Hsiung's are a very lonely people (1)

My dad was born in 1931 which makes him fucking old. 78, 79 if you count Chinese years, which no one ever does except for my dad to emphasize the mellowdramaticness of the whole thing.

He has a new girlfriend now — found out this past Thanksgiving. “Girlfriend” makes it sound like she’s in her early 30’s and that they met while she was caddying for her dad while he was on the driving range, but no — it’s actually the widow of a naval buddy of his, in her early 70’s. My mother knows who she is, but doesn’t know that he finalized the divorce specifically to be wit her.

Dad: Ernie, I want you to know that our personal information is in a safety deposit box at the Bank of America in Fremont.
Ernie: (At work, typing an e-mail) No prob, Dad. What’s going on?
Dad: I’m going to Brazil.
Ernie: What?
Dad: With lady-friend.
Ernie: What?
Dad: Argentina too. Maybe back in a month or two. [hangs up]

Ernie: (to co-workers) Hey, isn’t Nick going to Brazil for a couple of weeks?
Co-worker: Yeah, for Carnival. Why?

Then I imagine my almost-80 year old Taiwanese Military father — someone who I’ve never known as doing anything for enjoyment ever — someone I have never seen smile or laugh when I was eight to twenty five years old — wearing a goddamn white fedora and white linen pants while in group photos with Brazillian girls with fucking sea shells as pasties, and a part of me rolls my eyes at the audacity of that vision and 1% of me is gripped in horror — what if he actually DID that shit?

What if my dad, who I’ve known as the person to chi ku, or “eat bitterness,” with his unhappy marriage and 35 years of working as an Engineer and dealing with a mentally ill daughter that will be a burden on us for the rest of our life, officially just give up? Moved out, bought a condo, bought an SUV, got a new girlfriend, wrote off my sister and me, just gave the fuck up and said to himself “fuck all y’all, I’m going to salvage what little of my life left?” And what does it mean for me, who has approximately 5-40 years left in my life to put the pieces together for him?

A part of me is filled with an undescribable anger that doesn’t come out often until I sit here with a fever, mind left wandering to my own devices. A part of me is like, “Good for you. Run. Do what you got to do, you old bastard.”

Hsiung’s are a very lonely people.