When my parents came to visit us in the United States during April 1997, we were living in an apartment near 19th Avenue in Daly City, close to Golden Gate Park. The Botanical Garden in Golden Gate Park was free to enter at the time and my mother, who loves flowers, especially liked the flowers and plants in the park. Unfortunately, since I was busy working as a newly hired software engineer in a small startup company and had a long commute from Daly City to Novato City in Marin County, we couldn’t visit Golden Gate Park very often.

At the end of 1997, after my family moved from Daly City to East San Jose, I changed jobs to work at Lattice Semiconductor, a programmable chip hardware company. Since I was working in a hardware company as a software developer, my workload was much lighter now as the delivery cycle of software products was driven by the hardware chip delivery cycle which is usually slow. My father liked outdoor activities and my mother and I liked flowers, so I started to drive my parents and my daughter to the nearby parks to walk around and to see flowers almost every weekend. I still remember when my mother first walked in Overfelt Garden Park, she immediately pointed to the evergreen trees on our left side and said: “These are osmanthus trees. We can come here to smell the fragrance of osmanthus in the autumn.” It was my first time seeing osmanthus trees in the United States and I thought they were short, less than two meters high, unlike the tall osmanthus trees I saw in China before.

During the next autumn, in 1998, we went to Overfelt Park just to smell the fragrance of osmanthus. Although the silver osmanthus flowers were sparse and could not fill the air with fragrance, my mother stood among the osmanthus trees, putting her nose close to the silver flowers and said with a smile, “It smells very good!” This scene is engraved in my memory with the joy of my first autumn with the fragrance of osmanthus in the United States.

In November 1998, after my son was born, my mother went back to China alone due to illness and my father stayed with us to help me take care of my newborn son and kindergarten daughter. I often drove my father and two children to Overfelt Garden Park, as it was very close to our home. I remember the purple morning glories blooming at the entrance of the park in summer and the aggressive geese by the lakeside in spring.

In the summer of 2000, before my daughter entered third grade, my family moved to South San Jose for a better school district. After moving, I stopped visiting Overfelt Garden Park and the name of Overfelt Garden faded from my memory.

In the summer of 2018, I moved from San Jose, California to Waltham, Massachusetts to accompany my daughter’s Ph.D. study in Brandeis University. While talking with my son who lived in San Jose, California over the phone, I suddenly heard of Overfelt Garden Park again, because my son liked to play Pokemon Go and there were many Pokemon in Overfelt Garden Park. I remembered the sweet-scented osmanthus in Overfelt Garden and started to look for the sweet-scented osmanthus while enjoying the gorgeous autumn colors in the East Coast. Unfortunately, I never saw nor smelt the sweet-scented osmanthus.

In September 2022, after returning to Silicon Valley in California from Massachusetts with my daughter’s family, we lived in an apartment for a few months. I happened to see several huge trees with silver osmanthus blossoms across the street from our apartment. The trees were taller than a one-floor house. I frequently walked there to smell the sweet-scented osmanthus which reminded me of the osmanthus trees in Overfelt Garden Park again.

In early 2023, my daughter’s family moved from the apartment to a house in East San Jose. In September 2023, I visited Overfelt Garden Park again for the first time in more than twenty years to try to see and smell the sweet-scented osmanthus. Unfortunately, seeing that the sweet-scented osmanthus trees were gone made me sad, as the trees were an object far away from my hometown which reminded me of my late mother’s love for flowers.

I suddenly wanted to see the forest of osmanthus and smell the fragrance of osmanthus which filled the air, such a scene can only be found in Xindu Guihu, Sichuan in my memory.

My longing for the massive osmanthus scene was finally fulfilled in October 2024.

Seeing the flowers suddenly made me remember the time my Mom and Dad visited Overfelt Garden in the United States and made me smile. Seeing the flowers again brought me the same happiness I felt back then.

Postscript:

Before returning to China at the end of September 2024, through an alumni from Sichuan Normal University, I invited Sichuan’s gold medal tour guide Jiang Yu to plan a few days of travel for my aunts and uncles from my mother’s side in Zigong. I thought of Xindu Guihu, so I put this place on the itinerary. Unfortunately, my aunts and uncles did not want to stay overnight outside, so this plan fell through. Finally, I accompanied them on a one-day tour, chartered a six-seater business car for 1,000 yuan, and went to Lizhuang, Shunan Bamboo Sea, and Yibin.

The autumn colors in 2021

The White Mountains in New Hampshire:

The Flume Gorge in New Hampshire:

The North Bridge Conccord in Massachusetts:

The Gibbet Hill in Massachusetts:

In 2022, I encountered the silver osmanthus huge trees.

After my parents came to the United States, we moved from Daly City to East San Jose. All the memories and thoughts were written here after I read my late mother’s limerick (1998).

