Life

Life

My mom’s restaurant got broken into. I’ve been meaning to write a post on it, but the thoughts have swirled around in my mind, with no particularly insightful outcomes. Anyways, I might as well share.

I heard about it all when my mom gave me a call a month or two ago. To be honest, every time I get a call from her, I’m a little nervous. I’m the person who does the “check up” calls, and she normally doesn’t pick up the phone unless there’s something specific that she needs. As expected, the conversation began with her asking a favor. She wanted to use my social security number to set up a new security system. “If I use your SSN, I’ll save at least $400 on the setup charges. Don’t worry, I’ll pay the bills and everything. It’s a three year contract.”

“Wait wait wait- what happened to your old security system?” I asked.

After hearing her tell the story, I think the only way to describe the burglary is to say that my mom’s modest pho shop in Rosemead had been hit by ninjas.  Now I’m not just saying this because it’s a predominantly Asian neighborhood. And dear god, I hate ninjas of all kinds. But there is no other word for it.

The affair happened overnight, with the thieves cutting a hole in the roof right above the safe room. (Wait, my mom has a safe?) They then shimmied in, snipping the electrical wires on their way down. This move disabled the security alarm and cut out the video cameras. Lastly they busted/melted open the restaurant’s safe!!!

Unbelievable.

Thankfully, my mom didn’t have anything in the safe at the time, and it sounds like insurance covered the many repairs. After talking with the police and repairmen, my mother learned that she was just one hit in a string of similar burglaries. Her neighbors the dollar store and the grocery store had both been robbed in the same way (hole on the roof above the room containing the safe), but had lost much more money. According to the repairman, the grocery store lost a whole deep freezer full of cash. Yikes.

My mom and I laughed hard at the idea of a team of skilled thieves spending all this time breaking into Saigon 22 for… NOTHING, but still I felt a pang of worry. I’ve wrestled with the idea of moving to Los Angeles to be closer to family for a while now, and events like this push this guilty idea that I ought to be living there. It’s the guilt that every person who moves away from home feels, I guess. Except that LA isn’t even where I grew up!

While I do worry about my mom, I have to remind myself that she’s not alone. There’s quite the handful of relatives there to support her if she needs it. And hell, she handled this whole burglary situation on her own. I forgot to mention the kicker- by the time that she told me about the break in, it had already been two weeks!

Moving to LA may be inevitable when my mother gets older or sicker, but for now I’m happily remaining around the edges of my family.

Home, Life

How to Kick Out Your Roommate Like an Adult

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Just like all relationships in life, sometimes things just don’t work out with roommates, and they gots to go.

A couple of months ago I had to kick out a roommate for the first time in my life. Come to think of it, that’s kind of unusual, since I’ve had at least 20+ roommates over the years. !!! Anyways, things had been coming to a head for several months with late night disruptions and uncleanliness, but it took a major blowout to actually spur us to action.

It’s reminds me of this odd bit of human behavior I learned in one of my psych classes- small annoyances ultimately cause more damage than large disturbances. If you think about it, it makes sense. You’ll put up with a bathroom door that needs to be slammed shut longer than a broken living room window. While the broken window is worse, you’ll get it fixed immediately and so it is ultimately not as annoying as living with a slammed door for 5 months.

Not that our roommate was just slamming doors. And it was really more than just a bad fit. He  was a heavy drug user and occasionally acted in ways that made us feel unsafe (I didn’t know about this until the end).  Ultimately he threatened to attack one of my roommates, and because of that he had to go. It was a no-brainer, but still I was incredibly nervous about the confrontation.

I bumbled through the process, but you don’t have to! Here’s a guide : 

