I want to meet you, birth mother. From your womb, from contractions through canal, opening to the light I emerged. You held me, or perhaps not. You looked, but you looked away. Our eyes never met, or if they did, for a split second before I was taken away, missing the warmth, smell, touch of amniotic fluids. Slippery, you slipped away. I have been searching for you all these years: visits to Korea, to the adoption agency, the orphanage, police station, hospitals. No one knows anything.
So I listen to my bones, make a mosaic of all the broken pieces, re-create you in my mind, make up stories, draw images, dip down the well and wait. Wait for you to arrive. I don’t know if you are ever coming back. You would be old. Probably seventy. Bent, bow-legged, fierce. All Korean old ladies are tough. You might have been a war baby. I am no longer at war with all my pieces. I put them back together and if I could I would do the same for you.
Lao Tzu says, When the student is ready, the teacher will appear. I didn’t know I was looking for a writing teacher until I took a workshop this weekend with Laura Davis, author of The Courage to Heal, until my body said yes listening to a humble, brilliant author talk about the doubts and insecurities that came up over the ten years writing her memoir about reconciling with her mother, telling the truth, not trying to make herself look good, and healing shame. My body knew. I will get her help in finishing my novel, find community, and birth my book.
In my book, I write us back together. Reunify East and West and North and South, end wars between the superpowers that divide us. I find places of peace, floating in the ocean, climbing volcanic peaks. Once in a blood moon people find their way to each other, different changed. Once in a blood moon, miracles happen.
Many students tell me they have known about my work for years before they felt ready to take the plunge and join a group class or work with me privately. Others say they found me on a whim, searching the internet, and reached out immediately. Wherever you are on your journey, know I am here for you should you choose to explore voice work, grief, ancestral healing, or whatever other topic that needs witnessing, creative expression, transformation, and holding. If you are ready to free your voice, body, and life, reach out.
