" title="Juliane Huang"> Juliane Huang

Photo Essay on Happiness, Color, Joy, and Beauty

“I love you and I am trying my best.”

…

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“I am flying back to Taiwan tomorrow afternoon. Uncle told me that Grandpa is not doing good and the doctor now gives him around 1-2 weeks to live.  Although we had known it coming for two years, it is still hard to take it. I am sad.”

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I open up my email searching for something else when I find the message from my mother.  I read it once quickly, then close the window.

I feel suddenly that my understanding of the world has greatly shifted.  All that I have gingerly and painstakingly procured is flaking apart, with no solid base underneath.

Last August:

I called Taiwan last night to speak to my grandfather. “Everything’s great!” he says.  “Tell me if you need money!  I will give it to you!”  I feel like his laugh is a little too loud.  “You are welcome here, anytime you want to visit!” he nearly shouts into the receiver. When my mom gets on the phone, I ask how he’s doing.  I say he sounds pretty good. “Of course he sounds good over the phone.  He always does that.” “At least he has the energy to pretend.” The prognosis is end of November.  I tell my mom I will be back in October. “Yes,” she agrees. “It’s a good idea to come back while he can still enjoy your company.” When I was living in Taiwan, I would visit him on the weekends.  He liked having his grandchildren around, and would hand over his favorite recliner and the TV remote for the days I stayed.  For my 24th birthday, I traveled to Szechuan and forgot to tell him.  He was in a panic trying to find me to wish me a happy birthday.  I had to apologize when I got back; he wasn’t very happy with me.

Last week:

“I know it sounds ridiculous,” I say as I book my ticket, “but I feel like he’ll be really mad if I don’t fly back for his funeral.”

This week:

A large and intermittent sadness sits heavily on top of my chest.  I rub my sternum miserably.  I miss him.

Visiting A Fortune Teller, In Taiwan

[From the archives: 2006.11.17]

A day off work landed me in DanShui with the beautiful Misa.
(note: Something about the looks of these Japanese-Chinese women tends to veer off course and end up lost in the territory of the exquisite.  Seriously.  Misa was turning heads.)

We only go because I am two snaps away from phenomenal nagging.  I want to get my fortune told and according to Misa, the lady in DanShui is the one and only clairvoyant to see.  And, it’s cheap as hell.  So we down our coffees and hop on the next northbound subway.  It’s a beautiful day out.

“Do you want your palms read or a tarot reading?  Combined it’s 400NT. The palms are 100NT, but the card reading will answer the questions you have.”

I have no looming questions at present.  Since I am mostly coming to the fortune teller for entertainment value, I choose to have my palms read.  She takes my left hand first, then my right, looks at the lines, looks at the back, and starts to rubbing them between her hands while she speaks.  From my inclinations, to my weaknesses, to my failed relationships, the woman basically digs around my 23 years, pulling out any junk that strikes her fancy.

“You are surrounded by good people.  Whenever you need help, someone always shows up to help you.  You have very good fortune.”

It’s true; I am very lucky to have the people I have in my life.

“You will not stay rooted in one place.  You will fly from country to country and perhaps you prefer it that way.”

I have conflicted feelings about this.

“You give too much in relationships.  You need to learn how to hold back.”

On this topic she stops at the edge of detail.  Reading the lines on my hands, the lines on my face, the look in my eyes, she knows what I know.  And she stops talking for my sake.

[I wonder what she would say to me now.]

When I Am 37

Lately I’ve been reading blogs by women at least ten years older than I.  Married with children women.  Single sexual escapades women.  Career women.  And it’s got me thinking about my life now and how different it is going to look a decade into the future.

Ten years ago, I was an apathetic teenager ready to move out of the house.  Ten years from now, who will I be?

And though that feels really far away, I am sure it’ll arrive faster than I anticipate.  “There” can quickly become “here” when we don’t pay attention.

So I pay attention.

I record my thoughts.

I constantly refer to my calendar.

I feel my presence in my present.

I drink a lot of coffee.

I draw blood.

I analyze test scoring strategies.

I pay rent on time.

I fly almost every month.

I bite.

I haven’t had a one-night stand in ages.

I don’t call my parents.

I get tired of being a gender and ethnic minority.

I am looking forward to the next ten years.

When It Hurts

I crawl into bed without changing.  I’m too tired and sick and achy and miserable to be bothered to do much else.

“I have food poisoning,” I whimper to the empty half of the mattress next to me.

My body’s never been one with a high tolerance for suffering; my physiological reactions are simply too strong to let things go, and I’ve the acute disadvantage of enduring their results.

When I was little, I’d constantly forget to eat.  I’d run around for hours, exhausting my energy supply, until the minute my hunger pains struck.  Like a paper house of cards, I’d collapse wherever I was, hands on my stomach and a whimper creeping out the sides of my mouth.

My mother had seen it so many times she was no longer amused.

“Get up,” she’d command.  “That means your hungry.”  Later in life, I learned how not to let it get this far, though I still wouldn’t consider myself finely in tune with what my body tries to tell me.

I remember last year, I thought I felt calm as I defended myself when my uncle told me my life in its current stages was not worth living.  It wasn’t until I reached over to pick up the chopsticks I had put down that I noticed I was visibly shaking.  After a bite of food, I realized I had no appetite.

This week, I rode the waves of nausea and stomach pains for hours before finally forcing myself out of denial and into the bathroom to vomit.  I was hoping I didn’t really have food poisoning.

I suppose I’ll always think I can endure more than I can endure.