"I want to leave New York!"
The remark came with the sigh of my husband, who is still tired of living in obscurity even though he has been through all sorts of hardships in New York.
Was he getting mad that some of his colleagues quickly turned back to the booming home country and become professors? Or has he grown weary of living with me who loves New York and not leaving New York? The husband declared that he would "go back to Korea and find a university position."
I agreed and said, "I go to northern New Jersey, where there's a deep, wooded lake, where deer play, even at the expense of debt. Rather than live to hear that 'I couldn't become a professor because of wife.' it was like, "Go for it." It is my philosophy of life that you should do what you want to do and shed tears of regret.
In January 1995, after 10 years of marriage, my husband and I decided to separate for the time being in search of our own lives. My husband decided to go to Seoul, and I decided to take two children to New Jersey.
Moving to New Jersey, I retired old cars that failed to pass the inspection and bought a small new car. Raising the volume of classical music to the fullest, I ran Anderson Avenue, North Bergen. I felt very good.
I transferred my children to an elementary school where school districts are good, and also put them on a soccer team for their after-school activities. I was proud of children who were running in a green field in a flamboyant uniform. I felt that I was finally enjoying my life in America, as I joined the white crowd and cheered for my kids.
The garden, which looked out from the library's large window, was so free that the mere sight of it relieved me of my fatigue. The baby deer in a herd of deer that burst into the backyard was so cute and amazing that my eyes were filled with tears. Every weekend, I went to the mall and spent time wandering through the endless piles of stuff. The children also enjoyed the new environment while watching toys that they had never seen in their lives. My husband's voice on the phone was also very excited when he often had drinks with his friends, saying he was giving resumes here and there.
Tears welled up in my eyes as I sat by the window and looked in the backyard in the fall of that year. It seems not just because of the beauty of nature. Something deep in my heart, the wriggling emptiness surged up. When darkness fell behind the red oars, a sense of silence different from city life was felt.
"Mom, what's wrong? Let's go home (Brooklyn). Why isn’t dad coming?" The children, who have been hanging out with the multiracial population, often asked to go home to school if they can't adjust to school life where only white and Asian people. I used to say, "this is your home." They wrote a letter and asked me to send to dad. A letter said, "Dad, I'll be a good boy. Please come back"
After spending nearly a year as a lecturer in Seoul, he became increasingly loner whether his serious meeting with his friends had cooled. Unlike when he first went there, he often asked about American news in a droopy voice. "I guess I've lived in the U.S. too long. Life in Korea is not easy. Maybe I should go back." "After seeing a few deer in the backyard, I don't want to live in New Jersey either. I was tired and couldn't draw because I was driving whenever the kids moved. Let’s just go back to Brooklyn."
My husband returned from a year of vent his spite about his motherland. 'Let's go back' as if a displaced character habitually spits out unconsciously in Lee Bum-sun's short story 'Ovaltan,' the murmur disappeared from his mouth.
No comments:
Post a Comment