to McDonald's once, and he picked apart a hamburger one layer at a time, because he had no idea how to eat it. He looked around, at a woman taking a bite out of a huge burger, and he was stunned. He could also barely speak English, and my mom taught him. By the time I was born and actually able to understand him, he could speak, as my mother puts it, "immaculate" English. His vocabulary was even bigger than hers by then.
For all his amazing attributes, he was also pretty screwed up. He was manic-depressive, or bipolar, and was also a pathological liar. He came straight away from the Chinese Revolution like a bat out of hell to America. His father was actually one of the chief officials in the government at the time, who was imprisoned as a political prisoner for years upon years. Wherever he picked up his baggage, it was bad news for my mother and me.
As a growing child, I knew the worst oaths before I could speak. I soon got used to screaming voices and slamming doors (I have an aversion to people raising their voices now). My father would leave and come back again, over and over, nearly driving my mom to insanity (I mean this literally), even when she was still pregnant and when she just had me. As a result, I grew up very unbalanced. When I was five, I once had my left index finger and left thumb chewed off in a conveyor belt that was carrying boxes of vegetables into a truck on a vegetable farm (I still have them, though--stitches and the nerves regenerated, miraculously). According to my mom, it was just when my dad had left, and I was in general extremely off. She said that she would freak out about it, and tell people to "watch Way, watch Way, make sure he's safe". Myself, all I remember is standing in front of the conveyor belt, watching. My mom had warned me not to get too close or my pants would get stuck in it. I have no clue how my finger went in there--it just happened, and all I knew was that I was watching my fingers get ground up, 'til I yanked them out. I won't go into any more detail here.
To speed up a bit, I'll fast forward to when my dad (now divorced from my mom) convinced both my mom and I to move to China after he was sent off by immigration for whatever reason. He convinced us that we could get a nice house and easy life there, and convinced my mom to buy a huge villa with four bedrooms, four bathrooms, two TV rooms, two huge skyrooms, a study, gigantic living room, and more for $55,000. So, we began that plan. I lived there for two years alone with him. Frankly, I can't remember much aside from that it was, when I wasn't playing on the computer alone (I had no internet until I later moved to a downstairs computer, where I discovered the wonder of gaming and roleplaying), a lot of emotional suffering because of my dad. I couldn't tell you much else on that--or rather, I don't want to.
Long story short, my dad managed to convince my mom that it was never the plan for her to come over there. He refused to speak to her. At times, he even wouldn't let her talk to me, which was arranged for every Sunday around noon my time. One time, he even eavesdropped on the conversation outside my door and burst in and shouted something along the lines of, "You want to go live with her? Fine! Go and live with her, see what I care!" I can't really remember. I was 10 or 11. My mom could tell what was going on, and she was getting real freaked out. As she discovered when she visited of the two or three times she did, he even had a little weed-smoking thing. I had no idea what it was at the time, and can't really remember what it looked like, either. This was the time that he was away and refused to help us for anything, so we had to figure stuff out ourselves.
Finally, my mom had me sent home. I brought everything I could with me, along with a lot of extra baggage and negative one cat. Needless to say, I was pretty screwed up. I was about as cold and emotionless as my dad. Hilariously enough, when I was young I would always say that I "felt empty", like "something was missing". This was even before all of this, when I was more acute as a child. That had to be when I was about eight or nine. Already! Either way, I then went to this horrible middle school called Bancroft.
A lot of my friends at my current high school were from there, and I don't know why. I hated the place. It was full of horrible students with horrible attitudes, the campus was terrible, people were thrown into dumpsters every week, and, most importantly, I was teased constantly. This was mostly because I entered school a month late, so I was "the new kid". I had two little devils for antagonists who would constantly kick my small rolling backpack. You can only imagine my joy when they were taught about sperm. (If you don't get it, look at my profile. My last name is Spurr-Chen.)
