I used to think that my mother got into arguments with people because they didn't understand her English, because she was Chinese.

I have loved works of fiction precisely for their illusions, for the author's sleight-of-hand in showing me the magic, what appeared in the right hand but not in the left.

And then she had to fill out so many forms she forgot why she had come and what she had left behind.

My mother didn't teach me lessons about being Chinese as strongly as she did the notion of who I was as a female.

And now I have to stop. Because every time I remember this, I have to cry a little by myself. I don't know why something that made me so happy then feels so sad now. Maybe that is the way it is with the best memories.

I love my daughter. She and I have shared my body. There is a part of her mind that is a part of mine. But when she was born, she sprang from me like a slippery fish, and has been swimming away ever since.

A mother is always the beggining. She is how things begin.