I have a long and interesting history of playing Pokemon Go with my children in San Francisco and in Boston here

In 2016, I had not thought of enjoying osmanthus in the golden autumn, but I enjoyed the of tasting golden osmanthus flowers in the golden autumn, as I had dried osmanthus at home. This is the story

Today is Saturday. In the morning, my son told me that he and his wife, Zelene, planned to come over for dinner around 5:30 PM. Zelene wanted millet porridge and my son wanted Korean-style fried rice noodles.

After taking an afternoon nap, I got up to make dinner. I started cooking the millet porridge first, since it would take more than two hours. Then I started to make lemonade, one of my son’s favorite drinks. Last year I squeezed out some lemon juice and froze it to save as lemon juice ice cubes, but there was only enough to make three glasses of lemonade. I knew from last week that this was not enough lemonade so I went to the backyard to pick a big lemon and came home and rinsed it. I looked at the lemon, which was bigger than my fist, and wondered how to squeeze the juice? After all, my manual juice squeezer can only hold lemons that are up to the size of an egg. I suddenly remembered that when I went to my college roommate, Ping’s house for dinner in big Boston in Massachusetts, I often saw her patting and pressing whole lemons with the skin on and then cutting and squeezing the juice directly. I put the big lemon on the cutting board and turned it while patting it. After a while, the hard lemon became soft. I held the lemon with both hands and squeezed until the juice came out from a hole I had cut into a large bowl. When I saw that some pulp was squeezed out, I felt that I patted the lemon too hard. After squeezing out most of the juice, I cut the lemon into half and scooped out more pulp into the large bowl, then added sugar and boiling water to make a large porcelain jar of lemonade.

It took too much time to make the lemonade today. When they arrived, I had only cooked the twice-cooked pork belly, the rice noodles and rice were not yet cooked.

I rarely cook fried rice noodles so I didn’t have a good sense of how many ingredients to use. The raw materials I prepared such as minced beef, rice noodles soaked in water, chopped carrots and onions were too much for tonight’s dinner.

While stir-frying the rice noodles, I said to them: “Yesterday, one of my high school alumni who came back from Seattle gave me a box of Qingtuan. Do you want to try it?” Zelene replied: “Is your friend from Shanghai? As Shanghai people like to eat Qingtuan.” I said: “No, she is from Sichuan just like me. I haven’t eaten Qingtuan before.” Zelene said: “Let’s try it together.” After the stir-fried rice noodles was ready, the children set the dinner table with bowls, chopsticks and napkins. Before starting our dinner, I followed the instructions given by my friend: “Remove the plastic wrap, steam in a pot, and let it cool before eating.” I steamed two Qingtuan that had a filling of red beans and black sesame for dessert.

There were only two dishes tonight: twice-cooked pork belly and stir-fried rice noodles (with minced beef, green vegetables, bean sprouts, red onions, and carrots). Zelene had millet porridge, my son and I had the leftover rice. I passed the porcelain jar of lemonade to my son and said: “The lemonade is made of fresh lemons with less sugar, drink it first. If it’s not enough, there are three more glasses of lemonade made from frozen lemon juice with more sugar.”

After taking a few sips of fresh lemonade, my son said: “It’s not sweet, it tastes good.” Zelene also took a few sips and said: “This lemonade is not sweet or bitter, it tastes good.” I laughed and said: “It means our lemons in the backyard are of high quality!” My son quickly finished the jar of lemonade. I took out a glass of sweeter lemonade from the oven for him but he noticed an ant floating in the glass and didn’t want to drink it. I took out the remaining two glasses of lemonade from the oven for my son. Fortunately, there were no ants in them, so he quickly finished them.

When we finish our dinner, the Qingtuan were finished steaming and had cooled for a while. Zelene cut the red bean filling Qingtuan into three portions of different sizes. She ate the smallest portion and my son ate the largest portion. They both said it was delicious. I liked it too. I then cut the black sesame filling Qingtuan into four portions. Zelene and I each had one portion, and my son ate two portions. Although my memory is not as good as before, I hope the scene of eating Qingtuan for the first time and the story behind it will stay with me forever.

Later, my daughter sent a text message from Shandong saying that her babies just woke up and wanted to see their grandmother. I quickly opened FaceTime and saw my daughter’s family and her in-laws were in the car ready to go out. After my son and Zelene greeted their niece and nephew, my daughter asked me to sing Twinkle Twinkle Little Star for my granddaughter Sue. After singing the song, I greeted my grandson Ben, whose arms were full with various stickers, and said hello to Ben’s Nainai, then hung up in a hurry. Although the time was short, it was also the high point of the night. My son listened to me singing and whispered to Zelene: “Look how happy she is!”