As a result, I started to hate everybody. Everybody. I was a monstrous and dark little child for a long time. There was no real security or stability in my life, either. Would it surprise you to know that within the past seven years, I've probably moved at least fourteen times? That's not necessarily divided evenly amongst the years. I was lucky to not have fallen into the trap, though. I'm lucky that I had a natural amount of intelligence (I always was bright as a child, regardless), and a serious romantic streak which I doubtlessly got from both of my parents. They were both incredible romantics.
Enter high school, where my mom decided to put me in public school, full steam ahead. She thought it was an important experience for me. You might be confused a bit, but I'll stop to explain--my mom alternately put me in public school and homeschooled me, every other year. Second, fourth, and sixth I was in public school. Everything else I was in homeschool. In fact, I didn't last sixth more than a month (Bancroft) before I begged my mom to let me be homeschooled. She gave it to me as a Christmas present; many gigantic boxes in smaller boxes in smaller boxes in smaller boxes in smaller boxes in the smallest box then in an even SMALLER box then in a folded little note. It was cute.
Luckily for me, I fell head over heels for a girl at my school. I'll call her "Zenny". Anyway, Zenny thought I was a creep (I'm sure she had her reasons, too--I bet I was creepy). Nobody really liked me, and as people later informed me, they thought I was stuck up. Which I was. Incredibly. They also thought I was unfriendly--which I was. I hated everyone. I made one friend who I'll name "Bly". I owe him a lot of credit for my balancing. He introduced me to his little clique, which had Zenny in it. Most of the time, I would hover around and just kind of watch everyone. Quickly enough, I found that I stood out like a sore thumb, and I was in actuality, social enough to want people to like me. I really wanted people to like me. I wanted to fit in. Most of all, I wanted Zenny to like me.
That actually came later, though--I didn't start crushing on her until around 10th grade. Either way, the first year was my introduction to people. Because I was homeschooled majorly, I had no idea how to act in a social situation. I wasn't very good at talking, or anything of the sort. At first, I hated to hug people. As a child, I would never hug anyone but my mom and dad. I came a long way from there. Up to this point, even--I had learned so many, so many things. I learned many things about people. I learned many things about life, and I grew extremely philosophical. I learned a lot--more than I could possibly even summarize. I don't think I could even summarize a summary. Most of all, I became somewhat of a sage, with one problem. I was still furiously angry. Very angry.
My constant smouldering mood had transformed into a good mood, but I was still deeply bugged by the human condition, and what I saw people do to one another. I was angry at the stupidity of people, at the vain actions, the vanity, the presumptuousness, the politically correct arrogant bullshit--all of it. I was angry at the world, mostly. I was angry because I believed that people could change, and they were stupid for not changing. I was angry because people threw their lives away for their depression and materiality. I was angry because people didn't see what their friends were worth, and they treated them like crap.
Where did this anger come from? Perhaps from where I came from. I abbreviated--or barely even touched on--my own development past my own selfishness, my anger at everybody for what happened to me in life. That's probably where my deep rage came from, which transmuted itself into a righteous fury in the light of my new self.
We speed forward to the present, now. Just last night, rather. Last night, I was telling my mom about everything. I was telling her about how irritable and angry I was at these kind of things. She sighed, and explained to me things she'd said before, which I had never listened to before. She told me how there was really nothing you could do except be kind and patient. There was nothing you could do to change people, because we, as individuals, can't change anything in another person ourselves. She told me about the freedom that each person has to improve--or not improve. She told me that I should do the best I can to be the best person I could possibly be.
Finally, I realized she was right. I realized it was time to let go of my anger, to go on to my next stage of personal development. I realized that I really couldn't change anything--for all my crying, raging, and shouting, whether I have people shouting alongside me, does it do anything but appeal to somebody's useless sense of justice? No, it doesn't. It doesn't help anything. It doesn't help the people who think the same thing as me, and it doesn't help the people I'm shouting about. I'm saying what's wrong, but I'm not actually doing anything about it.
Then, I asked--what can I do? What could I possibly do? It seemed hopeless. At the same time, my anger was a large part of who I was, as a person. I identified with it. It was "my thing". It was what I could always count on, and what I could go on. I asked, "What would I do then, if I didn't have my anger? What would I write about? What can I write about?" The thought of losing a large part of myself terrified me. What would I do? What could I do?
