Will she come back?

"I said I would be back. Don't be lonely. You are welcome back home wherever you are."

- G-Dragon, Daesung, Taeyang Comeback

I never left. I must have made a promise that is hazy now, but in the window, there is

a flower petal behind me somewhere. A 4-foot tree is there now.

Like all the great returns there ever was, I never let you go. I looked back, perhaps not enough, but I did look back.

I will never let you go. Even if it gets harder, even if the bureaucracy sweeps away our efforts or the house gods want us to run around a bit more.

Even if we never find peace

and die empty of what we wanted in life, I will never let you go.

Take a petal off my flower. Stand on this hill with me. Our 4-ft tree will be great one day.

The petal looks small in your hand. The flower looks big in mine. There are great places beyond our corner of the world. Yes, I have seen. Yes, I long to return to some.

But this hill is our haven, when it's you and me and whatever else the birds can see. The vultures can have us after this.

Don't be lonely. Don't hide away. I am here after all. My arms can wrap around you.

I am hungry too. I am full of places I could belong in. You are full of places you've wished forever to see but couldn't. The one you lived with kept burning your garden.

Our knees are only good for so long to see it all, beyond this new attempt of a local garden.

Even if it's been just this hill, you have grown many a flower. I simply picked one up.

While tending your garden, did you ever wonder if I would ever come back? 

You know me too well. You probably knew I'd be back.

I am sorry for leaving the first time and the time after that.

The world is sweet. The world is lovely. We are not as small as we believed. I've never held a hand as strong, as tough, sturdy, and lovely as yours.

I would never let you go.

Remembered Me

After months of struggling to call each other, we finally did. It took a while, it did. A lot of things happened. There was upset. I remembered that 2 am, too much coffee too late in the day, wide awake with not one out of a million ways to describe the distance in my heart. Or why I was tending to that distance, like stoking a fire. 

I convinced myself if it can happen once, it can happen again. It wouldn't matter. All the doors can slam shut at the same time and I'll be just fine. I've always been just fine with things ending.

This time was different.

When I finally let up and opened one of the doors a smidge to your undying knocking, you were there with teary eyes. Maybe it was the undying knocking. It must be. Or the way you spoke to me. I thought I had quit you, but you weren't quitting on me, even though it had seemed like you had. On multiple accounts, I had left confused and my heart poked, the same reasons.

So when I finally let up and opened up a smidge, I heard you say that,

you saw me in every Subaru, every green car, the one that picked you up from Charleston, WV, and dropped you back,

in gas stations and the car charging wires they sell for $15,

you saw us on the subway, giggling hard after our own comments, the ones that made other strangers who must've overheard smile a smidge,

in the attention to the timbre of others' voices when I said that conductor's voice was fucking hot and definitely in Charlie XCX's "party 4 u", because it was our anthem in your little white car,

the way someone would laugh with their head thrown back and the abundance of cheek and littling of eyes,

in the mention of Lasik or Ohio or Texas or marriage or pregnancy, 

in someone nerding out to League,

the slight mention of a boyfriend or two, in Taylor Swift's concert, a joke about Matty Healy's rat boyfriend vibe, Taylor's new album drop,

in public policy or my Mom's Facebook page for some of my pictures >-< or my blog and its earliest episodes,

"like a boyfriend" you said. "Like a boyfriend", I said,

you remembered me when you connected your Spotify to your Discord on purpose in case I'm online and can see what song you're listening to and I felt so silly and laughed into our Discord call, head back,

and you remembered me when you're back at Smith on your site visits, our Paradise Pond and the proof that they cut down the tree with the beloved swing, the way you'd leave your sneakers at my door years ago when you successfully snuck into my triple on the topmost floor of Haven house like a ghost and stayed the night in my sleeping bag or my bed after cheerleading practice, the same spot where you won the lottery and got us Taylor tickets,

the way I'd wave at you goodbye and adieu as your little self shrunk out into a night lightly snowing like a painting I saw for one last time and didn't know it, stolen from the Louvre,

when there's a club and people are dancing in it and we both remember when,

we were best friends.

I remember you too

in a peach High Noon, in Taylor's "Miss Americana and the Heartbreak Prince" in its specific line "it's you and me, that's my whole world" to which we both cried like babies at the bar,

I remember you in plastic bags, when after my ex had called it quits and like a treasure, you visited me on Thanksgiving, and you saw all my plastic bags, my depression plastic bags, and you helped me roll each and every one and now I just have to roll them, every time,

I remember you in "party 4 u" because duh,

little white cars and whenever I see the "Premium" gas option,

when I'm in my civil engineering job and well, you're a civil engineer and you'd totally get drainage,

when it's Wednesday and it's our day, it's been that way for 2 years until it wasn't,

and well today is one of those days. A non-Wednesday. A Sunday. And we just finished playing League together and I feel hopeful again.

