literature

Breathe Again

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She was the proud owner of a Laundromat connected to a small room in the back that she called home. Working alongside her husband until he became too sick, and then she ran it herself. That was before the place went out of business. A small, family-owned Laundromat was not in demand in this part of Queens – the Queen has too many of those. So instead, she worked in a factory on the outskirts of Chinatown making patterns of clothing so hundreds of other seamstresses can copy it. She would work from nine to seven, making five dollars an hour – and that was only after ten years of working there. After work, she would attend classes at a local church to learn English, only to drop out because she was too old to absorb any of it. The church was only a fifteen minute walk from the factory where her husband works. He made the holes on shirts where the buttons go. He got paid by the number he produced that day. Sometimes, there weren't many shirts on the line to punch holes into. And this life is what so many people run towards.

She ran for quite awhile. She ran from the communists, taking over her country, into the English territory of Hong Kong. They finally let her go to school – two years late – as one of the few girls who was permitted to an education. She left behind her mother, who couldn't read or write, to go to a boarding school forty miles away, where she could only come home twice a year. But she didn't dare say that she missed home, because what if someone listened and pulled her out of school forever? She believes that the journey was better in Hong Kong – the island is small to begin with. Small, but a decent place to start a family. And by "decent," I mean in an apartment meant for one person but instead holds four, and her aunt giving her food so her family would have something in their stomachs for at least one day. For toys, her son and daughter shared an unused pot – because there was nothing to fill it with – and a stick found outside. Their prized toy was a porcelain doll, whose one eye would never open. But even in America, they still played with sticks.

She left on a plane, cramped alongside with the rest of her family, with everything they owned packed into three suitcases. She and her husband had what amounted to twenty-five American dollars in their pockets– it was a miracle getting their daughter into Catholic school, even if it was only for a few months. Her heart sunk when her daughter came home crying, who thought that the Merriam-Webster dictionary was a book, and that she was expected to read it. How can anyone go from barely being able to write "boat" in Chinese to being expected to understand foreign squiggles of different length? Knowing only a handful of English words herself, she knew she couldn't help her daughter, who went to the library after school each day to study instead of coming home.

She finally retired after twenty years of working barely minimum wage. She retired only because her daughter had me. The only thing worse than having a granddaughter who can't walk is seeing your daughter struggle with how to deal with said granddaughter who can't walk and not being able to help. So she moved in so her daughter can go back to work. And so she taught me all the basics in her broken English so that I would be ready for school by the time I was three. She taught me my colors, how to count to a hundred, and the alphabet, except I pronounced "r" with a Chinese accent.

She tells me these stories whenever I mention that I'm not smart enough, that I will never get into college. And I just sit there, not admitting that I have nothing to complain about. But she knows that I know. And maybe when I do leave for college, she can breathe out once again and take the break that she so well deserves.
Well, this is an essay that I wrote for AP English and ~HoboScone told me to put it on the internet. I haven't written much this year... too much other stuff to do. And to think, I want to be an English major.
So, anyway, tell me who you think this is, even if you don't know me.
I'm sorry it's a bit long. I hope you're not too lazy to read it all.
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