Our house in Kimberly is along the muddy shoreline of the Fox River, and I often stand in the backyard, close my eyes, and think about my parents, siblings, ancestors, and childhood home half a world away in the mountains of Laos.
When I’m near the river, I imagine that my mom, dad, and ancestors are with me and that they’re my angels. Then I whisper, “I made it. And I’m okay.” I used to weep in sorrow. In time, however, my tears became tears of joy. Even so, because I’m far from home, and because I’ve changed so much during my life, I often ask myself, “When I die, and one of my many souls makes it to the ancestors’ world, will my parents and ancestors be proud of me? Will they recognize me? Or will they disavow me?”
I’m grateful that today I can stand by the Fox River, because it means that I survived my childhood. Many children I knew in Laos weren’t so lucky, never making it to the “heavenly kingdom above the clouds where cities glittered of gold,” which is what Hmong elders called America when I was young. They never lived in comfortable homes with electricity and indoor plumbing—or even learned about such things.
As a child, the scope of my world went only as far as
