Bonding, between father and sons, translated…
“Do you want me to bite my hand hard, to call my older brother back home for you?”, my youngest son asked.
In the Ichibangai Street in Tokyo train station without wi-fi, the four of us got lost in the more fearsome waves of Kanagawa. His older brother is, apparently, a world class surfer.
This sort of delicate connection between us, we’d, often need to practice it with our ritualistic ways, to get it back again, and to, strengthen the bond we have with one another.
Like how my dear wife and my two children all hoped that we can all go on a family vacation abroad in the summer. It’s just, that the Leo woman is too hard to manage, eighty-seven seconds before I was about to book the flights online, “Perhaps, we shouldn’t, go to the capital city of Thailand, let’s head to Kawaguchiko instead?” my lovely wife said. I’d needed to, brush a lion’s mane right, otherwise, I won’t have my hand anymore.
a photo of the family, on vacation, from online…
It’s like, we would always get lost at the station in Tokyo for a long while every single time.
“There’s no point in you, biting open your hand!”, I’d told my youngest, this won’t be effective for brothers, let his dad do it instead!”, I’d proudly added, “our hearts are connected”, then, I’d, made the move of about to bite down on my own hand.
“Dad’s wouldn’t work either!”, my youngest stated, “We’d need mom to do it!”
Although we don’t have the storybook connections of being a family, but, we’d needed, some trash talks to keep bonding.
Later, we’d finally alighted the trains to the lakeside. And, we were, riding on the train with Thomas the Train printed all over. As I was so excited, shooting all the photos, I’d found the two of them stationary, in their seats, sliding on their cell phones. Don’t the high school kids these days feel compelled, to relive the moments of their childhood now? It’d actually, felt, a bit, saddened by all of this, and this reminded me of the train in the movie directed by Hou.
We arrive at the lake, and the four of us circled around it, aimlessly. My youngest squatted down by the lake, and started photographing the water, like he was, acting like an webcam star, to stream it to his profile live. MY wife and I strolled along, and picked up the furry round plants. As we came to, we’d found, that my son who’s up ahead had a plastic bottle in his hand, he’d shyly told us, that he’d, picked the piece of trash, this child, I may need a DNA test on.
The ten-day vacation, I thought it was, long, but, it’d, ended way too soon. My dear wife cried at the Narita Airport naturally, and she took our two teens back to Taiwan, and I, on another flight back to Hong Kong, to continue my life, and my job there.
As I returned to Hong Kong it was, close to midnight. I’d, reconnected the wi-fi, and my tempo for work again.
“Actually, traveling together, then splitting up, it seemed, to add to the emotions by thirty multiples.” That was the LINE message from my youngest. “Thank you for working so hard to make the money, then raising me, for not tossing me into the rivers. I will take good care of mom and older brother, you need to watch out for your health too. Come home more, otherwise, you will, run out of topics to write about. I love you!”, then, he’d, sent a picture of a child crying his eyes out.
“Thanks”, I’d wrote him back, “But why would we throw you into the rivers?”
“I really don’t know, perhaps, you both only wanted a child?”
“Psycho!”, I’d added, “Thankfully, you’d, told me this”.
He’d sent a “I love you so” picture in return.
And so, this is how the father of this family stays connected to his own children, he worked away from home, and, can only have limited time to spend with his children, and he took the advantage of every opportunity he has with them, the vacations, the visits, to strengthen the bond between his sons and him, and, I’m sure, that these two young man will grow up, knowing that their dad loves them so, and, they will, more than likely, stay close to him too!