A good Asian daughter goes to the grocery store with her mother a lot. And is happy about it. Helpful even. I know, because I was that good Asian daughter. I was never taught what any of the stuff was we were buying, I can recognize it all now by smell or touch, packaging if it hasn't changed yet (which most asian stuff hasn't, even after all these years), but beyond that, I'm as clueless as a white person. I was merely a shadow of a presence there in case my mother ran into anyone she knew, in which case I'd transform into a trophy of honor, an indication that my mother had done something right. Also, I was a helpful hands there to shuttle the groceries from cart to home, including all the movements in between.
I remember my mother telling me about the other dishonorable and rebellious children who refused to go on grocery trips with their moms. We'd hear about them from the other moms we ran into at the store who were without child. She never said it outloud, only offered simple condolences of empathy, but I knew the truth. It was shameful. I was evidence that my mother had done something right. Like when a child says thank you without being prompted, my mere presence in the grocery store was exactly that. My willingness to accompany my dear mother to the store. To promptly request double bagging (because it was the late 90s after all, and we didn't seem to care about our environment as much, just our ease of moving big bulky grocery bags). I never minded it. Any of it. I rather enjoyed my moment in the sun whenever we ran into someone we knew. I was actually a little bit disappointed when we didn't run into anyone. My good deed had gone unnoticed, and I wanted the confirmation that I was indeed a good Asian daughter. As I grew older, I started to ask questions. My thirst for knowledge of my own culture and traditions went unanswered. She seemed annoyed I was asking all these questions. Why didn't I know? Like when I asked for a recipe and she's just respond with, "some of this, some of that," giving no precise measurement. I think my mom grew increasingly more annoyed, and stopped asking me to accompany her to the store. She rather preferred my younger brother six years younger, more innocent, big eyed and silently representing her status as a good mother once more.
When I went off to college and returned to visit on the weekends, the first thing my mom would ask me was to go to the grocery store with her again, as if she forgot of my constant badgering about this or that. Now she welcomed it. And now, as an adult, when I call her to ask about certain ingredients, I've never witnessed such patience, even follow up calls to make sure I purchased the right thing. I think she recognizes that her culture is slowly slipping away from her grandchildren, and that the bridge is her own daughter, so she better help out or forget about any preservation of her posterity's culture. As an adult now, I often wonder how much value she got just from spending time with me in the grocery. Sure it's easier to go alone, but with your daughter stuck there, it's an opportunity to talk, to spend time together, to just be. And maybe I didn't annoy her as much as I believed, maybe that was just my interpretation of it, because of a bad day or a long day. Maybe I was an annoying teenager. Maybe I was rolling my eyes too much, or checking my pager too often. I often wonder how the reel plays in her memory versus mine.
History has a funny way of rewriting itself though. As I take my kids to the grocery store with me, I see how quickly I am happy when they are well behaved, as if I've just been rewarded mother of the year, and then one tantrum, one misstep, and I feel like an ultimate failure of a mother who is snarky and annoyed. And yet, I keep going back with them, because I have to, and because I can. Is that how it was for my own mom too?
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