Finding Momentum

I’m not afraid of dying. I’m sur­prised by the thought flit­ting across my mind as my plane takes off. Were we to plunge into the Cal­i­for­nia coast as the scene used to play out in my imag­i­na­tion, I’d be ready for that.

I had a backwards-sort of feel­ing tonight as I entered the air­port, breez­ing through the secu­rity lines and arriv­ing at my gate much too early. Justin and Frank had dropped me off and gone to In ‘n Out with­out me.

I’m going home to Pasadena. Or rather, I’m going to see my fam­ily in Pasadena, with Annie’s grad­u­a­tion being the rea­son for cel­e­bra­tion. Going home means some­thing dif­fer­ent these days. Is it the house you grew up in? Is about see­ing your fam­ily, your friends? Is it neon-lit boba shops, or the wide­ness of De Anza Boule­vard or Cal­abasas Park with the ghost sto­ries or the pan­icky feel­ing of wak­ing up real­iz­ing you’ve over­slept first period or junior or senior prom from how­lon­gago– and the exhil­a­ra­tion of pulling off a spec­tac­u­lar field show or the happy sen­sa­tion of rolling up to a full din­ing table explod­ing with Tai­wanese foods? Yes, yes, and yes.

I have a mem­ory where I am drop­ping off my par­ents at SFO. They are leav­ing for China, my sis­ters are still under­grads in San Diego. I am see­ing Sarah at the time; she stands to my left as we wave our good-byes to them from across the glassed secu­rity walls. And that’s when it hits, a sud­den blue-ness, a feel­ing of being gone, or that finally, I am on my own. I won­der if that’s what it feels like to be grown-up. All the older folks in Stephen Min­istry tell about loved ones pass­ing away, spouses divorc­ing, bud­dies mov­ing across the coun­try for a job, or spouse, or to take care of a rel­a­tive. It’s a fact (it’s so true that you may sur­prise your­self because you don’t under­stand it yet), the peo­ple you grow to trea­sure and love will leave you, and that leaving-ness is a sen­sa­tion that star­tled me that day. Per­haps it’s just as true that I was unique in expe­ri­enc­ing it so late in my life.

In that mem­ory, we duck in to the Sharper Image store to play with the mas­sage chairs. The rollers play­fully tug and push and pull at my calves and lower back, and I stare hard at the remote, squirm­ing, barely mak­ing out the but­tons, fight­ing back stu­pid tears. Hold it together man. C’mon, I’m self-talking. Pull your­self together.

But it’s a back­ward feel­ing because tonight I’m fly­ing home to my fam­ily. I am excited to see every­body again. I’m proud of my sis­ter. I’m glad to get out of Oak­land. I’m feel­ing a bit more coura­geous. It merely took time.

Later on the plane, I’m doz­ing off when another mem­ory star­tles me: Shortly after my dad gave me my first com­puter some­where in the fifth grade, I con­vinced my mom to buy me a word proces­sor to install on it. I was a book­ish kid then (thank­fully!), and always had my nose buried in a novel. I had just fin­ished read­ing some Crich­ton book–Air­frame I believe–and wrote a story basi­cally ver­ba­tim from the book about a plane crash­ing in the Pacific. In it, I describe in painstak­ing detail the panic of the pas­sen­gers, the lug­gage fly­ing about the com­part­ment, the sound the latches made when they flipped open, what exactly the pilot would say into the inter­com… which was what­ever Mr. Crich­ton would have said in his novel. I titled the piece The Final Flight of Flight 738 or some­thing equally dra­matic to an eleven-year-old. But the most clear part of the mem­ory was when my dad saw that I was writ­ing some­thing that Sat­ur­day morn­ing: I saw a blend of curios­ity and pride light up his face. “Here. Let me see it,” he had said, mov­ing toward me, reach­ing for the print­out in my hands.