I was really happy to see and chat with my daughter’s family from a distance via FaceTime while having dinner and chatting with my son and daughter-in-law.

There was some millet porridge and twice-cooked pork belly left over from tonight, they will be my lunch tomorrow. I plan to stir-fry the remaining ingredients that were originally prepared for fried rice noodles with the leftover twice-cooked pork belly as a dish with the leftover millet porridge.

This year, many flowers are blooming in the orchard in Xincun, a suburb of Changping, Beijing: roses, peonies, hibiscus, bougainvillea, dahlias, and begonias…

The orchard with hundreds of flowers in full bloom has become a veritable flower garden.

As a flower maniac, I took many photos of pretty and gorgeous flowers here, Ying, my uncle Yongyuan’s wife, changed her WeChat profile picture to a blooming big red rose, so beautiful!

Watching the bees buzz around a purple rose, I said, “This rose must be very sweet.”

Ying smelled it and said, “It smells so good! We can use it to make rose candy.”

I answered: “In the past, my nanny Yeyi used sugar to pickle rose petals. The pickled rose candy smelled very good and it was delicious when eaten in glutinous rice balls!”

Ying said, “We can collect this type of rose petals to make rose candy too.”

The next day, I saw my uncle Yongyuan collecting all the petals of the bloomed roses that Ying and I talked about to make rose candy yesterday. I asked happily: “Are you collecting them to make rose candy?”

My uncle replied: “Rose candy? Nonsense. I am making rose wine!”

I immediately felt that I had met a liquor lover who was better than me, as I was just a flower lover.

There are many roses in California. I had used sugar to pickle rose petals to make glutinous rice balls in the past, a thing I watched and learnt from my nanny Yeyi when I was little. I enjoyed using various fruits to wine for many years; but I only started to make osmanthus wine last year after I learned it from my uncle Yongjia in Nongtuan Mountain, Zigong.

Today, my uncle Yongyuan’s words made me feel that all the uncles on my mother’s side are true liquor lovers. I told myself that I will definitely make some rose wine after coming back home.

For three weeks, my nest is empty once again. My mood now is completely different from when my children were studying in Europe. At that time, I was filled with worry, now I am filled with peace.

I have time to savor home slowly. I think a warm home can really make life full of sunshine.

This February, my beloved second aunt, my father’s little sister, passed away. I realized my pain while paying my tribute to her while far away from her. She, the last parent-generation relative who cared, loved, and watched my brother and I grow up, is gone, and there is no more such relative who remembers our childhood stories. The end of her life is also the ending of some stories of life, which is painful…

Letting go of the pain, thinking that although my parents have passed away for many years, my brother and I can chat about our dear parents and relatives in heaven and talk about our hometown and the relatives and friends there, those chats warm my heart! I am grateful to my parents for showing us the warmth of home throughout their lives, so that my brother and I can always talk about trivial matters across the ocean and understand each other and encourage each other.

After my brother encouraged me to create a channel to publish my short videos, whenever his friends praised my short videos, my brother would forward the chat records to me in time. My original intention of making short videos was to help my brother and sister-in-law’s business, after some time, I started to entertain myself by telling stories in my heart, which I enjoyed a lot; the pleasure of bringing entertainment to others through my short videos is an unexpected enjoyment to me. This is the feeling of human love, floating and flowing warmly in the world by words, by messages, and by short videos.

Last night, while chatting with my daughter on the phone, I heard an interesting story about my little grandson, Ben. After his one and half year old little sister tore off the duck attached to the head of her plush toy, she was very upset but was not able to express it in words.

Ben saw his sister was upset and said to his mother: “Use tape (to stick the duck back)!” When I heard it, I laughed and replied: “He really is your son! He already knows the power of tape.” My daughter also knew early on that tape can repair walls, fix books, and things, which made me very proud, as when I was a child, I did not known about tape. Until one day, my daughter told me sadly that the tape failed to fix the fallen hem of her skirt.

Her words made I felt sad and regretful because when I was my daughter’s age, I liked knitting, crocheting, cross-stitching, embroidery and other handicrafts. I remember that my father bought a shed and special needles from Chengdu for me to do embroidery; but my daughter has never seen me do any needlework, because I was busy working and never had the time. This is a glimpse of the tiredness of the first generation immigrant working mothers. After that incident, I began to consciously let my daughter and son see or enjoy me needlework (my daughter learned mending when she was a graduate student, but my son never learned it). I felt at ease knowing that I had tried my best. The three circles in the photo are three embroidery sheds of different sizes.

My daughter also told me on the phone that people praised the trousers I made for Ben using the two long sleeves of an old sweatshirt. I was very happy that my daughter could chat with me about trivial family matters in an interesting way.

