Drawer Dollar

I couldn’t have been older than 6. We lived in a duplex in Glen Ellyn. It was the first home I remembered living in. My parents moved from Seattle to Kenosha to finally a suburb outside of Chicago. I still remember the first day I went to school and my father dropped me off at the bus stop.

My father told me stories of how when he was young, his brothers and him had very few possessions. He grew up extremely poor and had a small dresser he shared with his brothers. They each had one drawer for their special belongings. I don’t remember what my father kept in his: diaries, makeshift toys, or money. He told me he was so poor growing up he would gather the pits of peaches to use as toys and he would unravel cigarette butts for their paper. Even as a child I could understand how poor he once was and how I wasn’t as poor as he was as a child.

He asked me to place a few of my things into a drawer. I didn’t really have much, I didn’t collect anything from outside like rocks or stamps or coins and my father had yet to fill my drawer with teenage things like he did with pens and trinkets later in my life.

The only thing I remember possessing was a $1 bill. My mother or father must have given it to me to teach me to save or to treat me for candy. I stored this dollar carefully in my drawer.

One evening my parents were arguing. I heard them yelling about “qian,” the Chinese word for money. I listened from another room, scared of the situation. I had never seen my parents angry at each other. Why were they so upset? I thought they could work through anything together.

They continued to argue and I ran to my drawer. I didn’t want my parents to argue about money so I grabbed the only money I had and ran back to the other room. I must’ve ran to my mother for a hug and cried out she could have my money. My parents saw the dollar in my hands and laughed. They told me not to worry and to save my dollar. I was so sad I could not help.

The next day I walked to the corner store across the street. I took my dollar and looked for Wrigley’s Double Mint gum. It was 25c and I knew my father enjoyed them. I bought one pack of gum and excitedly ran home. I gave my father my gift and he smiled at me. He thanked me and told me not to worry.

Later in my life, I would be hit by a car and receive a decent amount of settlement money. My parents would ask me for a large loan and I would accept without question. They were able to pay me back, but I wasn’t really concerned on how or when and I don’t remember the details. All’s I know is they never fought about money after that. My father’s business stabilized and the arguments died down. He was right, I shouldn’t worry.

Bad Dating Stories in California

I was ecstatic to move to California for a number of reasons. One of them was for the women. Dating was tough for me in Chicago and I found the most success dating Asian women. I knew California had a strong Asian foundation and with a new dating pool of women to select from, my luck would come in no time.

At first, I did experience a new pool of women to select from, but my quality of dates was not very good. A couple of my matches did not match their pictures or used somewhat deceiving photos, or the girls were dull and uninteresting. The most upsetting one was with a girl who could not stop texting during our drive or dinner. She was insistent upon going to Universal Studios as well, something I was not interested in. She was polite enough to buy me lunch, as she offered to take me out as my birthday gift. That was our second date and I never saw her again. Thinking back, I gave her a second chance because my luck with dates was so bad, I couldn’t turn down a lunch date with a girl. Now I know better.

A confusing girl I went on a few lunch dates with was obsessed with Uni, the Japanese name for sea urchin. She was a young working professional who met for for three or so lunch dates. She was very strange, as she never engaged in any conversation beyond food. I remember listening to her talk and talk, then suddenly I asked her, “What are looking for from your dates? Why are you dating?” She looked puzzled and said, “That’s really deep,” before carrying on about the food. She made a big deal about how she chose this placed based on their delivery route, getting the best and freshest fish. I tried to order a bowl of udon, a comfort food of mine, and she told me we should go to a different restaurant to get noodles and that I should get what she’s having. I paid for another date afterwards. What a waste of time.

Some girls took artsy photos of themselves or had weird angles. I wasn’t getting a lot of matches and I found these types of girls were more likely to match with me. Turns out, if you don’t have a normal good looking photo of yourself, you’re probably not that good looking. I tried overlooking the discrepancies between her profile and her self, but it was difficult in the nicest sushi restaurant in town. To my left and to my right were guys on dates with beautiful girls. I realized if my peripherals were more attractive than my focus, I was in a lost battle. I never saw her again.

I took a lot of lessons I learned from these girls and applied them to my dating profile. I was way more mysterious and aloof, I took much better pictures of myself, which required the aid of friends and the strategic use of backdrops, and I focused on my life experiences and charisma over “connecting” or being too similar to my date. One thing I had mistaken in Chicago was believing that my dating pool or my environment were holding me back. But really it was myself with my lack of experience, my lack of worldliness, and my lack of status. As I grew into myself and became more confident, my luck with girls came very naturally. It sounds cliché to say this because I wished for this confidence when I was 18. But as a young male adult, we don’t have any experience, worldliness, status, charisma, strength… it goes on.

I started getting more and more dates. Some were good, some were not. I learned a lot about women and how they saw men. I find that with just a little bit of sexual trust, women will tell you everything they think about men whether they consciously or subconsciously understand it themselves. Some women gave me chances based on my charisma, some based on my height and race, some on the pictures I had. Many rejected a second date with me because of laundry list of reasons: from status, to lifestyle, to income, to appearance, to my charisma, and more. I went on a date with a cardiac surgeon who spent her free time working on a board of health directors. She said it was hard to find tall Chinese men. I tried to play up my humor and my personal character. She asked if I spoke Chinese, so I joked and told her, “Only enough to disappoint my grandmother.” She looked disappointed. I tried to laugh about it and I asked her. She said yes without interest. I playfully asked, “Mandarin or Cantonese?” She said both. I glowed with excitement and said that’s amazing. She said, “No, it’s easy.” She did not want to be friends.

