Rule Follower
and learning to break my often self-imposed rules
I’m a pretty big rule follower. This is a truth about me. If I took the cookie out of the cookie jar, when asked, I would fess up. Before I moved to NYC, I never jaywalked. In college, I was the student who didn’t have my first alcoholic drink until my 21st birthday. And instead of telling my classmates that I didn’t want to break the law, I would just hold up my hand and say: I’m good.
More like I’m a good-y two-shoes. 😅🤦🏻♀️
Those rules were self-imposed. I recognize this now. This means I unfortunately only have myself to blame when I now regret how I handled my rules following. I regret the instances when I unintentionally hurt my family and friends’ feelings by choosing the rules over a conversation with them if they broke one. I regret the times when I got myself or others into trouble needlessly. I don’t regret waiting until I was 21 to drink as even now I’m not much of a drinker.
My biggest regret as a rule follower will always be my decision to not be with my dad when he passed away. As a rule follower, it makes sense that I wasn’t with my dad. My dad passed away last January during the height of COVID omicron in California and I’m here in New York. I remember the ER doctor calling to share this gut punching news with me: my dad only had a few hours left as his vital organs were failing him. I weighed the cost of the flight plus the flight time to SFO & drive to Stockton plus my complicated relationship with my dad. I then made calls so that the family who wanted to be there could be there with my dad. I decided that it would be fine if I didn’t make the trip. It would possibly be too late when I got there. I would probably have to fly back immediately. I thought I was making the right decision.
In hindsight, this was the wrong decision.
I recognize I’m writing about my past decision from the vantage point of Me now. The Me back then is not the Me now. Me now have had over a year and a half of therapy, of conversations with my dad’s sister, my Ming Heng, and of books and experiences that have altered my perspective on life. Me back then? She did the best she could at that time and she honestly thought it didn’t matter if she was there.
It mattered. My regret about not being there with my dad took over a year for me to work through (read My Dad is Dead: and I’m okay).
Imagine this: last October and me as a rule follower standing at baggage claim in Phnom Penh, Cambodia waiting anxiously for my checked luggage. I had chosen to stash my dad’s cremated remains in my luggage instead of following the rules. The rules had stated that I needed to file paperwork with the Cambodian Embassy. I couldn’t. Cambodia needed proof that my dad was born in Cambodia. I didn't have proof. My dad left me with neither his birth certificate (he didn’t have one!) or his passport (lost in the shuffle between the pagoda, hospitals, and other places he stayed at in the last few months of his life). Instead my dad left me with a wallet that held $123, two android phones, a beanie, and a cane. My dad left me with a lot of unanswered questions.
Back to me in baggage claim in Phnom Penh airport. There I was waiting anxiously after a 20+ hour flight. I pictured being handcuffed and taken into a windowless white room. Interrogated in Khmer. I could hear myself insisting in English that I had US documents of my dad’s ashes. How very American of me to stress the importance of them even when I wasn't in America. None of this happened.
The reason why I have been such a rule follower seems pretty obvious now. I grew up in chaos. Rules comforted me. If I did X, then Y happened. If I didn’t do Z, then I would be safe. Rules made sense to me. But life doesn’t always make sense. Why did A happen to B when B did everything right? Why can’t I wish for C to happen to D when I’m so angry? How can B and D spend so much time together and not know each other?
I realized that life doesn’t need to make sense all the time and not all rules needed to be followed, but life did need to matter.
In total, I was on Cambodia’s soil for a total of four days. I breezed through security with the Khmer I knew and the perfect manners my parents instilled in me. I spent one night in Phnom Penh and three nights at my uncle’s home in Phnum Toch. I went to Cambodia to take my dad’s ashes to his family’s columbarium and I did. I thought I was going to Cambodia for my dad but every single day I spent with my dad’s family, I realized that it was mainly for me.
There were just so many things that I needed to experience in Cambodia to shift my perspective. One big perspective shift was my way of dealing with things that hurt or scared me which was to retreat into myself or to simply not show up. I can point to all the many times I have done this. For me, showing up and being seen when I’m hurt or scared are two very hard things (read Showing Up: Is sometimes hard to do).
Visiting Cambodia was my attempt to try to be different. There was no part of me that wanted to go to Cambodia. Even hours before I headed to the airport, I was crying to Hal about how scared I was and asking if I could just not go. What if my family in Cambodia hated me for taking so long to bring my dad’s ashes to Cambodia? My dad passed away in January, it was then October. What if I offend them with my American ways? I am a pretty strong and vocal feminist. Khmai women are often traditional. What if I don’t understand them or they don’t understand me? I haven’t spoken Khmer regularly in years. What if they don’t like me? Oof.
I thought I was going to Cambodia to take my dad’s ashes to his family’s columbarium. I truly thought I was there for my dad because I had made a promise to him. Yet every single day I spent in Cambodia with my dad’s family, I realized that it was mainly for me.
I went to Cambodia and it changed me. I finally understood that some rules can be broken. I also learned to not be so afraid to show up as myself even when I’m scared. When I show up, I can allow myself to be truly seen and sometimes the people who see me, they are exactly the people I need in my life.
I will be forever grateful that I stashed my dad’s ashes into my suitcase and took him to his family’s columbarium in Cambodia. Doing so not only slowly helped me heal, it also helped me to connect with another side of my heritage. I’m so thankful.