TJLC Flashcards
America was where all my mother’s hopes lay
My mother believed you could be anything you wanted to be in America. You could open a restaurant. You could work for the government and get a good retirement. You could buy a house with almost no money down. You could become rich. You could become instantly famous. …America was where all my mother’s hopes lay
I won’t be what I’m not.
This girl and I were the same. I had new thoughts, willful thoughts, or rather thoughts filled with lots of won’ts. I won’t let her change me, I promised to myself. I won’t be what I’m not.
But I was so determined not to try
Maybe I never really gave myself a fair chance. I did pick up the basics pretty quickly, and I might have become a good pianist at that young age. But I was so determined not to try, not to be anybody different that I learned to play only the most ear-splitting preludes, the most discordant hymns.
“I wish I’d never been born!” I shouted. “I wish I were dead! Like them.”
You want me to be someone that I’m not!” I sobbed. “I’ll never be the kind of daughter you want me to be… I wish I wasn’t your daughter. I wish you weren’t my mother,” I shouted. As I said these things I got scared. It felt… as if this awful side of me had surfaced at last… And that’s when I remembered the babies she had lost in China, the ones we never talked about. “I wish I’d never been born!” I shouted. “I wish I were dead! Like them.” It was as if I had said the magic words Alakazam!—and her face went blank.
my mother’s disappointed face once again
And after seeing my mother’s disappointed face once again, something inside of me began to die. I hated the tests, the raised hopes and failed expectations. Before going to bed that night, I looked in the mirror above the bathroom sink and when I saw only my face staring back–and that it would always be this ordinary face–I began to cry. Such a sad, ugly girl! I made high-pitched noises like a crazed animal, trying to scratch out the face in the mirror
remember things
I can never remember things I didn’t understand in the first place.
I talked to her in English, she answered back in Chinese.
These kinds of explanations made me feel my mother and I spoke two different languages, which we did. I talked to her in English, she answered back in Chinese.
You don’t even know little percent of me! How can you be me?” And she’s right. How can I be my mother at Joy Luck?
A friend once told me that my mother and I were alike, that we had the same wispy hand gestures, the same girlish laugh and sideways look. When I shyly told my mother this, she seemed insulted and said, “You don’t even know little percent of me! How can you be me?” And she’s right. How can I be my mother at Joy Luck?
My mother and I never really understood one another
‘But listening to Auntie Lin tonight reminds me once again: My mother and I never really understood one another. We translated each other’s meanings and I seemed to hear less than what was said, while my mother heard more.’
What can I tell them about my mother?
What will I say? What can I tell them about my mother? I don’t know anything. . . .
Not know your own mother?
Not know your own mother? How can you say? Your mother is in your bones!
They are frightened
And then it occurs to me. They are frightened. In me, they see their own daughters, just as ignorant. . . . They see daughters who grow impatient when their mothers talk in Chinese . . . who will bear grandchildren born without any connecting hope passed from generation to generation.
to help me understand my grief.
…but these days, I think about my life’s importance. I wonder what it means, because my mother died three months ago, six days before my thirty-sixth birthday. And she’s the only person I could have asked, to tell me about life’s importance, to help me understand my grief.
always mean something to Chinese people./I guess my mother’s telling me I’m still worth something
I now wear that pendant every day. I think the carvings mean something, because shapes and details, which I never seem to notice until after they’re pointed out to me, always mean something to Chinese people.
choosing the best
Because [Waverley] had learned this skill, of choosing the best, from her mother, it was only natural that her mother knew how to pick the next best ones…