Before my mother had Alzheimer’s disease, she often talked about her needlework on the phone, such as altering a piece of clothing or mending an apron. Unfortunately, at that time I was too busy with work and housework and didn’t have the energy to praise my mother.

My daughter also asked me if I had a good dinner last night. This is because I told her the day before yesterday that her brother and sister-in-law would come to dinner on Saturday. I told my daughter that on Saturday morning, Shan (daughter-in-law) said she wanted to eat porridge, but didn’t say what kind of porridge; I cooked three kinds of porridge: millet and pumpkin porridge (millet itself needs to be cooked for two hours), rice and sweet potato porridge (add sweet potato and cook for another hour after the rice blooms in the pot), and rice, glutinous rice and green bean porridge (these three things are soaked in water for a few hours and then put into the pot with cold water to start stew). After hearing this, my daughter praised me. I told her that I made two versions of twice-cooked pork: one that her brother liked, and one with garlic sprouts and steamed bread slices, fried a plate of carrots, lettuce and pumpkin cubes and a plate of broccoli, and boiled a lotus root soup.

There are people to eat, people to listen, and many pots to clean, this is a great joy that only chefs can enjoy.

When I was cooking the sweet potato porridge on Saturday, I suddenly remembered my tiredness of working in the past. There was a period of time I wanted to eat sweet potato porridge and knew how to cook it, but I didn’t have the time or energy to make it. I often went to the deli next to the Chinese supermarket and paid three dollars to buy a cup of very watery sweet potato porridge. At that time, I said to myself: “When I have lots of free time, I will cook a big pot of sweet potato porridge and eat it slowly.” After I became free, my desire to eat sweet potato porridge faded, so I still haven’t cooked a big pot of sweet potato porridge for myself to eat slowly. Today, as I cooked sweet potato porridge for my daughter-in-law, I felt very happy after thinking of this past, because I finally had time to cook sweet potato porridge and eat it slowly.

It is very nourishing to savor the taste of home in my spare time, in my temporarily empty nest.

Yesterday, I went on a planned day trip with my son and daughter-in-law for the first time, and I had a great time. In the evening, while reporting to my daughter, who was far away in China, about my day trip, she suggested: “Mom, you should write a story about this trip.”

Planning

Last Saturday, my son texted me: “Do you want to go Mystery Spot with us around next weekend?” I immediately replied: “Yes” He then texted: “On Sunday, April 21st, around 12. I bought the tickets.”

This Friday, I texted them: “On Sunday, after visiting the Mystery Spot, do you like to have dinner at home?” My son replied: “It is close to Santa Cruz Beach so we can go to there and eat something.”Later he texted: “Tomorrow we’ll arrive around 11 to pick you up.”

before Leaving Home

I started to dress up at ten o’clock on Sunday morning. The weather is warm today. After trying floral skirts with light-colored tops several times, I felt that black was better, so I wore a knitted black long-sleeved shirt with a black and white pattern short skirt. I also wore additional things, a necklace with the word “love” written in more than a hundred different languages which was a Mother’s Day gift from my daughter-in-law last year; a pearl ring, which was given to me by my daughter many years ago; and a silk scarf, which was given to me by Ben’s grandma last year. After getting dressed up, I felt happy even before going out.

My son and daughter-in-law came to pick me up at 11 o’clock. I specifically recommended them to inspect the peach tree that was now bearing thumb-sized peaches, as my son was the one who labored to plant this peach tree in our backyard last year.

the Mystery Spot

“The Mystery Spot is a gravitational anomaly located in the redwood forests just outside of Santa Cruz, California. It is a circular area of effect around 150 feet or 46 meters in diameter. Within the Mystery Spot you will be stunned as your perceptions of the laws of physics and gravity are questioned.” The admission fee is 10 US dollars. It is an extremely short tour so the tour guide needs to slow down the tour to make it a 40 minute long experience.

My son booked our tour at 12:20, with a group of more than ten tourists, our tour guide was an eloquent pretty young girl. While following her around, our group enjoyed spending time at this nearby small scenic spot. After the visit, I felt that language is also very mysterious, as the tour guide often made fun of herself to amuse us and by changing her cadence to pique our interests to prevent boredom on this very short tour around this small place.

I’ve been to the Mystery Spot many times and never felt sick before. Today, while climbing uphill to the cabin, I felt that my legs were heavy and my chest was so tight that I had difficulty breathing, a bit like the altitude sickness I experienced not long ago in Cuzco, Peru. This sudden physical discomfort made me think that it would be best not to come here often.