People come and people leave and people end things. And sometimes I end things. 

But this time, someone actually fought for me, even when I was slumping, even when I was lagging and wasn't there. There was no ego you upheld. No contract on your end. You did the rare thing.

No one's ever fought for me and for us like you did. I'm so used to people leaving and never coming back. I'm so used to never looking back too.

But this time was different. It simply was.

so it's september again

9/28/2025

playlist I wrote this to. and fuck it's AI generated. most likely. T__T

like a kid, the early morning 7 am air makes me feel like I must soon be on my way to school. There's that kiss of humidity in the air. Houston isn't remarkable but our mornings feel like a hug. Whereas Marietta was a swoosh through the legs, early morning cool winds and all my pores closing up, Houston is a hug from above and from behind. A warm, wet thing.

Jesus where am I going with this.

I'm a Virgo. It's my time of the year or even, my time of the month. T__T. Whichever it is, I am here.

I am 25.

The crazy thing is even if I wanted to, it didn't stop me from squirming in slight distress as I handed over my Discover credit card to pay for lunch between my new boss and I today. I really did want to pay for us. I admire him so much. Our first lunch with him as my boss. 

In a crazy middle-of-my-life kind of way, in a miraculous feat of undeterminable fate, in a quiet shout heard from across the yard, when I least expected it, when I hadn't the energy left in me to even plan after myself, when I was ready to fight for scraps, my head turned to the sound of a grungy voice. Someone who just lost their voice, who sounded tired but kind.

He's not at all how I imagined the second boss in my life to be like. A voice I can barely hear at times with the most thoughtful gestures. An extra plate of cheese and crackers for me every time. I barely hear him but he's there, a little old man.

But he's exactly how I needed my second boss to be like.

Kind. Safe. Gentle. Never angry. Perhaps too kind for his own good. Kind but never, ever blind. Never ever. He sees life as gray. "Straddling close to good, best I can."

I think about all the kinds of intelligences, and he has all of them. A little Chick-Fil-A ice cream in both our hands after each site visit. He is the SWEETEST SAFEST LITTLE MAN.

YOU CAN BRING YOUR CHILDREN HERE. BRING ALL OF EM.

I'm 25. I reconnected with my old nail salon customers. Grandma Karen!! The famous lady who sent me flowers when I was in Ohio. <3 She's got the biggest, bestest surprise for my mother's birthday. I can't wait to luncheon with her. <3 MY WHITE GRANDMA IRL?! donde estas?! Donde hoy. I think.

Her laugh on the phone meant so much to me. This instant familiarity. Another way that Houston hugs me.

The other way that Houston hugs me is in one of my favorite coffee shops. Seven Leaves on Bellaire, and my favorite drink there oh my god, the Sea Cream Jasmine. FUCK. I curse more.

Your Ohio girl became an Irish sailor.

Or maybe Ohio never left. Maybe it's the Ohio in me. But that coffee shop and studying across from Kim is just healing. Any coffee shop can be the Neilson library if I just let myself smile in it. Let myself derail from reviewing Construction Job Costing and look up Alaskan cruises, in time for the whales, the aurora borealis, when I turn 26 next year. Just in time then.

It's getting windier and I haven't really moved much. I know, technically, yes I have. Actually, I move all the time. At work, with family, with doggie, I'm always on my feet. There's always something to do. If I'm not cooking, I'm cleaning. Or washing dishes. Or mowing, washing dishes again, they always pile up. Or cooking something else that my father can actually eat. Or driving him out to the cheap gas station, where even before he speaks his broken English, the nice ladies know what he's looking for. Or spending half my Sundays chaffeuring him everywhere, gas in the tank. Or calling a friend while doing some of it, so I'm not alone.

Sometimes, I can feel so small and lost in the daily little things. My life has just begun here in Houston haha. Maybe the big difference now is that my time isn't my own anymore. I could afford that luxury to my heart's content in Ohio. Of course, I miss that. 

In Houston, I barely catch my breath. I'm just glad I have great friends in town who feel like a hug, when I see them. When I can afford to. 

My sweet friends from Ohio check in on me. Austin, Jana, Elizabeth, even Gina  Houser haha. They are so, so sweet, and appreciate that there are things I do have now. I won't take for granted family ever again. It's been almost 2 months back home, and it's been wholesome. But...it's not sustainable to be in this mindset that I can continue to please everyone, every second of the day. 