A thought hit me, something I'd learned many times before but seemed to have forgotten. It was simple. I would do anything I could. I would be more kind. I would be more patient. I would let people live their lives and learn their own ways. I would let the stubborn people learn their way. I would give advice to the people who would listen. I would do everything I could to actually help other people, instead of crying about it. I would bring awareness to these issues, not by lamenting about it, but by setting a good standard. I would perfect myself as much as I could, and inspire whoever I could.
But where to start, where to start?
Ah, that's right; wherever your foot lands.
But where to go, where to go?
Aha, indeed; wherever your feet take you.
But how to go, how to go?
Ah, yes; one step at a time.
But what about the anger, what about the anger?
Ah; let it go, let it go...
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A bit long, but worth the read.
Good job.
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If You Swear That There's No Truth And Who Cares, How Come You Say It Like You're Right? [Bright Eyes]
http://progressiveu.org/143541-how-to-survive-the-2008-elections
Rest in peace
yourfuneralguy
http://www.lowercostfuneral,com
I am still working on patient and kind.
Wow, what a candid and detailed post. Much respect for baring all this for us. I have a lot of respect for people who really know darkness and bitterness, but who remain optimistic enough to want to work past those feelings. I actually can relate very closely to this sort of conflict, of having a hard time as a child, of growing up intellectually heads and shoulders above one's peers, isolated, and having to struggle to close the gap. But I'm a college sophomore, and I'm still not where I want to be.
But it's all part of the process. I've actually been thinking of using semester break to write/blog about some of these things, so maybe I'll post, too.
I actually think it was Vladimir Nabokov's /Lolita/ that jarred loose my benevolence from the grip of my hostility, near the end of junior year of high school. I remember that I, auspiciously, had a gift card to Waldenbooks, and I'd narrowed my choices down to Victor Hugo's Ninety-Three and Lolita. The first had been mentioned glowingly by Ayn Rand, and was the 'correct' choice, and the other I knew very little about, but it had a strangely evocative cover--the off-balance monochrome photo from the waist down of a girl in a thigh-high skirt and Mary Jane's, with the understated John Updike 'ecstatically' quotation. I made my choice and the rest is history.
Michael Allen Yarbrough (PBUH)
Telling the story is just part of the process too, I suppose. Everybody can relate, on some level. I've never read Lolita, though--I'm guessing I should pick it up.
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"Your comment doesn't make sense. Whats this about Paris hilton? What are you talking about? You don't make sense." - alenka
My Blog.
But wait, what happened to "Zenny"? I want to know the ending! Leaving me in the dark is not cool! Did you end up "fitting" in?
Well, I'm glad that the story there was interesting enough to keep you wanting to know the rest.
I thought that it'd be way too long to finish in the blog, but I'll post it here for you and whoever else might be curious. Careful, though, it's long enough to be its own friggin' blog.
I can knock out two birds with one stone here. Yes, I did eventually manage to fit in. Most of the "fitting in" at all had to do with Bly's little group. Bly accepted me immediately, for whatever reason, and helped me out of my shell a lot. He was--and is--an extremely friendly guy, with a volatile personality and short memory. Quickly enough, he became my only real confidant after about a year, by 10th grade. He was the only one who ever knew that I liked Zenny, aside for one or two people who had figured it out and I was forced to admit the truth.
One of my biggest steps was definitely becoming more physical, because at the time I had a serious case of whateltheythinkitis, a disease that paralyzes you from head to toe. Some people get it for saying things, others for being around people, others for touching people, and others for other things--there's many variants of it. As for me, I fell into the third category; I was nothing short of terrified to touch people. Bly would always force his hugs on me, which I would grudgingly accept, mostly because he bear-hugged me without much regard for my say on the matter. He's just like that. Also, for whatever reason, Zenny was also terribly afraid of physical contact with nearly anyone except her best friend, who I'll call "Lucy". Obviously, that aggravated my whateltheythinkitis a lot.
