Story of my Life

Part 1

Every time I sit back and think about my life, and everything that's happened to lead up to this point, I honestly begin to wonder how in the hell I'm alive. Alive and not in a psych warrd or suicide watch. Now, I'm not saying that I've had the hardest life, because God knows that's not true, but it hasn't exactly been the easiest. Let me explain.

I was born on the fifteenth of May in Albany, Georgia. My mom was half Brazilian American and half Hawaiian and my dad was Japanese, so yeah, if you guessed that my dad was a part of the military, you are correct. He was a sergeant in the army when I was born and my mom used to be a dance instructor before she hit her third trimester and became a housewife.

I don't really remember too much, about my baby days, but I do remember being a hopeless daddy's girl. According to my aunt Madeline, my mom got diagnosed with postpartum depression shortly after I was born. I do remember feeling really neglected and lonely when I was little, spending most of my day sitting and crying in my playpen while my mom did whatever she used tovdo. All the fun always seemed to start whenever my daddy came home for the day, when he'd pick me up and bathe me and play hide and seek together before he'd make dinner.

I don't really hate my mom, but she was never as fun as my dad. It wasn't her fault, since she was sick all the time and she tried her best, but one of my earliest eidetic memory of her or in my childhood, period, was when I almost drowned in the bathtub when she was arguing with my aunt Kiko about some baby clothes that she'd sent over.

 I remember that I was two, at the time, since I was trying to show my mom that I knew the letter s that was on the shampoo bottle( I learned my letters and how to read a little bit early). Anyways, I was in the tub, looking at the shampoo while the bath was running when my aunt came to deliver some clothes. My mom always hated my aunt Kiko, I guess they had some sort of fight before I was born, but the fact that my aunt was trying to "give charity" really pissed my mom off, that day.

While they were fighting in the living room, I remember that i was starting to get scared, since the water was higher than I was used to. I tried crawling out of the tub, but I was too short, so I tried to stand up, and I slipped and went under the water that was overflowing from the tub, at this point. I tried to scream loud enough for either my mom or kiko to hear me in the other room, but water flooded into my mouth and lungs.I tried to cough and sputter the water out, but the more frantic I got, the more water seemed to gush in and choke me.

 That ordeal seemed to go on for what felt like forever, but probably wasn't that long, since i was still conscious when my mom came and snatched me out of the water. She dried ne  off and sang to me until I calmed down and then gave me some icecream. My aunt told my dad what happened when I came home, and I don't know exactly what happened then, since I was a toddler at the time, but after that, I got to stay with puna Katherine ( my mom's mom) for a while after that.

Spending time in Kahului was a lot of fun for me when I was little. It seemed so different to me than when I was living in Albany. The plane ride was fun, for me, staring at clouds, and what child doesn't like visiting their grandparent? Besides, we went to the beach almost everyday and the days that we didn't go, I remember coloring, and practicing my letters and staring at the hills and mountains out of puna Katherine's windows.

Another thing that used to thrill me was that there were people, specifically children, in Hawaii that looked like my dad! I was only just turning three years old from Albany , Georgia, at the time, so the only other Asians I'd ever seen in my life up until then were my dad, Kiko, and the kids from Dragon Tales. I used to try and play with the other Asian children, but I was either too young or didn't speak their languages some of the Japanese kids I understood, because of my dad, but it wasn't enough to join their ranks.

I also learned how to spell my entire name by myself, while I was staying at my grandmother's, and I was so excited. I remember writing it as much as I could to make sure that I didn't forget it; my parents had been working with me on my letters and numbers, and such, and I wanted to surprise them when that came back for me. Then I made a mistake.

I accidentally wrote part of my name on the wall. My grandmother spanked me with her wooden spatula and madevme sit in a corner. It hurt lots, and that was the first time that I'd ever been hit, before, so I sulked. After a couple minutes, I felt better, though, but then my parents came. I was so shocked to see them there, in Hawaii, that I thought puns Katherine had gotten so angry that she never wanted to see me again and wanted to send me home.

remember my mom picking me up and asking what was wrong, so I told her what happened and she laughed. Apparently, they didn't know that I had written on the wall and my grandma didn't hate me, but it was just my time to come back home, plain and simple. My parents were both thrilled that I had written my name so many times, but the first thing that my dad said when he held me was " why'd you let my child get so dark?" I didn't know why, but I felt insulted when he asked my grandma that; it was the first time that I was upset with my dad.

After my parents, I stayed in Hawaii for two more days before returning back to the mainland with them. Everything was pretty normal, after that, but then my mom started going back to work and my dad started to do lots of paperwork whenever he came home from work instead of played or read books with me. When I got older, I learned that he was trying to leave the army, but that didn't go well. Before his paperwork finished pending for approval, 9/11 happened.