When we walked into the tilted wooden cabin, the visual illusions immediately intensified, our group crowded into this small space and became excited, I felt my surroundings were very noisy. Looking at the familiar layout of the cabin, I asked my son: “Do you remember you have been here?” My son said: “I don’t remember.” I said confidently: “You have been here!” My son replied: “You said I’ve been here, XXXX?” Because it was so noisy here, I didn’t hear clearly what my son said, so I asked, “What did you say?” Zelene, standing next to Duke, said, “Duke is talking in Chinese. “I said to my son: “I didn’t hear it clearly, could you please say it again?” My son repeated it, but I still could not pick up what he meant, so I started to suspect that the altitude sickness had made me slow. Zelene smiled and said, “I think Duke said it very clearly. He was saying if he had been here, there should be photos of him here.” I laughed and said to Zelene: “I really didn’t catch it. You know Duke’s Chinese best.”

My son was hanging on the doorframe of the cabin to show us his feet tilted to the right noticeably.

After visiting the Mystery Spot, I suggested we go hiking a bit, but my son said: “Sorry, my shoes are not good for hiking.” I looked down saw he wore a pair of slippers and I asked, “Are you comfortable walking in these slippers?” My son said: “I’m used to it.” Zelene said, “Oh, I suggested that he wear these slippers to get some air for his feet, because he has sweaty feet.” I laughed and said to Zelene: “I have sweaty feet, Eileen and Duke have sweaty feet, Alex also has sweaty feet, Ben already has sweaty feet. Do you have sweaty feet?” “I don’t,” Zelene replied. I smiled and said: “Your baby will have more chance not having sweaty feet.”

Actually, my own father does not have sweaty feet, but my brother and I both have sweaty feet. In the past, when we didn’t change shoes and socks every day, I really wished I didn’t have sweaty feet, because sweaty feet are very uncomfortable and shoes of the sweaty feet smell bad.

There is no cell phone signal at the Mystery Spot, so we can’t use GPS navigation. At the first fork in the road leaving the site, my son made a right turn sign. Remembering he turned right into the Mystery Spot, I reminded him: “You should turn left.” My son said, “We are going to the beach, which is on our right.” I looked at the big map in the car and sure enough, the ocean is on our right. I suddenly felt very happy as I really don’t need to worry about the route and direction when going out with my kids. While my son was driving, Zelene was looking for a restaurant for lunch. Though we were near the ocean, my son doesn’t eat seafood and I don’t eat fast food so there were very few choices. She picked a Korean restaurant.

Korean lunch

It was already one o’clock in the afternoon when we arrived at the restaurant. The restaurant was very empty, I sat face to face with my son and daughter-in-law at a table next to the window. I’m not familiar with Korean food, watching they discussing what to order, I joked: “Eileen said that nowadays we need to ask you for good restaurants as you eating outside often.”

After ordering a today’s special of stewed beaf rib and a typical Korean fried rice noodles, we ate the free Korean cold dishes and chatted while waiting for our dishes to be served. I told them about Ben’s trip in China: “Ben’s grandma is teaching him how to speak Chinese and Ben can count one, two, three, four and five in Chinese now.” I also told them a story of Ben’s behavior change: “After Ben turned two years old, he started to cry and got up to open the door to get out as soon as we put him on the bed in his room. Eileen asked Alex to install a door lock, so Ben could not open his door from the inside. Then Ben stood by the door alone in his room and cried for many days, finally he stopped crying and stopped trying to open the door. He stays on his bed playing until he is tired, then falls asleep.” I concluded: “When raising a baby, you have to be firm sometimes.”

The two dishes were not small. Zelene likes vegetables, my son likes meat, and I like everything. The stewed beef rib also has rice noodles and very big carrots. The noticeable red carrots in the stew reminded me of my late aunt’s saying: “Carrot is the poor man’s ginseng.”

As my son started to teach high school students, in one-on-one classes for math and economics, I asked him: “How is your throat?” My son said: “I drink more water now, and it’s fine.” Zelene added: “I asked him to bring chrysanthemum tea and honey to his office, so he often drank chrysanthemum tea now.” I was very pleased to hear this. Zelene added: “Duke likes teaching. He often talks to me about his students.” I asked my son curiously: “How many students have you taught now?” “More than twenty.” he replied. I asked again: “Are they all taught face-to-face in a classroom?” He said: “Some students are still taking online classes.” Zelene smiled and said: “Duke has DaBaiTu candy in his office, and some students asked him what it was. I told Duke, if students ask you, tell them they are candies and let them taste it. ”

I also chatted with Zelene about her job and very happy to hear she is doing well.

The stewed beaf rib and the fried rice noodles were delicious and we finished them all, only the rice was not finished. Today’s lunch plus tip is $100. After lunch, my son drove us to the beach for a walk.