I went on a date with a girl who wore a sports suit and a large fake watch. She was the manager of her optometry store and worked a couple hustles on the side. She wasn’t my usual type, but I thought why not, it could be interesting. She controlled most of the conversation and asked a lot about my job and status. I did my best to match her energy and ask her the same questions back. I was interested in her position because I was learning managing as well, from an independent and remote type of work environment. My inexperience showed with the questions I had. Our chemistry had subdued pretty quickly and our meal had yet to come. I attempted to transition the conversation to a more friendly and professional tone. I asked her about dating in general and adulthood in general. She was quite open minded. She spoke about her dating experience and how it was difficult for her to date as well. I asked if she wanted to see each other more and she firmly declined. It felt like a bad interview.

Two dates in with a different girl and I had decided in the back of my mind that we should probably only be friends, I wasn’t very attracted to this woman. She had started taking a fond liking to me for my conversation and problem solving. She had difficulty changing her sleep schedule, which was something I had a lot of experience with and worked with in professional gaming. The more objective and knowledgeable I was about a subject, the more interested she was in my attention. She asked for more dates and I made it clear I only wanted to be friends. We would hang out and she would ask to take me out for dinner. She was persistent and I began to flirt back with her. We had casual sex and I agreed to go on a dinner date with her. She drove and paid for the date and I felt nauseous the whole time. I tried being friends with her, but she kept seeking sexual attention. The dinner was the last time I saw her.

I was with a younger girl, a freshman in college. It was a cute date, I was having some light-hearted fun. She was nice but a bit reserved. I asked to kiss her before I dropped her off. We made out a bit and she stayed in my car and chatted. I asked her about dating and sex. She laughed. She said she doesn’t go on many dates and that this was a cute experience. I laughed and agreed. I casually brought up when was the last time she had sex and she said recently. I like having honest conversations and she opened very naturally. She asked me about sex and I said it’s been a little while. She laughed again. I asked her, if she doesn’t go on dates a lot but is sexually active, if she had a recent boyfriend or something along those lines. She laughed. Her openness and honesty trailed off there. I tried to be playful about it and asked if she went out and looked for guys or if guys just hitted on her all the time. She took out her phone and gave me her number. “Why don’t you text me the next time you’re in the area?” She smiled and got out of the car. I texted her and she never replied.

I have a few bad dating stories that preclude this in Chicago. I’ll include those and how my good dates in California went in a future post.

How I Bullied Ricki Lake

I must have been in 1st grade. It was recess, we were on the asphalt outside our classroom. A circle of boys formed, with one boy in the middle, helplessly being pushed around. I didn’t know what was going on. I don’t remember anyone’s name. I just remember everyone shouting “Ricki Lake. Ricki Lake.” Another boy took me by the shoulder, joining me into the circle. We started chanting louder.

Who was Ricki Lake? What was I doing? Why was everyone so enthused?

A teacher came and broke up the ring. She took down all of our names and we one by one went to different adults. Over the next few days, I’d visit a special faculty member. Looking back, this was either a counselor or a conflict resolution HR type of deal. In the moment, she just treated me as a kind lady asking questions.

She asked me why I called the boy Ricki Lake. I was confused, wasn’t that his name? She replied that his name was indeed Ricki, but that his last name was not Lake. She asked me why I thought his last name was that.

“All the boys were calling him that.”

“Ricki Lake is a television host.”

“So that’s not his name?”

She replied no, explaining that the kids were making fun of him. The boys were making fun of Ricki’s size, calling him the same name as an overweight celebrity.

“So you don’t know who Ricki Lake is?”

No, I replied. I really thought that was his name. I was just joining in with the other boys.

She asked me a few more questions about my family. I told her I was the only English speaker in my family and that my parents would use a mix of Chinese and English with me. She grabbed some flashcards and sat down with me. “So you don’t have any older brothers or older friends?” I replied no. I remember this question sticking with me, because in the future I’d refer back to it whenever I had a culture lapse.

She showed me a flashcard with a pear on it. I remember looking at the card and looking at her. “I know what this is but I don’t know how to say it. I only know how to say it in Chinese.”

She was kind. “How do you say it?”

“Li”

“In English, it’s called a pear.”

I told her how much I liked them. But only the Asian kind. My mother once gave me an American pear and it was really different. She laughed and agreed.

Shortly after, I never saw her again. She must have deemed me a good kid who lost their way. I don’t think I ever saw Ricki again or the other boys. I do remember becoming a lot more aware of social bullying after that, despite not remembering any direct teaching or scolding from that woman. Maybe she asked if I knew if it was wrong to bully people. In my eyes, I never wanted to bully him. And she probably saw that.

I would go on to join Breaking Down the Walls, an anti-bullying club in my high school that focused on short, informative skits and targeting popular kids to be a part of the club. I never really saw bullying in my high school, but that really was before cyberbullying and Facebook became prominent.

I once saw some bullying on a school bus. Some guys were hassling a girl for whatever reason. I told them to stop cause they were being obnoxious. She thanked me and a few months later invited me to her birthday. I lost the invitation.

I believe I still inadvertently bully people here and there. With social awareness and a good community, we should all be able to identify and stop bullying when we see it.