Finding Momentum

I feel like sea­sons are chang­ing, not just in the air but through my life. I’m out­doors more often, laugh­ing more, more okay with things being stuck, or in-between, or just not formed yet.

The plan­tar fasci­itis is still there, and not being able to run has been frus­trat­ing to say the least, but I’ve been enjoy­ing bike rides and swims. Sum­mer is in the air, and a part of me is stretch­ing and yawn­ing and set­tling in to it. One of my favorite feel­ings is being at home with friends on a warm evening with the win­dows open, full after a shared meal, lis­ten­ing to a George Strait song and chat­ting about what­ever. Those nights I go to bed and think to myself, I’m happy. God is good. I have been given much.

I thought the same thing about my fam­ily… we Skyped for a bit last week and I won­der why I’m not more in touch with them more often when there’s clearly a lot of love between us. I have been given much. And this is kind of awk­ward because they all read this blog (hi Mom!).

Those who sow in tears will reap with songs of joy, said the psalmist, from autumn to win­ter to spring to summer.

Lunar, a photo by andrewhao on Flickr.

An after­noon at Bernal Heights, SF.

Really dig­ging Yuna’s vocals. Chill, relaxed R&B sound.

He looks into me with soft eyes, and sings in Man­darin: “Look into His face / and your wor­ries will dis­ap­pear with the light of the sun”.

He’s not bad for his age. Appar­ently he sings in the elderly folks’ choir at his church. “He’s the only one who can sing!” laughs my dad.

We’re sit­ting in a hotel restau­rant, filled to the brim with Christ­mas­time muzak and chatty cus­tomers. I feel the restau­rant grow­ing qui­eter as he con­tin­ues to sing, a throaty bari­tone voice grow­ing more con­fi­dent as I grow more self-conscious at the same time.

My yie yie (爺爺)‘s eyes are becom­ing dim­mer with the years, I can see, hid­ing under bushy, busy white eye­brows and thick, leath­ery sun­tanned skin. Com­ing over with the KMT from the main­land was tough on him. My dad would tell me of Yie yie’s extended mil­i­tary deploy­ments in Viet­nam, Korea, and Japan. His past is a sto­ried and shrouded one, work­ing for Chi­nese intel­li­gence doing radio sur­veil­lance. After split­ting with his unit dur­ing the upheavals of the Rev­o­lu­tion, he came to Tai­wan to work again for KMT intel­li­gence, eaves­drop­ping on the very same peo­ple he used to work with.

“Japan was espe­cially nice”, Yie yie recounts with a smile. He was sta­tioned with US troops on a mil­i­tary base, and he tells us sto­ries of watch­ing a movie every night, eat­ing great food. He is a young man, still. He keeps a jour­nal of each movie he sees, and the jour­nal grows thick over the year. A mis­chie­vous smile grows over Yie yie’s face as he recounts how he’d smug­gle hard-boiled eggs from the cafe­te­ria in his pants pock­ets, only to spill them all over the bas­ket­ball court in a pickup game hours later.

How old is he in those years?, I won­der. He couldn’t have been much older than I am now. Does he enjoy Coke? How about man­goes? I imag­ine him writ­ing his wife, ask­ing about my father as a young boy. The world is a dif­fer­ent place. He tells a story of los­ing close friends in a Viet­cong mor­tar attack in Viet­nam, and his eyes grow misty. Smoke rises from the jun­gles, and I won­der if he ever won­ders why he, and by exten­sion my father and myself, are spared.

My dad would never get to see his dad much dur­ing those years, and when he came back, most of his mem­o­ries of Yie yie were of an ill-tempered man he’d tend to hide from. But some­thing hap­pened in the inter­ven­ing years after Yie yie came home for good. He soft­ened out. Jesus got to him.

I wanted to come here to find myself in Yie yie and his life. I want to know his strength and deter­mi­na­tion to live, and real­ize that there is much more beneath the sur­face of the man that I’ve only seen sit­ting down, smil­ing and laugh­ing. What keeps a man rooted even when he is swept about?

Right now, Yie yie’s singing Psalm 23. “Can you remem­ber the words?” my dad asks as Yie yie strug­gles through the verses. The Lord is my shep­herd. He leads me through quiet waters. I fear no evil.