To please my Mom best I can, even as her sum of worries infects me. I do my best to cheer her on. She's so kind and there are things she doesn't know and none of it is her fault. I just, can only sit there and take so much of a monologue of bad news for an hour. Before I hear it as my own voice after.

I can only drive my father around so much. If he could have it, he'd happily absorb every minute and every dollar out of my pocket to take him to the far West edges of Houston and buy him all the spontaneous things he could get. Any refusal to any small trip, he holds onto like a grudge, even as he looks solidly back at my exhausted face. Taking no account of. 

My boss is very kind. He told me kindly as I expressed how quickly I'm trying to catch up about the construction business. He quickly responded, "This isn't a race. This is a marathon. Take your time. You will learn in time. Everything will be okay."

I smiled back at him across our table at Schlotzky's. Which I love. One of my new favorite restaurants. THEIR DRINK OPTIONS ARE LIMITNESS, I FEEL LIKE ROYALTY AFRONT THEIR DRINK MACHINE. THERE'S EVEN BLUEBERRY DR. PEPPER?!?!!? IDKKKK

Being back in Houston, has felt like a sprint every day. I barely catch my breath at the end of it. I think of myself last. I can barely breathe. There are so many fires, every second of the day. There are so many hurricanes we are trying to prepare for, and the last thing I can even think of is myself. I am just reactive. I'm just trying to clear up the sink. 

I'm just trying to calm my mother's panic on the phone. I'm just trying to cajole my father that I can only take him to Walmart and the gas station, and can't bring him to any other places beyond that. I'm just trying to tidy up my room because I've forgotten to. I get home, and I barely have the energy to cook or exercise. My shoulders. My neck, my eyes. They're all sore. I'm just trying to make sure everyone has what they want. I just want you to have what you want. I spend so much of my time there, I forget what I want. And when I remember a sliver of what I had even wanted originally, it leaves me again. Are my dreams so fragile? Such fair-weather friends, these dreams of mine?

My face has this constant optimistic look on it all the time, because that's all I can be. The hurricanes will come, and I can barely clear out the tiny wildfires. My poor mum, when I was away and light about life in Ohio. 

Of course you lose your color in times like these. Or your hair, haha. Or my hair.

I like to do this thing at night, when I feel so small and the world is so quiet at 3 AM. I hug myself gently and whisper in my head, my own voice as if it were someone else's, "you are doing your very best. you are a very good bean."

That's all I'm trying to be lately. Trying to be a very good bean.

No one comforts you at the end of a difficult day. No one will recognize your efforts. I used to wait around for that. I used to want to be comforted by any voice at the end of the day. I used to want so badly, a pat on the back for a good job, an acknowledgement from someone I had probably already put on a pedestal, a supervisor, a boss haha. That would light me the heck up.

Now... well, lately, I just want to turn off my little bed lamp, wear a cute pajama set, and feel this absolute feeling, a light beam warm on the top of my head kind of feeling. I play my day back like a movie sometimes, with mistakes and the "OH, NGOC!"s and all, I admit in the dark: "you're all you have. and you made it. good job, little bean."

So today, like any day, like every day, is one of those days. These will be my forever days. This is what it means to be a Ngoc. Ngoc, the eldest daughter bean.

I hope I don't only live a day out to where it feels like I just have to make it to the end of it, in time to catch the purple in a sunset. I hope I don't run every second of each one either. I hope I live in a way that I have stamina for the many years to come, enough stamina for the great grandkids to have too. 

I don't want life to feel like a race or a marathon. 

I just want it to be a cruise, on the ocean, where dolphins join along, whales are seen blowing bubbles at night, every night, albatross land on and off the tip of my head, and the aurora borealis is just so near. Perhaps it's damn well above my head right now, kind of feeling. Lol. Bless.

You. Lots. rawr rawr

Episode 105: I don't want to waste breath

Warning: Hard read. Violence. Bad thoughts.

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I didn't foresee running out of the house today. On the most peaceful, unsuspecting Sunday. But maybe I should have known. That's how things are here. I knew this when I came back. Sundays are when the worst things happen. But hey, I'll be back shortly, in a week or two. Things cool off. Back when things cooled off, and I didn't have a car, it was harder then.

This time, I can run whenever I want. And I know exactly where to this time.

All I know is I do my best. I always do my best. I will tell it like it is. I'll leave the worst details out. This blog was never intended to be a sad brain dump, and never will be. 

So for all purposes, I will stick to the facts best I can. Heck, I've even got cute Korean music in the background.

