day 9: someone you wish you could meet
this ones easy.
dear grandma:
im sorry i cant write this in japanese. not right now. because you know already, how much i would have liked to know you. and so im not really writing this for you. but im writing it for everyone else, to see what an amazing person you were.
born and raised in japan, in a fairly well off family. educated, beautiful, talented. and then the war. after the war, you met my grandfather, stationed in japan. am american. but not white. mexican. this wouldnt be easy.
you were disowned by your family for marrying a foreigner. you had my father in japan. you were married. you came back to the states when my father was barely born, and you were pregnant with uncle mark.
not even a decade in the states, with 4 sons, the illness. breast cancer, barely 30 years of age. this was the 50s, there wasnt any real good medicine. and unfortunately thats where your story ends. how lonely you must have been. but my family, the espinosas, they loved you like one of their own. they really did. i know because they tell me all the time. dear lisa, you sure do remind me of your grandma kiyoko. i remember hearing all the wonderful things about you, and then to be compared to you, was the most amazing feeling ive ever had.
you went against everything in the name of love. you were lonely, young, afraid, but determined to stay strong. you came to a strange country, with a man who wasnt guaranteed anything in this still white dominant nation. a man you had just met. and you were with child. english was challenge. and then you were given a deadline. i cant even imagine the kind of strength you had, that in all of the few pictures we have of you, you are always smiling. ALWAYS smiling, this huge, warm, calm smile. like you had faith that everyone would eventually work out.
well it did. even though after you left, it was really hard, especially for my dad. but you gave him the strength to push through it. i cannot even imagine the things my father had to go through. i cannot imagine, the kind of strength HE has. and he never showed it, he never showed that he lived, he grew up tough.
and that brings us to me. now that i go through it in detail, i know why i resemble you. because the ONLY thing we ever had between us was memories, and will power. you had incredible will, my father does. and now im getting there. to just be positive, know that its going to be okay, but that a long the way there will be frustrations. and its okay to be negative at times. because sometimes shit is just real deep in the ditches. but ultimately, as long as you are here, its going to be okay.
i want to be able to pass this kind of strength down to someone. but who? i dunno, maybe ill come across someone someday, that really needs me. ill be ready.
thank you grandma, for giving me this. all of what i have inside of me. it started with you. i am honored to be your grandaughter. and i really am sad we should never know each other. but i do know you. its me.
sincerely,
lisa
