today is the 11th anniversary of the death of one of the people i loved the most.
i find it strange how, despite the fact that many religions and cultures are guided by the moon for major traditions - lunar new year, for instance - the start and end of a human life is universally recorded based on the position of earth relative to the sun. besides that, we seem to gravitate towards multiples of five or ten years to derive larger significance from milestones. of course the first anniversary stands out because the memory is still fresh, but then the fifth, tenth, and twenty-fifth anniversaries are the ones which really stop us in our tracks and compel us to look backwards. last year i started writing a short story based heavily on amy's passing several months before the 10th anniversary date arrived. but this year, the number “11” not being as provocative for human meaning-making, feels in comparison like a drop falling into the bucket of elapsed time.
around four full moons before she died, amy and i went to spa world, a korean mega-bathhouse in the suburbs of washington dc. it was one of those places where you have to get completely naked except for a shower cap in order to enter the bathing pools. afterwards, clad in orange uniforms issued to us by the staff, we took turns in each of the 7 “poultice rooms” which were lined with either heated or cooled minerals to extract toxins from our bodies. i was feeling sad that day so amy decided to cheer me up by ordering patbingsu from the juice bar - a special treat consisting of crushed ice, red beans, condensed milk, tropical fruit and topped with corn flakes. sometime afterwards i remember seeing a facebook post from her joking that it’d taken her nearly a quarter of a lifetime - she was twenty-four then, just about to turn twenty-five - to let her fellow korean aunties see her naked. and then, just after she turned a quarter-of-a-life old, she was struck by a garbage truck while crossing the road.
it seems like by the time you’ve reached the 11th anniversary of a loved one’s death, there are no longer many new insights to discover, just the increasing feeling of distance away from a focal point. i have combed through thousands of permutations of how that one december night might have unfolded differently. i’ve been to an astrologer and a tarot card reader, i’ve told her story to anyone who would listen and i’ve relived, then subsequently forgotten, the last few interactions i’d had with her. she has appeared in a handful of my dreams, often wearing the same gray t-shirt. the pain has dulled to a mild, bearable sensation, like the bumpy-smooth scar tissue which still tingles to the touch at the site of an old surgery. sometimes i am overwhelmed by a sudden image of her, but so far the pain has always managed to subside, eventually.
this past summer i reached out to amy’s father on a whim during a vacation in new york city. i had planned to visit her grave without bothering her parents out of fear that they wouldn’t want to be reminded of her, but in the end i took a deep breath and messaged them anyway. afterwards they drove us to one of the many beaches on long island which amy and i used to frequent, and i plucked a broken scallop shell from a sandbank. then we went to a cafe in flushing and ordered patbingsu. it was only the second patbingsu i’ve ever had in my life, and the first one since amy died.
Sending you love from afar. I think 11 is an important number: the symmetry. Amy would live on as long as you tell her stories.
Thank you for sharing this story of Amy and her passing - those tiny details of food and love that mean so much.