Today, half a world away, my uncle, my aunt’s husband, died from a brain hemorrhage. My uncle was in his early 90s and lived a long life. He spent much of his life traveling between China and the US. He got bored and restless easily. He loved my aunt, but he loved himself more. He […]
Tag: Grief
Finding Family, Fragility and Strength
I am ending this Mother’s Day weekend like my last post began, with reflection & amidst another wave of grief, one which is strong, but which I find easier to withstand. Almost all the things I hoped for this Mother’s Day weekend happened as planned. My sister made it safely out of Yangon, and […]
Lost and Found
Whew. Grief. It comes for you out of nowhere sometimes, or maybe from everywhere. On a morning when you have a three hour professional learning session to give. At the end of a week you weren’t sure you’d make it through. At the start of a weekend that simultaneously holds so much longing, hope and […]
Intention, Community & Moving Forward
Sometimes, we just have to keep holding on, and moving forward, in community. This has been an incredibly hard week for so many reasons. There is still so much uncertainty. But today, I am beginning to see light and beauty again. And I am grateful for the community of friends, family and strangers that have […]
Slipping
I am at a loss on so many levels… I have not remotely recovered from all the things that have happened in the past month, to my family, my community, to those I love and hold dear and so also to me. And then more happens around me and I don’t know how to carry […]
Living Tensions
It has been such a week, after such a week, a series of such weeks over this past year, and a series among a lifetime of such weeks. These weeks teach me about the living tensions and holding space for the abundance that makes up life even when it is so incredibly complicated. This week, […]
To Grieve is To Be Human
To embrace my humanity, our humanity, humanity, in the face of a dehumanizing world is resistance. I will be nothing if not authentic. To be human as a woman of color in a world that is constantly pushing dehumanizing narratives, that is constantly trying to separate you from being deserving of love and grief and […]
When There is Too Much in Your Heart
I cannot remember crying after my mother died. Not immediately, although I’m sure I did, because I remember thinking that if I did not, people would wonder what was wrong with me. But it was so surreal. My mother, who had dropped me off the night before at my friend’s house, died the next morning […]
On Holding All the Heavy Truths
CW: Human rights violations, trauma, racial violence My sister, my father’s youngest daughter, and her mother, live in Yangon, the capital of Burma. My father and I have an extremely complicated relationship, but the complications of our relationship have never prevented me from loving my sister. As my father’s daughter, my only hope for my […]
The Space Between
This week was extremely hard for me. I kept going and going and going despite all the signs that I was doing too much. But I was wise today. I made space for the people that would tell me that I needed to stop. And, at the end of the day, with the call where […]