My Foundation

my father passed away from liver cancer on april 14th this year. by the time the cancer was discovered in december, it was already quite advanced. it's the nature of this particular cancer that by the time you have symptoms, it's already far along. the doctors we took him to knew the prognosis was dim and there wasn't a whole lot that could be done. i knew in my gut that he didn't have more than a few months to live. i was with him and my mom with the liver specialist when the initial diagnosis was given. it was a sobering experience that i had dreaded my whole life.

my father was a rock. i've always proudly said to my friends that i had only seen my father raise his voice twice my entire life. he was solid, built to last, and, without exception, well-liked by everyone he came into contact with. his disarming humility and lack of self-consciousness was both endearing and frustrating to his kids, and especially his frequently embarrassed wife. he would wander into the kitchen at a restaurant and start chatting with the cooks. everyone loved him. he'd get freebies constantly. a scone here. a free drink there. even a "liberated" magazine from a doctor's waiting room. and because of his uncanny resemblance to the late actor pat morita, he became "mr. miyagi" to everyone.

i admired my father greatly growing up. i admired his steadiness and laze faire attitude towards life. so, like a lot of boys, without knowing it, i emulated him. i saw that he never got mad or upset, so i just figured i should be the same. his stoicism and steadiness became the foundation of the way i handled the world.

growing up, our family was poor and barely scraped by. we lived in one of the worst parts of town and i went to some rough schools. being the only asian kid, i was picked on a lot. this was my first challenge in life, back in elementary school. so, i did what i thought my father would do... just blow it off, don't worry about it. push down the anger and the fear. don't get mad. this attitude kept me out of a lot of fights growing up. it was a survival mechanism.

when i entered my early adulthood however, this way of dealing with my negative emotions started backfiring. repressing my feelings and emotions became more difficult. it just didn't work any more. i couldn't figure out what was wrong. it seemed to work so well for my dad. everyone loved him and he was genuinely one of the most chilled out, happy guys i ever met.

it wasn't until much later, actually pretty recently, that i came to realization that i had it all wrong. the difference was, my father WASN'T "repressing" nor was he in denial. his attitude came from real emotional growth, forged in the fires of the war he had fought and the life he had lead up to then. i had unknowingly made a fundamental error in thinking and living. it wasn't just an act. it was real for him. i was just acting. i was acting like things didn't bother me, but they did. i was acting like things were OK but sometimes they just weren't.

you push enough pain and hurt down and it'll come back to bite you every time. and you repeat this process over and over for 30 years and it become the way you live. i just didn't know any differently. so i ran. ran from any pain or bad feeling. and ran towards the good ones. but always with the dread that the good ones just wouldn't last.

eventually, i came to a split in my life. the path i was on forked. one way was to keep running. the other, was the much more difficult job of starting to face things. starting to face the moment, even if it hurts. and working through those emotions and feelings. good or bad. a process that continues to this day and will likely continue until the day i exhale my last breath.

now that my father has passed away, i am left with the reality that i have to be my own foundation. i have to do the sometimes unpleasant work of growing up.

but even though he's not around physically, his ideal will always be with me in my heart and memories.