Walking along the beach

My son drove to the Santa Cruz Board Walk and saw the parking lot was full. I said： “I always park my car on W Cliff Dr near the Lighthouse. Let’s try parking there.” Unfortunately the parking near the Lighthouse was also full. Not long after driving pass the Lighthouse, the road to the Natural Bridge Beach was still closed for cars and only bicycles and pedestrians were allowed to pass. My son parked the car on the roadside in a residential area not far from the beach. We walked to the seaside in a few minutes. Smelling the unique saltiness in the seaside air, I shared the reason why I like to visit the beach: “I specially like to go to the beach during the pollen season because there is very little pollen in the air at the beach.”

We walked towards the lighthouse together and passed by the beach for unleashed dogs under the cliff. Watching the dogs having fun on the beach, I asked my son: “Do you remember us coming here before?” My son said: ” I remember we went to a beach with dogs, but I don’t remember where.” I smiled and said, “We came here after Eileen went to college. After seeing a lot of dogs playing happily here, you said you want to have a dog too. I told you: ‘Okay, if you get straight A’s on your final this year, you will have a dog.’” After hearing this, Zelene said, “Oh, I didn’t know you wanted a dog when you were a kid.” I continued: “Duke didn’t want a dog too much, as he didn’t get straight A’s that year, then he never mentioned wanting a dog anymore.” Duke said, “I thought it’s too troublesome to have a dog, so I was not interested anymore.” I asked again: “We were excited about getting a dog. Do you remember that we already named the dog?” Duke said, “I don’t remember.” I said, “We said we would name the dog Eileen, because Eileen always orders us around at home. Now we can throw a ball out and command the dog: ‘Eileen, go fetch!’ Later I told Eileen how we named the dog, she joked we were so mean.” Zelene was very happy to hear this story. I told her: “When I went out with Eileen’s family, I often told stories about Eileen on our way back home. Alex enjoys listening too.”

I told another story about Duke when he was little: “When Duke started eating solid food, he ate Gerber’s canned baby food. Those foods were saltless, tasteless and very unpalatable. We had a neighbor who was a stay-at-home mother with two children, her daughter is younger than Eileen, and her son is younger than Duke. She often makes delicious noodles for her children. One day when I came home after work, I saw several children playing outside, and the mother was feeding her son noodles. I saw Duke really wanted to eat the noodles. The mother happily gave me a bowl of noodles to feed Duke. I felt so sad and full of regrets because I didn’t have the energy to make delicious noodles for Duke at that time.” I paused a bit and said: “I now feel that it is not bad to live with regrets. Making up for the regrets brings deeper satisfaction, this is why I often make soft noodles for Ben now.”

While walking along the beach, I was mostly talking, they were mostly listening. We also watched the people surfing on the sea for a while.

We took a group photo before leaving the beach. On the way home, I fell asleep because I was very tired from the fun day today.

Little Episodes

04-11-2014, two photos of the beach for unleashed dogs under the cliff near the Lighthouse:

Our family trip at the end of 2023 was planned by my daughter a few days in advance: taking a train ride on Saturday, December 30, at Felton’s Roaring Camp. After she made the online reservation, it started to rain for several days in a row. As she was worried the rain would spoil the fun of the train ride, she talked about the forecasted weather for December 30 at home daily. It sounded to me the weather forecast was unreliable as the forecasted weather for the 30th changed day by day. She also quizzed Alex and I about the speed of the train to increase our participation, awareness, and interest. After hearing the speed of train is only three miles per hour, I felt the ride would only be fun for kids, but I didn’t say so as I didn’t want to spoil the fun.

This morning, my daughter packed extra clothes, diapers, and snacks, also bottled different milks for her children; Alex took the driver seat and we hit the road right after nine o’clock. On this rainy Saturday morning, the southbound Highway 17 had very light traffic and the distant mountains were shrouded in white mist, a very pleasant morning view! While seeing the white fog and the dark mountains, Alex commented: “When I was little, I thought spirits are living in those places.” I agreed: “That scenery is the fairyland of imagination.”

After Alex parked the car in the gravel parking lot of Roaring Camp, it started to drizzle. As I didn’t bring an umbrella, I put my head down and quickly pushed my granddaughter’s stroller forward and enjoyed the tender green grass and the moist fresh air, thanks to the rain! Walking on the gravel road and crossing a white-roofed short bridge, I arrived at a spacious area with small buildings on both sides: schools, blacksmith shops, a small garden, small shops, etc. which reminded me of the TV series “Little House on the Prairie”. The sight brought a fresh yet familiar feeling.