  • Decide for sure that the roommate has got to go and why. If you’ve got other roommates, it’s time to have an honest discussion about Roommate X. Whether the reason is aggressive behavior or even something as simple as you just want to live alone again, first you’ve got to make the decision to kick them out. Be firm! Be confident in your choice. No take backs. It’s just like breaking up.
  • Figure out the logistics. When would you like them to leave? What does the rental contract say? Are they on the lease? If so, search the tenant laws in your state for more information on their rights. If they’re not on the lease, do what you like. Think carefully about how you would like to replace them, if at all.
  • Once you’ve talked it through with the other roommates, schedule a quiet time to talk with your future ex-roommate.Talking face to face is best so that there is no confusion about what is going on. It’s also best not to suddenly surprise the person.  If the person is violent, hide or lock your valuables up first.
  • In your meeting, you’ll probably be incredibly nervous and maybe even shaking as you speak. Just breathe. Then calmly let the roommate know of your decision. Try to focus on non-personal and REAL reasons for the decision. Frame the reason as a difference between roommates, and not an accusation toward that single roommate. For example, “Our work hours are very different” is better than “You always bring people over after work to party at 2am.”
  • Don’t draw it out. Don’t give them the false hope of thinking that maybe you can work it out. If you are willing to negotiate on the terms of the moveout, now would be the time to talk. Be sure to talk about the security deposit and any expectations you have for the room (cleaning or painting for example). Also, just a note: if you’re at the point of thinking about kicking them out, chances are that the roommate knows things have been rough. It may not be a hurtful surprise at all on their end. In fact they may be relieved for the chance to leave.
  • After you’ve finished your talk, give them space! AKA run back to your room.
  • Clarify any open questions over email or in person. Wait 1-30+ days for them to leave. If you’ve given them longer 30 days, or have allowed them to “stay until they find another place…” well good luck. It could be a while. Try to be pleasant. If that doesn’t work, learn to revel in the awkwardness. It’s an important skill for life.
  • On their moveout day, don’t hide from them. It will be obvious. Say goodbye like a grown up.

Asking my roommate to move out was one of the most adult things that I had to do last year. While it was incredibly awkward at first, I think that now my ex-roommate is in a better housing situation for his lifestyle, and my house has become a much calmer place.

If you’re in this situation, good luck! It doesn’t have to be terrible.

 

 

Life

Miracle on 14th St.

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A couple of weeks ago I was lying in bed reading the internet on my phone, when I saw that  my friend Michelle had a new post up on her blog about goals and cream puffs. It’s a baking blog, so yeah I suppose that makes sense. The post is your usual blog end of the year recap and look forward, and while I knew ahead of time that Michelle had had a big year, for some reason reading about her multitude of accomplishments while staring at beautiful pastries that I could never have greatly discomforted me.

Why is it that my natural reaction to a friend’s success is sudden insecurity? Is it because I didn’t do something big like buy a house? No, I don’t even want a house.  I wasn’t sure, but then it was obvious.

In the back of my mind I was thinking of a certain “goal post” that I’d written earlier in the year. I was scared to look at it, to be honest. Yet when I did I was pleasantly surprised. I hit most of my goals. The ones that fell to the wayside had a heavy emotional investment, and as a result I didn’t get them done. Too fucking painful, surprise surprise.

I spent the last half of December pondering what my goals for the new year should be. Every time someone asked me what my resolutions were, I would make something up. Lose weight, increase my net worth maybe? Try as I might, it just felt like I was forcing it to play the game.

Truthfully, I know what I want. I just want this lost and wandering sadness to go away. I want my life to be busier and simpler, if that is possible. I want to start new creative projects and to make some money on the side. Try things, have them fail, or hopefully succeed. Move around, shake things up. What goal is that? I’m not sure how to articulate it.

A few days before I took off for the holidays I was cleaning out the kitchen pantry. I pulled out a few shelves to better sort through the contents. The hole in the cabinet revealed yet another mess, but there in between the plastic bags and the rat poop was an envelope! I reached in, pulled it out, and yes there was a real letter in the envelope, and it was dated to a former tenant of my apartment, circa 2003!!!

As a journal and letter addict I was in heaven. I don’t know how but I didn’t read it immediately. I waited until I felt ready, and read the letter with a glass of wine.

The letter was from a young woman living in Long Beach, and addressed to her male friend (and perhaps romantic interest) who lived in my apartment, of course. In the letter, which spans the course of several weeks and stops and starts mid-sentence multiple times, the woman talks about waitressing in Long Beach, missing family back home in Topeka, and wishing desperately for some sort of direction in life. You can feel her 20-something year old heart all bloodied up on the page, aching for someone to love and some place to belong. It was very dramatic in that special 20-something way. If this story had happened ten years later, I imagine that it would be posted on ThoughtCatalog.

The letter ended a bit breathless and confused, which meant that I felt breathless and confused as well. Whatever happened to this poor woman? Did she ever go back to school? Did she and he work out? Did she move to San Francisco? I am a person that needs to know the end of the story, even if the story is terrible. I mean, I read the entire 50 Shades of Grey because I HAD to know.