I just tried to fit in as much as possible by turning on my talk-box, not staring so blatantly (I think may have had a habit of staring rather too intensely at people when I observed them), trying to relate to the other kids on some level, and just... I don't know, do whatever it is that kids do when they hang out?
The biggest issue, and driving force, of course, was Zenny. I started crushing on her around 10th grade, having barely met her and her kind of existing under the radar all through 9th. Until I started having a lot of classes with her, at least. Something about her was incredibly... irresistible. Sure, she had a nice body, but I've only fallen for a girl's looks--just once, and never again. It wasn't that. She didn't even have a killer perfect personality, either (and I'm going to go more into that bit soon); but there it was. For some reason, I found myself attracted to her for reasons I absolutely could not explain. All my analytical logic and learned psychology, especially about relationships and compatibility, was completely useless. It was incomprehensible! Maybe it was something about the way you could just look at her and smile, and she'd smile right back. Maybe it was how innocent she was, that when Bly (somewhat rusque of a joke, but not really meaning any harm) would ask her to get his wallet out of his pocket because he had something in his hands, she would do it without even wondering his motives. Maybe it was her bouts of temper tantrums and physical violence, often preceded by a furious face and raised fist--especially if you disturbed her eating. She is a serious eater. Not that she's a fine foods eater, or a lover of food, seriously, but if you bug her when she's eating, she will murder you. She gets this really intense look on her face whenever she's eating.
She had a very bad habit, though, of being kind of inconsiderate. Or even, very inconsiderate. She played favorites a lot, but subconsciously. I know she wasn't even aware of her blatant partiality to certain people. Granted, she had known certain people since way back when (usually middle school or so), but she even would toss aside Bly like a ragdoll, her proclaimed "best guy friend" if she were distracted by a shinier someone. Right now, it's not so important, but it comes into play later.
A lot of the time, for all her habits, I never felt I had the right to ask for attention--from anyone. Who was I? I was just some guy. In fact, I was the "some guy" of the group for quite a long time. 'Til, "Ruce" came along (okay, I'm out of names so I slapped four letters together that kind of sounds like his last name, sue me). Ruce was one of the people in the group. There were six of us--Bly, Ruce, myself (the boys), and Lucy, Zenny, and "Cherry" (seriously, it's 5 AM, sue me). Ruce and Zenny had gone out back in middle school, and Zenny somehow hurt him. Bly told me about how Ruce had said that he would "get her back", which I learned later. This bit of hindsight came, as the word denotes, later. Ruce and Zenny started going out again. This was probably a large part in my own evolution; it pained me a lot to see this. I couldn't look at them, most of the time. I never let on, though--when I want to keep a secret, I have a poker face that would scare a robot. Eventually, I started to stumble on the thought, did I love her?
Obviously, not good thoughts to be stumbling upon at my age. I tentatively decided that yes, I did love her, but not in a deep "love at first sight", "true love" way. As a friend, it was, and maybe just a bit more than that. With that, I decided, if I really loved her, I should be able to be happy for her--happy that she was happy, with him. So I started reworking everything in my mind, rewiring circuits and reworking all my associations, everything... and it was starting to work, too! I could look at them. I could smile at them, honestly, albeit there was definitely the trace of sadness in it.
If you saw this coming, you can give yourself a cookie because I'm not going to bake you any cookies at 5 AM. If you didn't, you can give yourself a cookie because you've read this much so far. (No, people who saw it coming don't get two cookies. That's not fair.)
