The Po Show

Memorial Day

I feel like singing "Memory" from Cats or Barbara Streisand's "The Way We Were" (you know, "Memories, like the corners of my miiiiiind"). I know every word to both, which is kind of sad.

Memorial Day is cemetery day for my family. Time not for honoring soldiers of distant wars, but for good old-fashioned Asian ancestor worship. We make little bouquets of flowers, one for each of the ever-increasing numbers of our personal dead at Forest Lawn in the Hollywood Hills. When I was a child, we would go to sit through a memorial service, and then visit the graves of my mother's aunt and uncle, who died long before I was born. Now my dad is there, next to a Marine named Claude Thompson, under his crepe myrtle tree that gets bigger every year. My aunt and uncle are there, down the row. My grandparents are there, further down the hill, overlooking the Disney Imagineering Studios. My cousin Henry is there, in a little alcove where the urn drawers are stacked four high. When we go to visit, we bring them each a little bouquet, fill their built-in vases with water, and leave our flowery offerings when we say goodbye.

I can't be there today, of course, so I make the rounds in my mind. The grass is green and well-manicured and the headstones are all flat against the earth. I say hi to them all, especially my dad.

In three days, my niece will give birth to a new baby girl via scheduled c-section. May 29 was my dad's birthday, so when it was clear that she had to have a repeat section, and could choose what day to have the baby around her June 1 due date, that is the day they chose.

Talk about a nice memorial.