Dad likes to be driven out to Asiantown on Sunday mornings for the weekly South Vietnamese veterans flag-raising ceremony. He meets old friends. His name is mentioned on the microphone. He grins bigger. He sits with a cigarette and a makeshift walking cane, when I pushed him to use my rainbow umbrella as a cane for now. He always forgets his cane, and by extension, I do too. :(

For the full 2 hours, I find shade to sit in. I call a friend or two. I start processing a couple post cards. I buy tasty Viet snacks to bring home. I help the others set up the flags. I chat with people on the edges of the events. A friend of my dad's recognizes me, and implores me to take 2 of his homegrown squashes, out of his plastic bag. Another man knows I'm Loc's daughter.

Loc, the same guy who has several police reports under his name for starting fights in the past few years. 

In a dream 3 months ago, my grandmother directly communicated with my mother, "He is a car without brakes." And like a wisp, she left. I can imagine she feels like a warm person. I hope my grandmother is a warm person, because most of her children suck. Egotistical. Comparative. Bad gossips. Old randown shows. Anyways. T__T

The same words, "a car without brakes", I would repeat to myself so I don't react in any way. I could just keep things at teeth level. Not a facial expression. Just teeth grinding together inside. I must have done this enough times that 2 dentists recommended a night guard. I remind myself these very words whenever he shows me the first signs of resentment. Whenever he stirs my stomach with cruel words. About anyone I know. About myself. That's where it lightly starts, before he claims I must hate him for not taking him to the highly popular dimsum place after the 2-hour flag raising ceremony, and when he does this while I'm driving us at 65 mph on 59-S, he self-escalates.

A fist to the window. A struggle with the door to jump out. Or three words, "Drop me off."

It's funny because, once, I so desperately wanted to be torn open by the highway. I forget why now, but I was factually 15. In the passenger's seat. I wanted to rip open his truck door, roll out in one motion, and be so scraped up by the concrete, so scraped up that people can see the uneven open, meaty gashes. There wouldn't even be skin left. I wanted to look like a nightmare. Be living proof that he can't look away from, how cruel he is. Scars that prove it.

But I know deep down, he'd just scoff. And make some hearty response at my torn up body, how fucking stupid I am.

If I hadn't gone to Smith and met wonderful, sweet people. If I hadn't gone to DeBakey HS and met sweet folks there too. If I hadn't been so loved in Ohio, or wherever else -- I'm sure I wouldn't be as stable as I did today.

I really was there today, waiting for my Dad patiently. Conversing. Being a part of. I never rushed him, unlike the way he used to. I never rushed him today.

When he was ready, I was ready. I bought him banh tet with the pork filling. I bought myself a banh bao. "Let's eat dim sum," he said.

"Let's." 

"That place we went to last time."

"No, that place is too crowded. I know a better place with less people. A crowd gives me a headache."

"Okay," he agreed.

So we get there in the parking lot. He gives it one glance. "I don't like this view. You're bringing me to a Chinese place. I'm not eating here."

"But it's really good. And we've been here before."

"I don't want it. You can go in but I'll stay in the car." Things were calm.

"Then we're leaving," I say in disbelief. Pulling out of the plaza and driving straight home. I had a long morning so I took a nap.

I woke up to my Mum storming my room in tears.

"He's threatening to burn the house down. I've been trying to cook but I've been shaking, Ngoc. He said he's poured a tank of gasoline in the garage. He's going to burn this house down. Did you not take him out to lunch today, Ngoc??"

What the heck.

My mother was panicking, and angry and sad and shivering. God, a ghost would make her shake that way, but he makes her shake harder. And fucking hell. All of this started from him not wanting to eat at a place that didn't fit him. I truly couldn't deal with that stupid dim sum place he wanted, with the 30 minute wait. I'd already done lots in the heat that morning. God, I was so tired. We had driven home peacefully. Nothing happened in the car. 

"What kind of daughter doesn't take her father out to eat?" he would last ask me.

"What kind of daughter spends all of her Sunday morning and noon to take her father out?" I retorted.

It really all started when he didn't get his way, on one thing. On one tiny stupid thing, related to his fucking cravings. Related to his mouth. 

Everything starts at his mouth. Or maybe his sick brain. Bad thoughts make bad actions. Good thoughts make good actions, I learned, at my last Wednesday meditation.

That's the thing with my Dad. 

You can pour every good thing into him, go out of your way all FUCKING DAY FOR HIM. 

All fucking day. You can run yourself ragged doing every good thing for him, doing nothing for yourself. Maybe he finds you resting for 5 minutes on your butt and he'd find something else you can do for him. It's never fucking enough. It's never fucking ever, ever enough. Every second of your life is his. 

