The smell of kalbi would greet me every time I visited my grandparents’ house. I would walk through the doors, right into the kitchen. Hissing from the rice cooker, sizzling from the meat on the frypan, and my grandmother’s back. The dining table would be set up with plates and utensils and the island table would have all kinds of Korean banchan freshly made.
My cousins and I would drop our bags, go upstairs to say hi to our grandfather, who would be playing go-stop on his tablet, and bring him to the dining room for dinner. The table would be a tight fit, with extra seats added to fit all the guests. We would start off buffet style, but eventually all the food would end up on the table. These were all signs that I was in Chicago.
Growing up I found my grandparents’ house to be really warm. Less of the emotional warmth but rather the physical-I’m-sweating kind of heat. There were too many people in the rooms, bathrooms were constantly steamy from the consecutive showers, and the heaters seem to be set 5 degrees higher than necessary. In fact, everything at their house was to the extreme. Food, noise, heat, and arguments. Few days into the visit, there would always be fighting. Sometimes between my cousins. Often between my parents and me. Most times, however, it would be between my grandparents.
They were an interesting couple. Harabugi (Korean for grandpa) was a conservative, skinny Korean man who didn’t speak or smile much while halmoni (Korean for gradma) was the opposite. She was slightly overweight, talkative, dramatic, and very expressive. They clashed a lot, argued daily, but I knew they cared for each other. She cooked full Korean meals for him, he drove her to the health club where all the Korean old people would gather to chat. Their life had routine, with their grandchildren's’ visits shaking it up from time to time.
We all thought those Chicago weekends would never change.
Did everything disappear at once or was I just clueless? That hospital visits got more frequent, that grandpa drove less and grandma cooked less, that the house grew more quiet with each visit, I did not notice when I visited during my high school breaks. Was I too busy with schoolwork? with friends?
A person’s aging process is too long and violent that I wonder if death is the best, the only possible scenario of life. My time seems to be move fast, but in fact, it flows only to match the pace of youth. On the other hand, the time for our grandparents seem to move slowly, while in reality, it trickles fast towards an end. My grandma always asked for the time, checking the clock whenever she can. Perhaps, she, the woman who have lived four times as long as me, already knows the gap between my time and hers.
Last Saturday, I left Chicago for school. Holding my hand, my grandma walked me to the car that would take me to the airport. Her wrinkly hands felt warm against mine. As I put my luggage in the trunk, she not-so-secretly puts a bundle of cash in my purse, as she has done for years. We say our goodbyes and I hug her, nudging her to go back inside.
The car drives away and I wonder, when did she become so small?