Ruce broke up with Zenny, for Cherry. Zenny was best friends with Cherry--even more so than with Lucy. However, Ruce had always liked Cherry. I didn't know the details, either. I don't even know if Ruce actually did do it to get back at Zenny. Either way, Zenny was absolutely distraught. Up to this point, I had started to just hang around with Bly in my classes, and Zenny hung out with Bly, too--since we were the group. She got to know me better, and I got to know her better. That's probably how I got to crushing on her, as well. But whenever Zenny was upset, I was upset. My feelings mirrored hers exactly--and now that I look back on it, that's when I really learned empathy. I went to great lengths to comfort her as much as possible, to be there with her. Still, I still wasn't accepted around her by her. I think the only reason I may have gotten to help her at all was because there was no one else, at certain times, who would be there for her. A lot of the time, though, I took it unconsciously upon myself to be her guardian of sorts. All of that time, whenever I would walk her to class (because then we had about three or so classes together), it would be awkward. She would always speed up to get to class--doubtless, to lose me. It didn't help that I never talked, because I knew nothing about her, I was terrified to ask her questions (whateltheythinkitis), I didn't think we really had any common ground, and I was a plain bad conversationalist. Horrible at it, in fact--just horrible. Still am pretty bad at it, but now I at least have a "peaceful aura" instead of a "really creepy aura". Which, in turn, usually leads to idle conversation, so I guess it all works out.
But, her depression had to have an aftereffect, of course. As much as both Bly and I tried to help, she eventually fell into a major depression over it. I, having a bit of skill at drawing, would draw things for her every now and then when I had the time and she was doing really bad. One time, she asked me to draw a broken heart for her. I obliged. Later, I drew for her a torn heart with a small heart-shaped seed between the halves, with a small flower of a sprout coming out. She liked that one, at least. I also tried to listen whenever I could. I've had a lot of experience listening, mostly because I'm by nature curious, quiet, and naturally fit for it through lots of training listening to my mom talk about my dad--not that I hold that against her, of course. Eventually, a lot of other kids started hanging over at "our tree". Bly called them "cholitos" (Spanish for "wannabe gangsters", basically). Rowdy, irritating, and a horrible influence on Elizabeth. She started drifting away in all of the twenty feet of space to them for whatever reason, as much as they irritated and abused her.
Most of all, she started neglecting her friends a lot. Myself? I didn't think I had a right to her attention. After all, who was I? I wasn't her friend. I didn't feel like her friend--I had to have a reason to talk to her. I had to have a very specific reason, practically a ticket, to talk to the Zenny. Because, otherwise, what the hell would I talk to her about? As well as, the only time she would ever talk to me then was for if she needed help with homework. I was reliable for that at the very least. If I had asked her then if I was her friend, she would certainly say "yes", but I felt very much like she was my friend, but I wasn't hers.
This got progressively worse as she started hanging out with the punks (that's my favorite term for them) who had invaded our spot. By the end of the year, Bly and I had the intent to move to a new spot completely solidified. Zenny was also no longer talking to Ruce or Cherry, and Lucy was getting a little misty about the whole thing too. I was more patient than Bly. I gave her many, many more chances and insisted we wait out on her. Bly wanted to abandon her very soon (as is his nature), but I insisted that we wait. However, without going into detail, she kept up her habits, as well as a slough of generally broken promises to show up at this or that place, or do this or that, or go this or there--etcetera. (It's still a bad habit of hers, too.)
As the year came to a close, I was starting to get really fired up myself, along with Bly. I'd tried to talk with Zenny privately a couple of times, but she rebuked me every time. I also had tried to tell her in notes, poems, letters, and drawings constantly that I liked her, but I never even got close to it for it--so the fact that she wouldn't talk to me about something serious just made me think, "Yeah, like she would have talked to me about that." One morning, at breakfast, she was sitting with her friends. Specifically, Lucy and Charles (go away). By this time, I was really, really irritated. I walked in the door with one purpose.
I said to her, "We need to talk. At nutrition."
"I don't want to talk," she said incredulously, giving me a weird look.
I was furious. I raised my index finger and thumb and showed them to her with a millimeter between them. I said, "You're this close to losing Bly as a friend."
I could tell in her eyes that she was far off, that she was asleep and running from what was happening around her, denial everywhere in her face. It wasn't a dawning realization, but it was like staring at an infuriating brick wall. She shrugged and said, "So?"
