endofsummer

favorite album as of late: Sufjan Stevens – “Illinois”
favorite tv-show: My Super Sweet 16 (I’m so excited for this season)
favorite color: Green
favorite type of tooth: Molar
favorite brand of dishwasher detergent: Palmolive
favorite brand of everything: Kirkland Signature
favorite strategy in connect four: to win

Greetings citizens. It’s been a very long time since I last talked with you all …. maybe too long. I have not disappeared from the edge of the earth as I’m sure most of you assumed. This post is long overdue ….. so lets get started.

Summer has come and passed quite quickly. I realized I mentioned that I was going to post a lot this summer (in my previous post), but a lot has come up unexpectedly, which may have set me back a bit. So I will try to recap all that has happened recently.

my grandmother:
My grandmother of 88 years was admitted to the Bayshore Medical Hospital on July 4th. She later passed away a few weeks later after suffering a stroke to the right side of her brain which caused her to enter into a state of coma. We had a funeral service a week after her passing, a funeral service in which my uncle and two cousins from Taiwan, after short notice, returned to attend. My uncle returned to Taiwan thereafter with my grandmother’s remains.

My grandmother lived a very content life. She was the mother of four wonderful children (2 boy and 2 girls) and was one of the most loving and caring people that I have ever met. I do not want to sound all sentimental, but she was honestly one of the greatest people to have lived …. at least in my mind. She serves as a reminder to me of all that is great in the world …. she will forever remind me (and I’m sure the rest of my family as well) of the importance of family and its everlasting quality ….. because family was all that she had, and that was all she needed.

Thinking back on the effect that my grandmother has had on me, I think of all the family gatherings that she was indirectly responsible for and I think of all the happiness that she was indirectly and directly responsible for. You see ….. if my grandmother had never made the trek over to America, there would be no excuse for my cousins to come over and visit. She basically was the glue to our family …. without her, I’m not sure what we would have done. We would all probably be very distant and not the close, operative family unit that we are now.

When I think of my grandmother, I think of the New York Yankees. You see …. my grandmother was the biggest Yankees fan. Without knowing any english, she could tell you the numbers of her favorite players and even tell you their opponent’s team name, well not their given team name, but rather the name she comes up for them in her mind.

When I think of my grandmother, I think of my freshman and sophmore years in high school. My aunt, who has taken care of my grandmother for almost all of her adult life, liked to take occassional, yet well-deserved vacations back to Taiwan. While away, my family would have to take care of my grandmother, which basically meant that I would have to heat up food for her after school every day and the such. We spent a lot of time together, time which I didn’t fully appreciate at the time, time which was spent mostly in silence, but most importantly, time together. I believe that our relationship transcended the language barrier that separated us …. we didn’t have to understand each other to enjoy our time together …..  being in each others presence was good enough for the both of us.

When I think of my grandmother, I think of her infectious laughter. Her radiance and laughter would light up the room everytime our family would gather together.

All sentiment aside, I felt that I needed to get this out there …. to maybe share with the world how great my grandmother really was. Rest in peace, grandma. Our thoughts are always with you.

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A little change of pace right now …..

In other news, I am now attending Rutgers University and I have to say that it has been going great so far. The first few days were a bit slow, but now I think everyone is kind of settling down into their element. I’m living in Mettler on College Ave so just give me a call and maybe we can do something.