Once my father forgot my birthday
Posted: 18/01/2026
I'm both a very different person to who I was a year ago, and yet stubbornly a very similar person, and it's really getting on my nerves!!!
In more seriousness, I wish I could get my father out of Canada right now, and give him a better life. But we both feel so helpless. He went all the way to China, lost everything, and came back to a changed world and a son seperated from him, and though he probably doesn't want his personal life being talked about so much, there's just been so much going on to him in the past few years that I wish I could have stepped up and helped him with. I wish he were able to spend a day with his son without having to worry about his job or his life or his future. I couldn't even spend a day with him when I went to Canada to see him a year ago. I don't know when l'll next see him. And to be sure, I don't blame him for not remembering to wish me happy birthday that year. January 17 would have just been another working day in his life. I just wish he wasn't so unburdened to be able to wish his son a happy birthday.
I associate the music of Moby (especially this song Porcelain, and Why Does My Heart Feel So Bad?) with my father in particular. It used to play very often at the cafe my mother ran in Guangzhou before it was vandalised and forced to close. For a long time I could not find those songs before I noticed the Iyrics in one of the house or trance long sets my father sent me (and continues to send me) on Soundcloud. Now Play by Moby is one of my most played albums, and was the first CD I ever bought. It'll be the first CD I play on in my truck once I have my CD player installed.
This photo of me shovelling snow was taken on the 1st of January, 2020. That was the second to last time I was in Canada -- six years ago now, I was only 13 and already I was flying across America alone. I miss that house and the cats and my cousins and my aunt. I need to send her a letter sometime, remind my cousin we need to finish Halo 2 together.
For you all wondering, I wrote all of this on the early morning of the 16th and waited until now to post it. My canadian father remembered. This is all I wanted for my birthday. I don't mind if you forgot.