And if you do one thing, or say one thing, or not do one thing, or not say one thing that he wanted, he'll cling onto that one thing like a broken clock. 2:09 PM every second of the day.

Everything he wants he gets, or it's a living hell for everyone else. The threat of losing our lives. All the time.

My mother is shaking from the threat of the gasoline tank somewhere she can't see. "Maybe he's really poured already. I got to find it." I stop her. 

She was shaking and I held her close. I patted her hair and that's all I saw, this small little lady who's tried to balance everything. Every living threat still a wound on her body, all from one man. 

"We have to leave, right now," I tell her. "He can burn this house down if he wants to. If he wants a divorce, let's."

I can't believe we're still here, afraid of losing our lives, afraid of losing our house, our cars, important personal documents in a fire. That he made, because I didn't please him with my dim sum place choice.

Fuck, it's a famous dim sum place. It just happens to not be crowded. What the actual fuck.

"A car without brakes."

A fire doesn't have brakes either.

I used to see red whenever he took things this far. I remember throwing lots of things at the ground behind him, but never at him. 

I remember being so angry at how easily he treats us, like food in the fridge that could spoil at any time. Ready to be tossed out. Our lives are there to please him.

To feed him. To take him out to wherever he wants. He never asks how we are. Truly, a second of a break is a second he could have. A meal that we made, he would leave nothing left for anyone else. It's all his. If he sees it, he's not sharing. 

You can pour every good intention to being a part of his life, but it's all absorbed, like a bank after I'm dead.

It is a meaningless life, I feel, loving a black hole like him. Any step out of line, and his tail wraps around me, biting at every slight thing he remembers I did today or years ago. 

But I can't run away from how I feel. Of course, I love him. 

But my poor mother. He is a blackhole she can't escape.

"Grandma wasn't around to teach you anything. You didn't have a father, Mom, and yet, still, you're so patient, so kind, so sweet, so true to someone who doesn't deserve it. No one raised you Mom, you raised yourself and god, you are so beautiful. You are such a gem. You are such a gem. I want to protect you. Let's please leave. Let's leave and let's go somewhere we can sleep without fear. Please. Mom."

And so we do. 

And I'm driving. I'm running away.

It's not like the time I ran away when I was 12 and I disappeared at a park. My mother drove over, crying when she found me on a swing. 

We ran away back in July again, when he threatened to kill himself in front of my sister and I with his shotgun, because I didn't have the fucking energy left to drive him out to Asiantown, when he wanted to go. He really did bring out his shotgun. We pulled out of the driveway just in time.

Yen ran away again, on her own, when he forgot to turn off the fire in our house and we must have all had carbon monoxide poisoning. Because dang, my brain and heart felt so weird then. 

There are so many wounds in my family, you know? So many wounds on my sweet, poor mother. So many wounds on Yen. Poor fucking Yen, who has panic attacks whenever there's a raised voice. She was born in the sweetest way, so giving and loving and believing and for someone to take all of that from her. 

I can never forgive you for doing that to her. 

I can never forgive you for threatening our lives, all of our life, for the slightest thing. 

I can never forgive you for hurting Mum over and over again in all the ways you can cut a woman down to a smaller part than before. You fucking did that to her.

I can never forgive you for all the gashes I have but can't see on myself, until I'm in some sweet man's arms and can't believe it when he tells me he cares about me or if his mood changes even slightly, I almost believe it's all my fault. I almost believe it. I live on a precipice, a cliff along the angry ocean all the time, with my friendships. I fear I'll lose anyone at any second if I say or do something wrong. 

I'm afraid of being the reason I lose everything in a second. But we all know that's a lie now.

I can't lose something that didn't want to be there in the first place.

So that's how I've held everything. That's how I've seen the world.

So I've ran away tonight. In my own car. I'll be back. 

I know I'll be back. Give it a week. I'll be back, taking out his trash, digging out all the wrong things he put into the recycling bin into the right trash bin. I'll be back to mow his lawn.

In a week, I could talk to him again. Pretend like he didn't just want to kill us all again. 

So that's what I'm coming back to. I do have a night guard now. That helps. 

I'm just a really little bean tonight and Monday is tomorrow and I have to go to work and pretend nothing like this happened. It's just us and everything else. Tonight, I truly feel so small you can't possibly cut me down further.

How can I let myself feel this way? When none of it is my fault? How can I, with 25 years of this exact experience, still cry over this? It's not like it hasn't happened before. It's not like it won't happen again.

