Father's girlfriend

"I have a place to go. You have a lot of friend to meet, don't you?"

My father, whom I met for the first time in two years, got up hurriedly after lunch. "Where are you going?" "You look at your business. I'll see you at Namsan tomorrow morning," He went somewhere diligently. What is so busy that my father who is 90 years old is busy? First meeting with my father in Seoul ended that way.

After my mother died, my father never got married and kept busy with his girlfriends. Whenever I went to Seoul, I met his girlfriend.

The first his girlfriend who I met maintained a long relationship with him. She often said, "I want your father to live healthy even by the age of 80." Un fortunately, on a snowy day when he turned 78, he hurt his leg while climbing up Namsan. My father was lying down. She who thought my father was going to die left without hesitation.

My father, who has lived under Namsan since his youth, climbed the mountain every day and exercised steadily, recovered completely after a few months and was able to climb the mountain. When she saw my father walking around, she came to see him many times, saying, "I'll come back," but he already had another girlfriend.

He doesn't introduce his new girlfriend. "What’s wrong with you? Why don't you introduce me a new girlfriend? Who's she this time?" "You don't need to know, if you know her, will you be responsible for her life after I die?"

After his death, he didn't marry to prevent conflict between the stepmom and his children. He sent all his children to America and lives alone. He works out hard every morning on Namsan, because he doesn't want to make it hard for his children. Also, in order to if his children in foreign countries prevent the hassle of visiting his grave, he wants scatter his ashes on the way to Mamsan after cremate.

He came at my wedding once and never came back to America. "If I go there, I'd happy a few days, but in an American busy life, can’t an old man go and make children difficult. There is an old Japanese proverb that says, it's good to meet grandkids, but it's better to be apart." Of course, he doesn't give financial burdens to us and rather, he helps us and says, "It's his pleasure that he can still give us."

Wouldn't the thought of living alone without relying on his children have made him live healthy and rich to this day? If the father in the distance is lonely and sick, his children will only be grateful to him for thinking how well they can live with guilt in a faraway country.

There is an old saying that something happens when people do what they usually don't do. Until now, he proudly introduced me every woman he met. It is really strange. Maybe he's dating a younger woman than me.