I wait for the bus while standing in front of the chicken rice shop on River Valley Road. The smell is unavoidable, but I work hard to avert my eyes from the pallid poultry hung by their feet in a crowded row in the window behind me. The bumpy, flaccid chicken skin gleaming with slime. How this is considered gourmet, I will never understand.
But then again there’s a lot I’ll never understand about this place, no matter how much I love living here or how long I stay. Singapore’s magic is on loan to me, like a library book I am privileged to enjoy but must return, and my rightful place – I am reminded again and again – to seek to understand, knowing I never fully will.
Stepping onto the bus, I dial Grandma. This is our time. I surf in the middle of the most grounding influence in my life and this bizarre expat adventure as I pipe Grandma’s voice into my ears, while taking in the morning Singapore views from the bus window.
“Helllooooo?” she answers the phone with the exact same intonation as she has in all my 32 years. Like a song you immediately recognize upon the first note, I will never in my life forget the tone of her phone greeting.
“Hi Grandma!”
“Stacey?!?!!” she answers with authentic surprise and trademark shriek in her voice, even though I call her at this exact time nearly every single day as I ride the bus to work.
“Hi, Grandma, how are you?”
She is home. My home. I move through this foreign land while tethered to her voice and the routine of daily connection. Her love unwavering, unquestioning. Always so much said and unsaid.
“How are you feeling, Grandma?”
“Great… I feel great.”
“Are you lying?” I ask, as I always do.
“Yes.”
And I laugh and say, “ok.” No need to talk about it. I don’t judge her either. I don’t question. If she wanted to be nudged she’d talk to my mother. It is my privilege as the grandchild to be the enabler rather than the caregiving protector that my mother must always be.
There is a grace in the things we don’t say. It’s our pact. I don’t actually need to ask how she feels to know. I know it in the decreased frequency of her hand-written letters, or in the recaps she gives me of her days. There is a direct correlation between the number of times she and Grandpa go out to lunch per week and the way she feels. I’ve discovered the ways of asking without asking.
“Did you see the ballgame?” she asks.
Um, no. I couldn’t care less about her beloved Cubs. Never did. The only thing about ball games I care about is the opportunity for sun on my face and a hot dog.
Grandma hasn’t been to a game in over a decade, but she never misses watching one on TV. I laugh out loud when I think about her neighbors in the assisted living home hearing her shriek when yelling at the screen. Hopefully it brings them as much joy as it would me.
Grandma didn’t live to see my 40th birthday, but if she had she would have lost her s**t witnessing the Cubs making it to the World Series after years of curses, false starts, and embarrassing seasons – but the loyalist fans in the business. When I took the Red Line that night with Simon on my shoulders and Rosie gripping my hand tight amid the crowds in Wrigleyville, I could feel Grandma with me.
We did have a commonly held love for ballpark hot dogs though. Mine with ketchup only (much to the chagrin of every Chicago-dog purist in my life), hers with all the things, like a true Northsider. The hotdog and her weakness for it was an ongoing point of contention between my mother and I, when discussing the myriad things Grandma should be doing to take better care of herself, to help us by keeping her on this planet for even one more day because this planet was without a doubt a better place with my Grandma in it.
Eating a hotdog complete with mustard, relish, onion and pickle was one of Grandma’s purist joys, but it would wreck her system for days.
I’d shake my head when she would intimate to me that she celebrated a particularly fantastic Cubs inning by sending Grandpa out to get her a hot dog. I’d smirk and reply, “How’d that go?”
To which she’d say, “Today I’m just relaxing.”
The tacit agreement to leave things unsaid.
The bus winds around the circular road holding Lau Pa Sat, one of Singapore’s most famous hawker stands, like a crown jewel. It’s a bustling center for kopi and kaya toast in the morning, char kway teow or chicken rice at lunch and satay late into the night, when they close the streets and the scents of grilled skewers and beer take over the central business district. Not a hot dog to be found.
As I listen to Grandma chatting on and on about the latest “picture” she’s excited to see at the theater – “That Tom Cruise could park his shoes under my bed anytime,” she loved to say – I imagine her in this space. The aunties running these stalls would fall in love with my grandma, and she with them. She could talk to anyone and everyone, but she also listened deeply.
I imagine her ordering what would surely become her usual – a big bowl of noodles perhaps or maybe something deep fried – from a woman who transformed her family recipes into a business. In this sliding door world, Grandma would return to this auntie’s stall every single week and in time would learn her backstory, her children’s names and her dreams for them. She would no doubt make a special trip to be there on the day the auntie’s prodigal son came to visit, home from a break from university, he’s studying business, of course – wants to be an entrepreneur like his mum.
My daydream halts as the bus turns on Robinson Road. I’d give anything to have her here with me for real. Even just for one day, one hour. I feel the same today. She died over 11 years ago now, and I still feel a gaping, aching hole in my heart and tears immediately filling my eyes anytime I allow myself to remember how much I miss her.
Grandma never did make it to visit me in Singapore, as 24 hours in the air isn’t in the cards for someone who isn’t well enough to attend the Cubs game, but some of my clearest memories of those four years are those when I was simultaneously apart from and together with her chatting on the phone during my commute. These two different realities bridged by a relationship for the ages. No matter where she was or where I was, she was my best friend. Still is.
I make my way toward the door and carefully step onto the sidewalk, into the hustle of people channeling into the financial district’s skyscrapers. I spot a waving colleague and point to my phone. She knows who I’m talking to and smiles, giving me space for this ritual.
“Grandma, I have to go to work. I promise I’ll see if the show is playing here. I love you.”
“I love you love you love you, my Stacey,” she says, always ending in threes for good luck.
“And feel better, Grandma,” I said. I couldn’t help myself.
“Oh Stacey, Grandpa and I are going dancing today – I’m going to do the cha-cha.”
She really was the most wonderful liar, but she will always be my truth.
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