I promise you I can formulate words other than yes and thank you. I know it kills you to look at your grandchildren and see a lost generation whom you can’t relate to. We’re the future yet we can’t even connect ourselves to your past. You relay your wisest words upon me and I am absorbing every word. I promise you my stares aren’t blank and my nods aren’t superficial; I am listening. With our language barrier, I can’t enunciate Vietnamese, and you can’t articulate English but we are bound together somehow — please don’t feel as though you’ve lost me.
This discrepancy between our generations has hindered our relationship to the point where I’m scared to call you. I have so much to tell you. I’m doing well in school (as of now), I hope you don’t experience the pounding headaches my dad told me about, and I hope the food is somewhat bearable at the nursing home because you can’t cook for yourself anymore. I can’t fathom your loneliness without grandpa, but I’m right here, forever. I want to make you so proud because I know our success is your reason to live. The hardships you have undergone to seek a better life for your family is not ignored; everyday I live by your morals and ideals. Just because your words don’t make it’s way through my ears, your handprint is upon my heart. I’m sorry I didn’t take the time to learn our language or culture, and I’m sorry my parents have to translate for me because my stuttered words are barely comprehensible.
When I see you, everything seems so staged. I sit down on my usual spot on your couch, we exchange forced smiles — I quickly look to the ground, you ask me how school is — I say yes, you ask me what grade I’m in — I say yes, you ask me what I want to be when I grow up — I say yes. You nervously laugh it off as though it's a frivolous joke, but you and I both know we can’t progress from here. We can’t build a bond from repetitive conversations, and questions that you already know the answer to. I’ll live your life, your highs and your lows through sepia-toned photographs and smudged letters to grandpa because that’s our only way of communicating anymore. Your life before was exotic and spontaneous and you lived unlike I’ve ever seen you, but now you’re just a figurine I visit twice a year to wish “a prosperous New Year's” or a “Merry Christmas.” I want the typical cookie-making, knitting grandma who religiously sends Valentine’s Day cards yearly.
That’s okay, I have you, the grandma who lives to love your grandchildren you can’t talk to.
You are not a void in my life. I promise you, I love you more than any words I don’t understand can ever express.