It'll happen again. And I'll be fine again after. 

I'm afraid, I really am, of losing everything I have in a fire. I don't want to die in a fire either caused by a mad man.

My mom doesn't deserve it. Welp.

So we ran tonight, and when he saw my packed suitcase, he realized too late how much I meant that, "I really see you for what you are, Dad. A pit of trying to fulfill his every need, his every happiness, his every craving. You are the main character in your story and until you're happy and satiated, no one else can take care of anything else but you first. You must have everything you want or you'd threaten to burn our house down. Well then, you'll certainly live a very long life doing that, focused on filling every craving you have. Fill up that mouth. I can't believe you're your Dad's son and your Mom's son, because you have not an ounce of any kindness and thoughtfulness and selflessness that you claimed they must have had."

I didn't tell him I was leaving. I just left. I don't want to waste breath.

Episode 104: Dramathic

100 years are vanishing like snakes. 

    I place my hand on the cool car glass and then, I'm there, to the time when time didn't vanish.

100 years are vibrating through a hot coil. A circular shape heating the universe or someone's car.

    But it is a mere 100 years. I won't even make it to know what's beyond

    a pond or a lake. 

100 years and my name will be deleted from all financial institutions. The banks will swallow my debts.

    "What's left over, is absorbed?" I asked the teller. He nods, "Yes, any amount over what you paid today will go to your next bill." 

    I look down at the ground. "I see."

    I'm being dramatic haha. I'm being dramaticccccc.

    Dramathicc.

    I'm turning 25 soon and I'M BEING DRAMATHICCC HELPPP.

    I feel it you know? Time slipping?!

    It's just 25, boo hoo, but dang what the heck. Where has the time gone ever since, well, ever since?!

    EVER?!

    I'm not panicking, I'm simply feeling it all run like sand. Some ice engineer, idk what that is, told me ice is the best insulator. Well fuck that, because I feel like I'm just CONDUCTING. Heat, all the damn time.

    Heat, the moment I got home. The moment I saw that evening skyline, my heart leaped. And I've been running. I've been running my Subaru ragged, all across Houston every day, at the whim of family and needs ever since I got back from Ohio. My poor Bean. That's her racially insensitive name because she's green and kinda a smaller SUV, so Bean felt right. I'm not right too often, so I take pride in this. And also, my favorite word, haha.

Anyways, I got what I wanted, coming home right when I caught momentum. I got my family back. Now, my Sundays aren't filled with a long silence between making the bed and making a quiet breakfast. Now, my Sundays, heck all my mornings, have a thud at my door, from my dog's snout hitting it hard to open it. And once Lucky makes it through, he goes for my toes, nibbles, and licks, and paws on the bed. I don't have a choice and in mere seconds, I am out of bed. I start my day sooo quick. Not checking my phone. Just dog. Oh, Lucky. And honestly, look at me still being scared of being in my own head too long, haha. >-<

    Ohio seems like a story that happened to somebody else. Which is the silliest damn thing. Isn't it? Am I a newborn with no sense of object permanence? Just because I'm not in Ohio doesn't mean Ohio doesn't exist. T__T But ohhhh, does Ohio exist. Ohio is fucking real. 

    It was all, so so so real. 

    Don't deny it, Ngoc.

    It's Sunday night, in my childhood room again. Yes. I'm going to re-decorate this. And YES, of course, I'm going to add in my signature Christmas lights. And yes, I'll make sure all my dresses are color-coded.

    25. What does that even mean?! What did 24 even mean!?

    I want to take bigger risks this time around. I want to find my people. I want to make tons of new friends in Houston this time around. Slowburn, so be it. I did it at Smith. I did it in Ohio. I can do it again. I want to find my Sangha in Houston. The first time around, when I borrowed my family's car and snooped around like a little biatch -- THAT is a story that happened to somebody else, because poor me, poor thing, was a very tiny miss bean. Now, I'm a bigger miss bean. 

    BIGGER. BIG. LARGE. YES.

    When Bean merged from I-10 to I-45 and hopped right into the city, that skyline, at the tail end of my road trip. Oh my god. That skyline. Is kinda crazy. That was when I knew, like a crossbow to my heart. A cupid KO shot. Dang it. Fuck. Houston is real. Houston is so, so real.

    This was the city I left for other dreams. This was the city I left, to do what I thought I could never do.

    This was the city I left, like a test I had to pass. No one told me to pass anything. Perhaps, in your eyes, I was a mad woman too stubborn to turn around. 70 mph on the highway. 80 mph in my heart, until I could figure out the next thing.

