Dear Lili,

You’ve turned one-year-old. Happy Birthday! I hope you enjoyed your birthday on the peach farm in Brentwood (though it was an intended cherry-picking trip). How are you feeling for being a “grown-up”?  I guess it didn’t make much difference for you, yet, a big deal for your mistress.

12 days after you were born, 5/22/2008, your mistress graduated from CAL, UC Berkeley, school that she has been thrilled to join and graduate from, and she did, though there has been diminishing excitement during her staying at school. She graduated anyways. With no career path planned in mind, she accepted the offer in HealthCare and went back to Asia for her graduation trip.  Chilling out at her hometown, visiting north, travelling over the East Ocean, she didn’t do a lot but there’s the only period of time over the past year that she would wake up with a warm smile filled with satisfaction. She misses it, truly.

Coming to August 2008, after 3 months staying at your foster home, I came rescue you. As it turned out, you were the one that rescued me. That was a stormy season at home. A family that has been separated in China, East Bay, and South Bay for the past 4 years was merging back. Easy move for no one. Continuous complaints and fights, madness and upset were the only things left with the family. And you came, bringing joy and fun, bringing smiles back to everyone’s face with your goofy running on the floor, bringing stories and laughter back on the dinner table with your “daily drama”, and bringing back to me feeling that I missed for long – Home Sweet Home. Thank you my dear.

(to be continued)