Strange Tribe, Part 5
Floating Hometowns and Social Influencers
Parodying a famous movie, “Hometown? Hometown? We don’t need no steenkin’ hometown!” So what do you do when you have a child with no hometown? Read on, dear reader, to see the next developments in the saga of our strange tribe. As I said, strange but not dysfunctional. Like stories of the first colonies on other planets or of Torgeir Higraff’s true story of societies that evolved on balsawood rafts during a drift voyage across the Pacific, we developed our own society with our own rules that fit us and our changing situation.
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Strange Tribe, Part 5
The strangeness continues even today. This young boy may have been raised without an extended family nearby but that doesn’t mean he was without outside influencers. Living in Chongqing, he was soon adopted by a number of new foreign friends of his father. This little boy was sheltered and instructed and heard rowdy stories by a collection of English-speaking, elderly expats - men from the US, Canada, England, Scotland, New Zealand, Australia, Holland, Switzerland, and others - whose range of life experiences was as diverse as their countries of origin. Doesn’t everybody have a grandfather figure who served on a nuclear submarine, went to the US Army’s Ranger School, was a commercial pilot in Africa, and attended seminary school? Doesn’t every child hang out at Starbucks on a Friday morning to hear stories that begin with, “The last time I got blown up…”? What about the grandfather who was in Canadian special forces, a black belt holder who taught at his own Taekwondo school, a pilot, a gunsmith, worked on oil rigs around the world, and now writes, publishes, and spouts Canadian poetry? Or a giant former blacksmith who taught him phonics? (Think of Harry Potter’s Hagrid.) Even though retired now, you wouldn’t want to mess with any of these “grandfathers”. Proud of their young protégé? You bet! Additionally, he had a number of influencers among his father’s international friends online. By the tender age of six or seven, Chester had learned that there are many different but equally valid ways of seeing the world and addressing problems… and languages for speaking about them. And he continues to learn that unknown adults – even grizzled old men – are likely to be friendly, generous, and patiently instructive… and with some pretty interesting rowdy stories from their generation.
Recently, during my routine physical exam, an aneurysm was discovered which required immediate surgery. I was very fortunate in the discovery (the good way, not the bad way) and the availability of modern medical treatment. Two days after the initial tests, surgery was performed and I was released soon afterward to go home for a long recovery - a medical vacation, I called it. Eight weeks later, a CT scan confirmed that everything was progressing nicely and I was officially released to continue my recovery at home. That Friday evening at dinner, I was pleased to tell CS the Good News. I told him that Dr. Zhang had said the operation was successful and that I wasn’t going to die anytime soon. Then I stole a choice tidbit from his plate. Whereupon this 9-year-old kid turned to me and said, “If you do that again, you will!” But he was smiling when he said it.
Years ago, on one of my annual summer vacation trips back to my hometown, Chester’s American grandmother purchased a large, colorful nylon windsock to send back to her little grandson in China. That windsock became a permanent fixture on our balcony, regardless of which city the balcony looked over. We developed a little game as CS was growing older and knew – in theory, at least – about his American grandmother’s concerns and best wishes. Whenever he saw a breeze stirring the windsock, CS would say, “That means Meiguo Grandma [American grandma] is thinking of me.” His Meiguo Grandma passed away in 2019 and we gently modified the saying. Now, when he notices the windsock fluttering, he says, “That means I’m thinking of Meiguo Grandma.” This is a fine mobile legacy, suitable for a boy who may find himself comfortably living in many different and quite diverse locations throughout his root-free life. Whether it be in China or in London or Los Angeles or Lima or Lagos, he will not be held back by fear of the unknown. CS has no unbreakable ties to a hometown or extended family, no provincial attitudes about the superiority of his hometown’s conventions – he has no hometown! This young man is being raised to be truly international, to judge every situation and every opportunity against the simple standard of “Will I have a better life there?”
Maybe that’s one reason, when asked what new language he wanted to study, he mentioned Japanese, Spanish, and Russian before finally settling on German. One of the foreign teachers from Zhengzhou, “Uncle Martin”, has now retired to his peaceful forest in Germany. But Uncle Martin had better get ready. Some year, Chester may show up unexpectedly on his doorstep, eager to meet and speak in German with his “little brother” Albert. Then the following year, CS may be visiting his “little brother” Misha in Russia or one of his “aunts” in London. Maybe he will even drop by his father’s childhood hometown in Missouri to see for himself the fabled Little Dry Fork Creek.
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Tune in next week for the thrilling conclusion - as much as an ongoing family adventure can have a conclusion. While you wait, please stop by my Buy Me A Coffee page and make a small donation. Anything over my daily minimum caffeine injection of chemical sunshine goes into Chester’s college fund.