Living Again

by Tracie (Picture Happy Photos)

FOREWORD

The last few years have been extremely difficult for me. In 2015, my mom was diagnosed with terminal cancer. She passed away in 2016. In 2017, my dad was diagnosed with cancer. He passed away in 2018. Also in 2018, my 16.5 year old doggie daughter passed away. I adopted her when she was 9 weeks old from a puppy rescue. She had been my baby for three years before I met my husband.

My father in law has been asking us for years to go on a trip with him to China. He had always wanted to show the grandchildren where he grew up and share a bit about their culture. In 2019, in honor of his 80th birthday and with both of my parents finally at peace, we felt like we could commit months in advance for such a trip. This trip also felt like a tribute to my mom whose own mother came from China. She didn’t get a chance to visit her mother’s country. While my dad was able to travel extensively before he met my mom, my mom hadn’t traveled outside of Hawaii or California for most of her life. We had planned to take her to Japan in 2015. It was someplace she had always wanted to go. Unfortunately my dad fell and fractured his pelvis a few weeks before we left so she decided to cancel her trip to care for him. She was diagnosed with cancer a few months later. She told me after her diagnosis that she wasn’t going to see the world like she had hoped. It broke my heart. I am thankful to have the chance to visit places that she had always wanted to go to. After spending the last few years surrounded by death and dying, it is nice to finally start living again. I visit these places in her memory.

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