Listen to Grandmothers - They're Usually Wise

“You’re 26 years old, you should get a boyfriend,” grandma bossed me over the phone.

“Yes grandma…maybe you could hook me up?” I joked.

“Would you come back if I found you a good Chinese boy?” grandma asked in all seriousness.

“If we really like each other. Yes, I would,” I said in all seriousness back.

“Ok, I’ll ask the neighbors,” grandma concluded decisively.

Grandma and I are very close. Dad calls her every weekend. They talk about health, family, work. And I tell her about my boy troubles. Grandma always lends a patient ear for the boy in question, and the issues at hand. Sometimes she’d tell me to give him the benefit of the doubt. Other times she’d say it’s downright unacceptable. And that night was no different. Another evening of friendly exchange on modern dating dilemmas, and tried and true, century-old advice on love. You know – girl talk.

Just because grandma’s one of the “girls”, doesn’t mean our lifestyles in any way resemble one another’s. Grandma lives in China, and I live in Canada. She’s 89. I’m 26. Her day might consist of watering the plants in the morning, followed by a light lunch taken leisurely with aunt and uncle. Nap in the warm afternoon sun, and then watch Chinese Opera while sipping at a cup of fragrant jasmine tea. Meanwhile, I bounce out of bed at exactly 7:15, after slamming the snooze button for the nth time, slip into something professional-looking, and spend the day trying to management consult our clients on how their businesses can be efficiently maximized, with every single risk carefully calculated and resources fully optimized. At the end of the day, grandma looks as radiant as a youthful yogi, and I come home looking haggard like an old lady.

Which doesn’t help, especially if you’re single and looking…and aging rapidly…

Chinese people often say when you have an elder in the family over the age of 90; you pretty much have a live Buddha living at home. What this means is, the accumulated wisdom and goodness from this one person, will bask the entire family in glory.

I didn’t believe it…

And thought it was just something nice people like to say when they visited grandma..

Until a fleck of that blessing fell upon me. Like fairy gold dust.

 

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A few months later, I am in China.

Sitting in a quaint little café, sipping green tea, watching colorful people walk by.

I open my little brown notebook, and scribble down plans for the exciting upcoming 3 months - two months of traveling across China, and the last month, go to Bali, live by the beach, and experiment with my dream.

I chuckle quietly to myself, and wonder if this whole thing would have happened if it weren’t for grandma. How I would still be stuck in my cubicle, in my crisp white collar shirt and charcoal pencil skirt, frantically trying to find myself in the corporate world, wondering when I finally reach the top, if happiness is waiting for me there…

Yes, it is happiness, or the lack thereof, that brings me to the beginning of this story…