The railway and the train station are on the right. While waiting for my daughter to get the ticket from the train station, I pushed my granddaughter’s stroller towards the train to see. This train had six carriages, four carriages has plastic transparent roofs in the front, the seats were filled with passengers of all ages; there were two carriages with wooden roofs at the back, most of the seats were empty. As I started to worry about the seats on the train filling up very soon, I was suddenly eager to take the train ride. After she got the train tickets, an attendant on the platform asked us to leave our strollers on the platform. Alex carried his daughter’s carseat, my daughter carried Ben, and I held a bag of clothes and scarves, we got on a carriage with a wooden roof and two rows of back-to-back seats. Five of us took almost half the row of seats because my granddaughter’s carseat was wide.

In the rain, sitting on the steam engine small train that was slowly moving up the hillside, my daughter and Alex took care of Ben who kept on walking on the narrow pathway between the carriage wall and our seated legs, they held him up to look at the lush green and damp ground of the forest from time to time; I sat next to my granddaughter, who was quiet in her carseat. I was immersed in the changing green colors of the forest and the flowing white mist while breathing in the fresh and damp air with a high concentration of negative ions in my imagination. Though the train conductor plus tour guide was enthusiastically talking about the forest, the redwood trees and the steam trains, his voice was vaguely heard and his words went past my ears like the wind. However, when I heard the tour guide saying: “This steam engine can climb about 20% of the slope under a low speed of three miles per hour, modern trains with high-speed cannot climb a similar slope.” I quickly made a calculation in my mind as I love geometry: “Geometry common sense, 90° is vertical, guess 18° is 20% in slope.” Doing geometric conversions let me entertain myself silently. It suddenly occurred to me that 50 years ago, my parents’ generation had a slow paced life and few opportunities: bearing hardships and standing hard work with resilience was a common thing; modern people have a fast paced life with many opportunities, carving instant success and benefit with anxiety is noticeable. The differences between generations may have similarity to the differences between old steam engines and modern train engines, as the difference of environment alters the functions and purposes which humans fit into.

Because of the rain, the train only stopped once at Bear Mountain (it usually stops three or four places in a ride) to let passengers take a walk and to enjoy the scenery. Many people got off the train and walked along the railroad to see the thousand-year old redwood trees in the rain. Alex and Ben and I did too. I asked my daughter to go along, but she wanted to stay with her daughter on the train. So I got off the train, followed the crowd to see the ancient redwood trees, and walked back, then I saw Ben leading his father while still strolling along the railroad. This scene reminded me of when Ben who had just learned to walk was leading his father on the beach, in Carmel-by-the-Sea on July 1 2023. At that time his sister was not yet born. Now his sister is over 5 months old and is coming along to ride the train with us. Time flies so fast! I accompanied them back to the ancient redwoods and took pictures of them. In the rain, we walked back in no hurry, as Ben wanted to cross one railroad track at a time, which was very slow. When the rain became heavy, Alex had to carry Ben on his shoulder to speedup the walk. After I sat on my seat in the train, I saw two ladies standing beside their bicycles and the wooden sculpture of a giant bear in the heavy rain, waiting for our train to leave so they can cross the railroad downhill. I quickly took a photo of this vibrant landscape in the rain out of admiration for those ladies.

After the train returned to the platform and we got off the train, the rain stopped. While walking back to the parking lot, my daughter pushed her daughter’s stroller, and Ben pushed his own stroller. Ben wanted to walk sideways again, so he tried to push his stroller up a ridge but failed, then he stepped up to the ridge and tried to pull the stroller up still failed. Alex pretended to fail at helping to pull the stroller so he could convince Ben to sit on his stroller. Finally we started on the way home.

While following the “two under two” family of four, I enjoyed watching them and also saw a beautiful spring scenery in California’s winter: a clear blue sky with white thin clouds, dark tall green trees with tender green grass.

Right after Alex drove out of the parking lot, we saw a very low rainbow that was mostly blocked by buildings. We enjoyed our year-end family trip and wanted to come back here in the future.

Roaring Camp’s narrow-gauge steam engine dates back to 1890 and was first used in the 1880s to haul giant redwood logs out of the mountains. Here is a more standard description of Roaring Camp.

Back home, I learned that the train slope is correlated to the value of tangent, not angle, such as: 10% slope = 5°, 18% = 10°, 21% = 12°, 58% = 30°, 100% = 45°, etc. Because both the wheels and railroads of the train are made by metal, the friction coefficient between metal is relatively small, so the slope that the train can climb is much smaller than that of the car. Thinking about the road in life, if you are used to a smooth road with small coefficient of friction, you probably need a much longer time to adjust yourself for going uphill or downhill with high slopes. However, if you are used to a bumpy road with high coefficient of friction, you probably can quickly adjust yourself going uphill or downhill with high slopes.