So I googled her. And while I can’t verify that it’s her, there is a person with her name living in the area, working at Google. And someone with her friend/former love interest’s name is now a poet living in Oakland. Hmmmmmmm…

My roommate suggested contacting the old tenant to return the letter (he’s quite active on Twitter), but I don’t know if he would want it. It was stuffed pretty far back there. Perhaps he was hiding it from someone? Also, and this is completely selfish, but I don’t want to break the illusion. I want to believe. I want to believe that that scared and confused and kind of angry woman is now a happy smiling outdoorsy woman who did go back to school, and she now works at Google doing not evil things. She takes the bus down every day and even though the commute is killing her, most other things in her life are pretty great. Every now and then she sees her ex and they have a $4 coffee as they talk about the past and more importantly the future.

So I read the letter, and reread it, and I keep thinking about the woman who wrote it. This is kind of cheesy, but finding her letter hidden in my kitchen feels like my end of the year miracle. For some stupid reason, I have hope that it worked out for her. That hope spills over into my own life. Whatever goals I choose for myself this year don’t ultimately matter. One way or another, things have a way of working themselves out in the end.

Life, Style

Selfie Time: November

Lanterns

Stumbled across these W.T. Kirkman oil lanterns the other day while walking to the yarn shop. They were just sitting on the sidewalk. Aren’t they great?

I joked to Ryan that I felt like a character in an LL Bean catalogue, living my “rustic” Martha Stewart life (minus a few horses). Taking a look at this picture, I think it does sum up this phase of fall.

I love fall but it scares me. Quite a few years in a row I’ve fallen prey to seasonal affective disorder. So since 2009 or so I’ve tried to have an active “fall plan” so that I don’t drift into a hole of depression once winter hits. Doesn’t that sound pathetic?

So I do what I like. I’ve been knitting a lot. Cooking delicious fall food. Wearing big sweaters and favorite boots. Watching movies and tv endlessly. Listening to opera full blast on Spotify. And being totally antisocial when I want to.

I think it’s working so far.

Life, Travel

Asia, Again/ The Happy Place

It’s hard to believe, but in less than 48 hours, I’ll be headed off to Southeast Asia again.

This is my third time over there, and while I’m visiting a few new spots, I am mostly trodding well loved territory, although this time not with my family, or alone. Ryan is coming, which should be a treat. More for him, I think.

The pragmatist in me thinks “Why are you going back there? Shouldn’t you spend your money on new experiences? What about India? What about Burma? What about Nepal?”

For a while I didn’t know how to explain it, but it occurred to me the other night as I was doing a test pack: Southeast Asia is my happy place.  I’ve worked through major breakups, death and a number of other issues there. It’s a place of intense healing for me. It’s just something about the tone of life. You can’t help but be moved by being there. I may have mentioned it before, but when I meditate or do thought exercises in therapy, the Mekong River in Luang Prabang is the #1 thing I think about to calm myself down. I mean, come on, look at this shit.

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DOPE.

This trip was precipitated because last year I didn’t go to Vietnam, and I felt like I had made a mistake. For a year I’ve told myself that I have to get back to Vietnam.

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When I visited Vietnam seven years ago I met my family that was left behind in Saigon. I learned more about life and war by looking into their hard worn faces than I’d gathered from 22 years of books and stories.

Most notably, I’d been Chinese all my life, but once I went to Vietnam, I started feeling Vietnamese as well.  (Unfortunately, this “Vietnamese feeling” does not qualify you for a visa discount at the SF Consulate). I left Vietnam changed, with two little sunspots on either side of my cheeks to prove it. I was there, it really happened. See, here’s the sun damage to prove it.

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So anyways, on the housekeeping front this longwinded, winding  and maudlin post is all to say that I’m going back to Asia again for a couple weeks. We’ll be hitting Singapore, Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam (oh, and South Korea too, sort of). I’m pretty excited, and hope to post a little bit here and there.

Since we’re talking about it anyways, I guess I want to mention that if you don’t already have a happy place in your heart, you need one. Think about it. Sit still for a second, and conjure up the last place where you truly felt free and happy. Think about what it felt like to be there. Try to think of a specific moment that actually happened to you. Maybe you were riding motorcycles somewhere 3,000 miles away, or maybe you were on the couch with the cat, drinking chocolate milk and basking in the late afternoon sunlight. Think about all the little details, like the burn of the sunscreen in your eyes, or the grit of the rocks in your shoes. Even if this place doesn’t exist anymore, hold on to this feeling. The more you practice remembering the moment the easier it is to conjure up in times of stress and pain.

If you do try this, tell me where your happy place is. I’m curious.