    I once cried in someone's car, feeling the weight of it all. The weight of a yes, that I stubbornly made happen. Stubborn like the dragon I was born as. Stubborn and silly and stupid and crazy and wrong. It was hard to explain and be vulnerable then and confess under the weight of a Houston night, "There's no other choice I have! There's no other choice! It doesn't make sense, that it's me, or you, or anyone, but there's no choice."

    Does that make it right? Looking back? Was Ohio right, in the end?

    There was never even a hurricane to ruin my life here, yet I left stubbornly. Only to come to Ohio and be afraid to open all personal mail. :I

    Even I can't believe it, but I drove the full 20 hours back home. I did! My little sister was my cold noodle passenger princess. Every stop from Ohio to Texas was for Korean food, the search for the best cold noodle. LMAO. LMAOOO. I know. T__T

    And you know what? The best cold noodle was in Columbus, Ohio. Of all the places. It was in Ohio.

    I joked last time that all roads lead to Ohio. I think I was onto something then.

    But fuck.

    25. How darling. What a darling number.

    I will look back one day and admit that I wish I was 25 and awkward and wrong all the dang time again (gosh, I'm always wrong, about everything), and spontaneous and always perking up when I heard the word "pistachio"-flavored anything and so so so wrong, again and again. Today, as I turn 25, the actual 25, I am bleeding glitter, like Taylor Swift's "Anti-Hero" MV. Exactly that.

    That effin' MV is how I actually feel, about all of this.

    And gosh, they're getting married!!!!!! TAYVIS IS REAL. End game with a man whose hand envelopes the entire wine glass and who actually is in awe of her and all the big words she uses. How fucking perfect. <3 GOSH. I just want her to be happy already. Can't we all be happy already?

    My life has spun into an unexpected pre-ending this August 2025.

    I'll have not one, but two jobs. Happening at the same time.

    I know. I am doing the crazy shit.

    And I'll attend Wednesday meditations like a little miss bean. I'll volunteer my time. I'll take care of Lucky and Dad and Mum. I'll call my friends. I'll write them letters and stamp them with my manatee stamps. I'll get my bad ankle to be a good ankle. I'll play soccer again. I'll do it all. I'll find time to even, like Claudia, who inspires me every single fucking day to be better, do better, my gosh she is such a beautiful creature inside and out, MY GOSH! That's MY FRIEND! MY FUCKING FRIEND OMG!!!!  I'll find time to even re-decorate and re-garden my beautiful little home. The very home I keep leaving, again and again. For college. For study abroad. For internships. For Ohio. 

    Hello home. 

    As I turn 25, maybe that's all that it is. I'm greeting my home peacefully. No one can take this third job from me.

    I promise to take care of the home I have. I promise to protect the home I have. And all the people and beautiful creatures that live in it, except for the rats and roaches. :I And of course, I promise to take good care of myself. 

    I promise to find people who uplift and inspire me. Who rejuvenate my energy, my spirit, my heart, and my ideas. I promise to never forget my dreams and what they mean. I promise to never forget how it feels to even work tangentially to policymaking. I promise to never forget how it feels to say the word, "Love."

    I love Love. I'll always love, Love. I love Love. So much.

    May I glance into every mirror and whisper and believe it at the same time that "wow, I am beautiful indeed."

    I'm going to escape into bed soon and read the dystopian, sad-ass Handmaid's Tale. 

    25, and wrong about everything.

    25 and dramathic.

August rawr rawr - goodbye Ohio

My goodbye ode to Ohio. :)

This is a voice memo from August 8th, with just 2 days left to pack and return to Houston, and the biggest scatter of things in my kitchen still. These were my final thoughts, then, as I strolled along my empty apartment and leaned long against that double sink, staring at my vine plant. My mind touched on everything that I ever cared about in Marietta.

In voice form. Ah. Click Here.

Such a long goodbye. Such a warm stay. A sweetness lingers still, today.

There are shapes that haunt me still and people I miss dearly, and there will always be a version of me that risks it all, all over again, just to prove myself right forever, for the second time.

That I can, and I will.

Pinkston

I'm not a Mom yet, but I imagine if I was, I'd be better with everyone else's kids than my own. My own wouldn't bother listening to me. They'd pull me into one of their long-winded arguments and know I'd end up saying yes anyways.

"Yes! Fine! I'm getting you Chick-Fil-A, dang it!"

I can hear us in the car now. The evening sky a dusty orange-rose, everything else blue. It would feel like deja vu, the same sky that a certain Michelle Pinkston and I drove under, somewhere in Vienna, WV, long ago, before I started my career and suddenly moved back to Houston. Before I really took care of their grandfather and truly lived it up in Houston. Before I fell in love with their Dad and became their Mom. And how could I say no to those chubby cheeks and chubby fists? 

