30 days

I don't usually post anything too personal on my blog. Even when I got initially got engaged, I didn't really blog about it. I just posted a bunch of bouncing happy faces. Things that touch me too emotionally I generally keep to myself, I guess. Which is why I originally wasn't going to post this. In the end, though, I realized that I couldn't not post it.

My family and I just finished our 30 days of mourning. Popo, who just turned 90 in October, past away on February 9. It was hard. Harder than when we lost Kung Kung because we kind of expected his passing but I don't think anyone expected Popo's. Although she was 90, she was still fairly healthy. She still lived alone and still volunteered at Senior Citizen. And although she would always forget our names (she ran through two or three cousins' names before saying the right one), she was still cognitively sharp. She fell the day before the Chinese New Year and had to be hospitalized but initially seemed not too bad considering her age. She past away two weeks later.

I was lucky enough to live with popo during my first year of grad school. We drove each other absolutely crazy. I studied so much that I didn't relax or sleep as much as she thought I should. I was in my 20s, but she wanted to still take care of me. She wouldn't let me cook. Wait, I take it back. She did let me make won ton soup once (I just had to boil water, throw in the frozen won ton, heat up chicken broth), but that was because she had badly sprained her ankle. Even then she sat in the kitchen to make sure I wasn't going to burn down the house. We eventually compromised. She finally agreed that I would be in charge of washing the dishes.

We are a relatively tight knit family and a large part of that is due to popo. One of her sisters once expressed that she was a little jealous how close my family was. We went to popo's house every week for dinner. We're going to try to continue this tradition. Popo would be disappointed if we didn't.

As is Chinese tradition, my family and I mourned for 30 days. We didn't participate in any celebrations, including my birthday. Truth be told, it was nice to have an excuse to not celebrate it. I just wasn't up to it this year. I feel like I was walking under a cloud but I expected it to get better after the funeral. I avoided anyone not in my family or that I needed to interact with because of work. And when I was at work, I wasn't really there. It's a good thing that I took data while I was testing and doing therapy because I have no idea what happened in those weeks. We were all busy preparing for the funeral, especially since everything was done very traditional, so I thought that maybe the problem was that I hadn't properly mourned. It wasn't. In the week following the funeral, I felt the same. Interestingly enough, now that the 30 days are over, I do feel better. We went to the temple for the ceremony on Wednesday and I feel better. Maybe there's a reason why the Chinese mourn for 30 days.

Anyway, on a lighter note, here's a picture that Joy sent me during this time:She gave me permission to post it on the blog, but I forgot to ask if I could use his real name. Oh well, I don't even use M*Bark's real name here. Anyway, let's call him LB ('Lil Brad) since he looks just like his father. :) Anyway, here's LB in his fish sweater that I knit him for Christmas.