I was born with a talent. Not for dance, or comedy, or anything so delightful. I’ve
always had a knack for school. Everything that was taught there, I could learn: quickly
and without too much effort. It was as if school were a vast machine and I a cog perfectly
formed to fit in it. This is not to say that my education was always easy for me. When Ma
and I moved to the U.S., I spoke only a few words of English, and for a very long time, I
struggled.
There’s a Chinese saying that the fates are winds that blow through our lives from
every angle, urging us along the paths of time. Those who are strong-willed may fight the
storm and possibly choose their own road, while the weak must go where they are blown. I
say I have not been so much pushed by winds as pulled forward by the force of my
decisions. And all the while, I have longed for that which I could not have. At the time
when it seemed that everything I’d ever wanted was finally within reach, I made a decision
that changed the trajectory of the rest of my life.
From my position outside the window of the bridal shop now, I can see the little girl
sitting quietly at the mannequin’s feet, eyes shut, the heavy folds of falling fabric
closing her in, and I think, This isn’t the life I wanted for my child. I know how it will
go: she already spends all of her time after school at the shop, helping with small tasks
like sorting beads; later, she will learn to sew by hand and then on the machines until,
finally, she can take over some of the embroidery and finishing work, and then she too
will spend her days and weekends bent over the unending yards of fabric. For her, there
will be no playing at friends’ houses, no swimming lessons, no summers at the beach, not
much of anything at all except for the unrelenting rhythm of the sewing needle.
But then we both look up as her father walks in and after all these years and all
that’s passed, my heart stirs like a wounded animal in my chest.
Was I ever as beautiful as she? There are almost no pictures of me as a child. We
couldn’t afford a camera. The first snapshot taken of me in the U.S. was a school photo,
from the year I came to America. I was eleven. There came a moment later in my life when I
wanted to move on, and I ripped this picture up. But instead of discarding the pieces, I
tucked them away in an envelope.
Recently, I found that envelope and brushed off the dust. I broke open the seal and
touched the torn bits of paper inside: here was the tip of an ear, a part of the jaw. My
hair had been cut by my mother, unevenly and too short, parted far to the right and swept
over my forehead in a boy’s hairstyle. The word PROOF covers much of my face and a part of
my blue polyester shirt. We hadn’t been able to pay for the actual photo, so we’d kept
this sample they’d sent home.
But when I join the ripped pieces of the photo and put together the puzzle, my eyes
still gaze directly at the camera, their hope and ambition clear to all who care to look.
If only I’d known.