I'm not even in that future, because tonight? Tonight, I rode along in Michelle Pinkston's car for a matinee showing of the Fantastic 4. She picked me up and dropped me home because yes, my car is still in the body shop. :( Now the movie was sooo good. Michelle has 2 grand-children and they are the cutest. They fight the way my little sister and I used to fight and just overhearing them, made me laugh hard. as. hell. It was too much of Yen and I.

The younger one, "Oh my god, did you step out there barefoot??"

The older one responded, "Yes."

"But there are so many diseases out there!"

The older one didn't hesitate, "YOU'RE a disease."

"Oh!"

And I laughed so, so hard in the front seat. Oh. My. Gosh, repeating softly as if I had been the one to say it, "you're a disease..." T___T

How did Yen and I ever mellow out to who we are today, because she and I were too much back then. We fought all the time, talked all the time. We were too much. All we wanted was to be good in front of strangers, but in private, I was a mean older sister too. T__T It made me adore Yen even more, for dealing with me and all my moods. For being persistent and persistently warm. >-< And always wanting to braid my hair ahh.

Sigh. Oh gosh. 

Anyways, this isn't really an episode. It won't be. It's just a vibe, that I have tonight.

Michelle is soft-spoken, incredibly patient. Incredibly kind woman, who sincerely spends lots of lovely money on her grandchildren and her kids. She isn't fully appreciated, but she is a stellar grandmother. Unable to say no to those darn grandkids and I get it. I'd have a hard time saying no to them too.

I just want a childhood to feel like a childhood, you know? Where everything feels easy, even when it's not. When your mother suddenly has an inspiration to buy clip-on jewelry from the 99 cent store when you're 6, so you can look all magical at a family's wedding, in the middle of the night, at 10 pm. 

I remember the late night drives back from Bellaire, with my Dad in the drivers' seat, no matter how drunk. Taking the wheel, and always convincing my mother that he's not too drunk, that in fact, the alcohol is making him even more alert. My little self believed all of it. 

I always felt safe, even with him drunk-driving. But he didn't lie. He never swerved, never sped up, never drove too slow when drunk. It was a perfect medium.

There's something so lovely being a passenger, not the driver haha, at night. That's when I feel like my mind's opened up. That's when I feel transported to that sweet time when everything still felt safe, when I felt like a small bean.

Perhaps that's why I always insist to my dates, even when yes, I do love to drive that I love being passenger princess. It reminds me of that time, when I didn't have to be big bean yet. When I could just hold onto an arm and curl up and make it home safe. Of course, I'm not going to trust just any nice guy. I want to trust the right one.

Tonight wasn't exactly that, because I prodded Michelle with questions. Prodded the little girls in the backseat enjoying their post-movie Chick-Fil-A. I kept their minds alive in the dark. 

"Can you hear us back there girls?" I asked.

"No, Grandma, can you speak louder? I want to hear about your car accidents too."

Awww. 

And so Michelle spoke about all the supernatural car accidents she's been in. Her body bore the brunt of 3 big ones. 

A supernatural one, included, where bumper-to-bumper traffic disappeared the moment her car started to spin 360 across 3 lanes. And yes, traffic disappeared at exactly that moment, and when she stopped spinning, her car stopped into a perfect parallel park alongside the highway. She hit no cars... at all. All the way down an incline. When she started pedaling, the traffic returned as if it had always been there, as if cars could disappear and come back. At exactly the moment you need them to. 

Gosh.

She was meant to live, but not just that. 

Michelle Pinkston is unconditionally loved by such great powers.

An unconditional love. A truly unconditional love so great, they had power of intervention.

I kept calling her a liar, just to make fun, but it was all serious what this story means to her.

I think we each have our own stories you know? The ones that remind us how loved we are. How seen we are, by the powers that be or by the ones we don't see but love us far too great.

The stories that remind us that we are not forgotten. We are important. Our life means absolutely everything. And so does our joy. She is so selfless, with abundant love in her body. And I always feel so seen. So confirmed that she would never judge me, would always think positively of me, and is a rock to all around her.

She is a pillar. And she is a person. And she is a Pinkston.

I prayed to her, in that car ride, sometime in the middle of it, that she make it out to Alaska one day. I wished that she could see the aurora borealis someday. I wished there was a gift she can gift herself to celebrate such a beautiful life with. As hard as I wished that I can swim alongside the whales one day, I wished quietly, that she sees Alaska.