When Food is the Only Narrative We Consume
Chinese culture can’t be made bite-sized for mass consumption.
Chinese culture can’t be made bite-sized for mass consumption.
This non-conformist approach to adulthood still sounds radical today.
According to people I met back home, my face didn’t match my voice.
I found it freeing: to accept—instead of fear—gravity, to savor that brief float before the fall.
I believe so strongly in the beauty and autonomy of body transformation, but I’m worried that will erase the small visible echoes of my (and my mother’s) history of survival.
I don’t want to write today. I don’t want to write about violence today. I don’t want to write about honor or duty or respect today.
A lesbian Chinese American painter, she defied definition, which is why I was so fascinated by her.
My mom’s cellphone rang, but there was nothing, no notification of any missed call. She said, “That was probably your dad’s ghost.”
Sometimes even just a minor taste of something brings old ghosts back to me.
“I can tell I love you because I want to give you a bite of whatever I’m eating.”
Merlin’s poetic prose is so visual in the writing that many parts reminded me of a graphic novel.
If the muffins had been good, we’d have eaten them and gone to bed. But the story of their catastrophic badness: that, we could forever savor.
The creative release felt familiar. The soreness, the tenderness, making up new words for a new reality.
We’ve listed the names we get called and the names we call ourselves. Some feel true. Others give us aches.
I spent a lot of time in my nook, tucked away and dreaming.
“I mean, the life of a child! What they see and what they hear, and what they choose not to discuss.”
How do you mourn someone who is still alive, who might as well be a stranger now?
I have forgotten how to speak two languages. But I have learned this one.