I blew a casket. I swung my arms down, and I don't remember whether I gave her a nasty look or not, but I said something along the lines of "fine" and then walked out the cafeteria door. I pushed open the door on my way out, and I pushed it hard. It slammed loud against the cafeteria wall. I didn't mean to do it, but it felt good nonetheless.
As it turned out, it had a good effect. Bly asked me, as soon as he had a class with me, "What did you do?" I asked him what happened--I had actually seen Bly talking with Zenny on the way to their first periods; I had Bly first period as well, so I waited for him. In fact, I was calling him at that moment to tell him, "fuck it, we're abandoning her". He told me that she was freaked out and she wanted him to calm me down. Like hell he was going to calm me down! It gave me no small amount of pleasure to see how she regarded me like a dangerous beast the next time I saw her, her looking at me visibly cautiously, terrified that I might snap again. But it was good. It was good that she was scared enough, shocked out of it enough for her to go talk to Bly. The plan was back on, and she was back with us. She'd stick to us, and we stuck to her. There were a few rough bumps (perhaps even the whole scenario over again, downsized, and minus the dramatic declarations and door-slamming), but she was on our side by the end of the year.
And you know what? As much as I loved her as a friend, as strangely, enigmatically, irresistible she was, I was really getting sick of her. But I still had a crush on her, and I couldn't help it. At the very least, it was less. The next year, we moved on to a new spot. We managed to get everyone to migrate there. We all agreed; it was much, much better. Peaceful, better air, better surroundings, better people (except for the idiots who smoked pot north of us out of apples in open air)... it was great. We also had a couple other additions of people who didn't suck.
Up to now and on, we've just been spending our time, relaxing and trying to grind through the new year. I think that I finally earned my place in the group.
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"Your comment doesn't make sense. Whats this about Paris hilton? What are you talking about? You don't make sense." - alenka
My Blog.
Your writing style is remarkably interesting. I think this may be so because your story and mine have a near identical storyline. Many aspects of your story are the exact same way I feel or felt. Especially that part where you are alone with the one you like and complete silence. There are so many time where I would say "If I could only talk to her alone" and then I get my chance it's so silent I could hear my hair grow. Thanks for the story.
I hope it's remarkably interesting in a good way!
I have been messing around with it this time around.
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"Your comment doesn't make sense. Whats this about Paris hilton? What are you talking about? You don't make sense." - alenka
My Blog.
This was very interesting and I could relate to some of it. I haven't moved around as much as you but I always seem to be moving houses which as a result makes me easily bored with my surroundings. I recently moved back to Michigan from France and I've never had more difficulty making friends. Like you said, I quickly became bitter towards the people I go to school with. I couldn't understand why they didn't think like I did or didn't have the decency to invite me places to help me make friends. Along with being a shy person, I had a lot more life experiences than these people had and it set me apart from them. Not only did I move from over overseas, I looked different from everybody else (that usually came with stares in the hallways).
Basically, my junior year of high school consisted of crying, screaming, resentment, and hatred which was moslty taken out on my mom. She always told me that I should try harder to make friends; that I should put myself out there more. This, to me, seemed impossible. I'm terribly shy and have a hard time with rejection. I hated that I couldn't live where I wanted and there was nothing I could do about it. I've been going to school here now for almost a year and a half and I still don't feel like I've found my place in the small group of friends I have. I refused to sacrifice my individuatlity (and my afro along with my many peircings) just to fit in with the norm. I've let go of my resentment towards the people at my school for not being what I want them to be, it just complicates life and I find myself contridicting my own beliefs as a result. I'm just waiting for college to get here (so soon!) so I can move on to meeting new people!
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All the believers, they were smiling and winking at each other, I could honestly say I was scared for my life.
Hi Scyze. I am somewhat speechless. There are so many thoughts regarding your blog within my head. I might as well as start with the first thought. I admire you for your wit to turn your anger into someting proactive. I have a friend that once said,"Good people are people who deal with bad things in thier lives but still remain good, bad people are people who get good things and make nothing of it". I truly believe that you are one of those good people in our chaotic world. It is late and I have now lost the other thoughts. Nevertheless, kudos on your blog.