To My First Mother:
Sometimes I think you’re dead. You must be, or else you’d have let me know.
Sorry if that’s rude. It’s just, you named me. You left a note to tell me when I was born and the name you gave me: Bai Yun. It means “white cloud.” Maybe you wanted me to be pure. If you’re alive, I don’t know how you don’t miss me enough to find me.
Maybe it wasn’t you. Maybe it was my father. I’ve never had one of those, so he’s harder to fit into this story, this myth of mine.
You, though—we used to be close.
I used to think you were an empress. I thought maybe China still had those and I was the daughter of royalty, shipped off to a distant country to be protected, and one day you’d retrieve me. You’d take me home to the kingdom everyone kept expecting me to go back to. You’d teach me our language and the names of all our ancestors. Somehow, I would belong there and here at the same time, standing with one foot in each family. I don’t know when I stopped waiting.
It’s a little late now, but do you think we could do a Freaky Friday? I’m not sure if it would work across oceans and time zones, but I think it’d be fun to do a mother-daughter body swap. You could meet my mom, the woman who raised me. I could meet my father and ask him where he’s been.
Sometimes I look in the mirror like every protagonist of every movie and try to decode my face, to imagine its referents. It would be nice to look in the mirror and see you.
My eyes are still brown, if you were wondering. I dyed my hair blonde once—just a skunk stripe. And okay, yeah, one time I made it ombré. I became protective of my hair later. I promised to preserve the things I inherited from you.
Can we watch Ladybird together? We can invent a life where you are passive-aggressive and I am stubborn. We can pretend that one time you wouldn’t tell me I looked nice.
I’m not sure you would like me. But I hope you loved me, once.
If you haven’t noticed, I’m a little neurotic. I’m irritable and prone to jealousy. I am anxious and controlling. I am always afraid my loved ones will leave me.
Sometimes I look at my skin and want to tear it off. It’s like this, growing up foreign in your family. I used to imagine waking up white, my history no longer visible. I wished I could move through the world as easily as they did, without the inconvenience of my anger and grief. I tried to hold myself together. I tried to feel complete despite fearing I couldn’t know myself without knowing you.
I’ve read stories about people like us. Mothers and daughters, reunited after decades apart. The awkwardness, the weight of everything that can’t be translated. Sometimes unearthing family secrets, sometimes simple truths: you weren’t wanted . . . you still aren’t.
That’s my favourite story to tell myself. After every heartbreak, every time someone leaves. I decide it all began when you first held me. Maybe you could see I was already too much.
If you knew me, would you want me now?
Don’t answer, it’s okay.
Sometimes I think of you on Mother’s Day, but all my references are wrong. I want to picture you planting tulips, your black hair tied in a ponytail. I want to picture you shopping for furniture, maybe a child you kept by your side. You are the story I keep writing.
I love you, though I will never meet you.
If you are alive, I invite you to haunt me anyways.
If you are alive, I hope I haunt you too.
Love,
Ryanne 白云 Kap
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Rumpus original art by Peter Witte