Little Episodes

1. We were sitting in one of the wooden-roof cars with two rows of back-to-back seats facing outside：

2. In the rain, sitting on the steam engine train that was slowly going uphill, I was immersed in the changing green colors and the flowing white mist between the trees：

3. Ben and his father together：

（Ben leads his father on the narrow railroad at the top of the Bear Mountain，2023-12-30。）

（On the narrow railroad at the top of the Bear Mountain, Ben walked on one railroad tie at a time carefully.）

（At Carmel-by-the-Sea Beach, Ben held a computer mouse in one hand and led his father forward with another hand, 2023-07-01.）

4. At the top of the Bear Mountain in the rain，two ladies with their bicycles

5. The spring scenery in California’s winter is beautiful: blue sky, white thin clouds, dare green tall trees and tender green grass：

Each week, the working class’s busiest day is usually Monday.

Today is Monday, Ben, my little grandson goes to daycare; Alex goes to the office, and my daughter works at home. I am always at home. Today I am taking care of Meimei, my more than three months old granddaughter.

In the afternoon after picking up Ben from daycare, my daughter had to work, and Meimei was sleeping soundly, so I was in charge of taking Ben to his before-dinner nap, accompanying him drinking milk and changing his diapers, which allowed me to accidentally witness Ben’s logic in action.

After Daylight Saving Time ended at November 5th, it gets dark after 5 pm in San Jose, so we stopped going out for a walk after dinner, because it gets even darker after our dinner at 7 pm. On Monday, after a busy working day and a homemade dinner, my daughter, Alex, and I walked between the dining room and the living room, following and playing with our active Ben while chatting about trivial things.

Because there is no TV at home, my daughter often jokes: “Ben is our TV.” Looking at Ben who was concentrated on playing his toys, I told the story of Ben that I saw in the afternoon. I accompanied Ben, who was lying on the single bed next to his crib, holding a bottle of milk, and drinking by himself. After I knelt down and took off his shoes and socks, he started to kick his bare feet in the air while drinking. When I stood up and bent over to take off his pants and change his diaper, he suddenly kicked his feet in my direction very quickly. Before I could escape, he kicked my left hip bone and it really hurt. I bent over looked at Ben and said, “Ben, your feet are for kicking soccer balls, not for kicking people. It hurts when you kick me.” After hearing what I said, Ben looked at me and immediately put down the milk bottle to use both his hands to grab his right foot towards his face. I was confused and wondered what was going on? So I stopped moving to watch him curiously. I saw him using both hands to bring his toes close to his mouth and blowing on his toes very seriously. Then he let go of his hands so his foot returned to the normal position. He picked up the bottle and continued to drink milk. I suddenly realized that Ben was blowing pain, because every time he bumped into something or fell down, we would blow on where he felt pain, which is a ritual for blowing off the pain to clam him. When he heard me saying it hurt, he grabbed his toes and blew off the pain, as his toes probably felt pain when they hit my hip bone.

After hearing this story, Alex and my daughter laughed. As Meimei started talking loudly while sitting on the high chair in the dinning room for a while, I picked her up. My daughter reminded me: “Mommy, today Meimei had a story too.” Then I told them Meimei’s story. At 11:30 this morning, I went to wake up Meimei who had been sleeping for more than two hours. She was sleeping soundly and could not open her eyes, so I held her shoulders to put her in a sitting pose to wake her up. After sitting on her little bed for a while with her eyes closed, Meimei opened her eyes and looked at me, then the corners of her mouth dropped, without making a sound or crying out, as if to say: “Grandma, I don’t like this position.” I quickly picked her up and then described Meimei’s expression to her mother, my daughter, adding: “Meimei has a really good temper.”

After hearing this, Alex said that he also had a story about Meimei from the office today. This immediately drew our attention. While chatting in the office today, a technician asked Alex: “How is your daughter?” Alex said: “My daughter is very good.” After hearing them talking about Alex’s daughter, another technician held up his cell phone and walked over, pointing to a photo on his phone and said: “Look, this is Alex’s daughter. Whenever I feel stressed or tired at work, I look at her photo. She immediately makes me feel better.” Here, Alex also took out his cell phone and pulled out the photo of Meimei the technician was talking about. This photo made my daughter and I both laugh. Meimei in the photo has pointing up hair, while smiling happily, her eyes are bent down, her mouth is closed and the corners of her mouth are turned up, her little face is full of flesh, and her double chin is as wide as her face. I guess anyone who sees our Meimei in this photo will feel happy. Looking at Meimei’s photo, I said that she had vomited twice today despite not spitting up for a long time. After hearing this, my daughter said: “It’s OK, as it said online that the baby may spit up milk again after four months due to some organ development. It seems that Meimei’s organ development is normal!”

On a cold and dark evening in autumn, after a busy day and homemade dinner in a warm home, watching Ben on TV, playing with him, and chatting about trivial and interesting things, it is very nourishing. This is one of the joys of raising babies.