Made in 1910

My maternal grandma is 97 years old. For someone her age, she's in pretty good shape and fiercely independent, but when you're almost a century old, your body does get worn, and her leg muscles have been grumbling incessantly in recent days.

Despite having known her all my life, I haven't been very civil to her since my rebellious early teens. Now, I am past acting like James Dean but our static relationship has come to be the accepted way of life. The lack of conversation partly explains why my Cantonese sucks so bad. But even if I could speak the language, she's now hard of hearing. I do help her with stuff on occasion and when she asks, showing the care through actions, but I know it's far from ideal.

I don't know how long God's mercy on her will last, but the fact is that she isn't a Christian and doesn't seem close to being one at this point in time. Which leaves me feeling blue, as I recall her sacrifices for me particularly when I was a kid; how she's served and taken care of me. Despite her controlling ways (as the mother of seven, grandmother of 13 and great-grandmother of five), I do, after all, love her.

I took these shots because I needed to preserve her on 'film'—memory is so unreliable.

Poh-poh, June 07