I Wrote A Book. It’s Got Only One Reader
She reads with tears and laughs. Believe me. Even you just got one reader, it’s worth more than ten thousand.
I wrote a book. Well, actually, translated.
It’s got only one reader. Yes, One Reader. Maybe it will only have one reader ever.
It’s my mom.
She is in China, 78 now. For the major part of my memory, she was the superwoman of the large family. Now aging is beating her down, taking away her hearing, sight, and strength. She is turning self-isolated. It’s like a wick at the bottom of the candle. Standing and burning the whole life, now she suddenly wants to sink into the liquid wax.
My friend Pamela is a speech-language Pathologist. She says the hearing loss can lead to a series of problems. If people don’t hear, they don’t talk, then they don’t connect. They could turn completely deaf. Then the abyss of darkness, hopelessness. Mom tried hearing aids. They said she’d got an accumulative nerve deterioration. Hearing aids can’t help.
I don’t know how much pain she endures, but I am heartbroken watching her magic power dwindle rapidly. I have to shout to her on the phone. She is just like, “What did you say?” She tells me she turns the volume to the highest, and almost…
