10/20/21 - Writing My Way Out

The Universe planted the seed when I was a toddler that writing would be an integral part of my future. It began to germinate upon reading Maya Angelou’s I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings.  

But my preoccupation with fitting in and surviving a turbulent home life stifled my writing in high school. I didn’t have the space and time to allow the muse to sing to me. An invitation to enter an esteemed writing contest was drowned by my feeling of inadequacy and fear of failure. And, a fear of others kept me from joining the yearbook and newspaper staffs.  

Then, junior year hit. It was time to start planning my escape. I had known since middle school that college would be my way out, but I didn’t know which college and major. The one thing I knew for sure was getting into college was going to take a lot of effort on my part because my parents were not going to help me.  

So, I set to work. My college tours consisted of going to the guidance counselor’s office and thumbing through the myriad brochures. There was no Internet in those days (yes I am THAT old) and my parents didn’t want to go on tours. To make my college application look as good as possible, I maintained a high GPA and I worked the well-rounded student angle by playing sports, joining the student council, serving as homeroom rep and helping on the Homecoming committee. I was also in choir for two years and Junior Achievement. Besides all that, I also had going for me my minority status. Being non-White increased my chances of being accepted. The heritage I had all but ignored could save me.  

Where does writing figure into all this? Essays. Lots and lots of essays. The questions these applications listed were endless: Why did I want to go to college? How would I describe me? What has been my greatest accomplishment? What has been my greatest challenge and how did I overcome it? Etc. etc. etc. There was no access to a computer, so I wrote all of this by hand and sometimes by typewriter. The sound of the keys would reverberate against the wood-paneled walls of my bedroom, sometimes late into the night.  

Limiting my writing in this way didn’t make me happy. I missed my inspiration, and I didn’t know how to get it back. Going to the library or a café for some solitude and think time wasn’t an option. I was a kid trapped at home bumming rides from friends because my parents wouldn’t let me use the car except for emergencies. I guess applying for college to improve my life was not considered an emergency to them. But it was for me. I knew that if I didn’t get out and soon, I would kill myself. There was no way in hell I was going to live at home after high school like so many of my peers did. No. Fucking. Way.

My determination made me bolder, and that led to more fights with Dad. Dad worked at a small liberal arts college and he wanted me to go there because the tuition would’ve been free. Sounds like a great deal, right? It wasn’t. That college did not have the major I wanted, which meant I’d have to do independent study or major in something else entirely different. And more importantly, I would’ve been forced to live at home. Free came with a price.

When Dad learned I was applying to many colleges and not just ones in Pennsylvania, he flipped his shit. I was bold but not bold enough to tell him how desperate I was to leave and he was one of the main reasons why I had to do it. Unlike other areas of my teenagehood, I held my ground and refused to go to the free school. His response? Verbal and physical abuse. Physical wounds heal but the emotional ones, well, I’m still working on that.  

As I wrote for my future life, I was reminded how much I love writing and I knew that I had to make something out of it. I briefly entertained going down the psychology route after thoroughly enjoying that class, but in the end, I knew writing was my path. So, I finally decided to major in journalism. I settled for that major, if I’m being totally honest, because I was afraid I wouldn’t have a job at the end of four years if I had majored in creative writing. I envisioned having a huge fight with Dad after college graduation because I was unemployed. I chose what I perceived to be the safer route because of fear, pure and simple. Not a great way to make decisions, to be sure, but that was my reality. When you’re a child of trauma, decision-making can be fraught with peril. You tend to take the quickest, safest route at the expense of your desires.

The application responses came and each one was a yes. I started to envision life beyond Pennsylvania. I imagined jumping on a plane and heading west. The dream was becoming real until it didn’t.  

Enter Stage Right – Asian guilt and a hard dose of reality.

I don’t know if all Asian mothers are like this, but my mother had a way to make you feel guilty about your choices. In the way she asked questions, her tone and sometimes her face, she made you doubt. Was your decision made to serve the family’s interests or your own? Raised in a culture that honors collectivism, she was uncomfortable with any expression of individuality. How many times did she implicitly and explicitly express that I stop rocking the boat? That I give in to my father? That I just stay quiet and behave? Adding to this was my own guilt for leaving her and my sister behind. Who would protect them after I leave?   

Reality sunk in while scouring for scholarships. I realized I just didn’t have the time to apply for them all. Even with some of the awards I did win plus state and federal aid, I was still way short. My window of dreams started to close and I tried to salvage them by narrowing my choices to in-state schools only.  

Toward the end of my search, Dad realized I wasn’t going to budge, so he got a loan that covered much of the balance. This move shocked the hell out of me because his credit was terrible and he had been so adamant about me going to the free school. At the time, I didn’t fully appreciate this gesture. I have since realized this was his way of showing that he did love me.  

In the end, I went to Penn State’s main campus in State College and I became one of the first students to enroll in the new School of Journalism there. It was far enough away for me to spread my wings but close enough in case I needed to get home in a hurry. Mid-August couldn’t come soon enough.  

In the next post, I’ll cover what happened to my relationship with writing while in college. Write & Rise, my friends.