He can remem­ber them just fine.

Bub­bles at Dolores Park, a photo by andrewhao on Flickr.

Remem­ber when you were a kid and you blew lil bub­bles from the bub­ble can? Well mul­ti­ply that by a thousand.

Oak­land Run­ning Fes­ti­val, a photo by andrewhao on Flickr.

Lawrence, Mathilde and Ben before run­ning yesterday’s Oak­land Half Marathon. Super proud of ‘em!

Bridge back­light, a photo by andrewhao on Flickr.

Dri­ving back home over the Bay Bridge. Crazy light.

Stuck stuck stuck stuck stuck.

Now that the race is over with, I’m left feel­ing sur­pris­ingly empty. I guess it shouldn’t have been a sur­prise, all those morn­ings spent on trails were easy ways to feel pro­duc­tive, or to grab a endor­phin rush and start the day right. I wake up too early now and crawl onto my knees in bed and just kind of slouch there under the cov­ers, shak­ing off the fog of sleep, half-waking-half-dreaming-half-wishing I were some­where else.

I missed Boston by 17 sec­onds, and I try not to let the sig­nif­i­cance of the fact get by me. I tell myself it’s okay to feel dis­ap­pointed, to pre­vent myself from say­ing oh, it’s no big deal, next year. I’m try­ing to accept that I am disappointed.

I am dis­ap­pointed, I am dis­ap­pointed. I have to tell myself this some­times, from the out­side look­ing in, and bear the weight of it on my shoul­ders through my heart. Like: the angry plan­tar fasci­itis. The soggy shoes and fumbly umbrella. Cook­ing a crappy soup. My inabil­ity to make sense of my love life. A week of rain. Not even lik­ing, much less lov­ing Oakland.

This I’m learn­ing: laugh­ter is my cover and cloak. Hav­ing the right answers is my defense.

I tried to describe to Jeff this morn­ing how it felt, and I was sur­prised I couldn’t fig­ure it out. Well, it was a sorta lonely feel­ing. I’ll start from there. I real­ized in the shower the other morn­ing that I hated wait­ing. Recently I’ve been try­ing to dis­tract myself. I know it’s not help­ful, but I’d much rather be with the noise, the shiny stuff, the city din, the glitterati.

Henri Nouwen talks about allow­ing lone­li­ness to drive you to the seat of your true desire: being close to the Father. Father, I won­der some­times what the hell I am doing with my life. I want to know I want to know I want to know. When I was younger I used to pray: Jesus, be my only sat­is­fac­tion with total abandonment. It sounds com­pletely ridicu­lous, but I hon­estly didn’t expect to be here being asked of that now. I want human hands, I want tan­gi­ble touch, I want a gen­uine expe­ri­ence, and soul-connection and laugh­ter and tears.

It’s self­ish, Jesus, but on the other hand it’s not. I just want to believe it is from you, and I can expe­ri­ence it, and I can wait and say you met me on the other side. Can I ask that? Dare I ask that? I don’t want trite answers. I want to sit in the seat of the val­leys and remain there and say I waited patiently and he came, he really did.

Jonathan men­tioned that at our home group the other week. What do you want, I asked him. I want to hear him say he’s proud of me, he answered, and I thought it the most gen­uine thing I’ve heard in a while.

Tow­ers, a photo by andrewhao on Flickr.

On a beau­ti­ful after­noon in Dolores Park.

I’ve been wont to com­plain about how it sucks to be doing my train­ing in the gym. Ever since I tweaked my foot I’ve been feel­ing caged on the tread­mill and ellip­ti­cal machines. On the machines I can’t think about any­thing, it’s too stuffy and hot and I’m always drip­ping with sweat. I’m always star­ing at num­bers, cursed num­bers. It makes me remem­ber how I hated run­ning track in high school, and the unfor­giv­ing num­bers that come with it.

On the flip side it’s been breath­tak­ing get­ting out and real­iz­ing that I’ve been tak­ing nature for granted. It’s a gift to have your mind wan­der. It’s a gift to roam over mossy earth. I ran out over the Oak­land hills this morn­ing to see a blan­ket of clouds glow­ing through the sun­light and pour­ing out over the hills into the Bay. I both wished I had my cam­era with me and was glad I didn’t.