This is a picture of me and my elder son, Mark Benedict Cheong. He’s just turned 25 today so humour me as I take a meandering path through reminisce and memories and on through to what lies ahead.
“Close your eyes,
Have no fear,
The monster's gone,
He's on the run
And your daddy's here,”
When his mother and I separated in 2000, Mark was only 8. His mother and I may have had our differences (and still do) but we did agree that the separation should impact Mark, Megan and Michael as little as was humanly possible.
In order to ensure they had as much of a normal upbringing as possible, we balanced the time they had at their home with time spent staying over with me. Mark had two weeknights a week with me on his own as well as alternate weekends along with Megan and Michael so we could all do the 'family' things, and this worked quite nicely indeed.
In the early part of 2000, Mark was in Primary 2 and we had a weird trial thing when his mother was living away while I stayed with the kids. I would wake up early and help Mark get ready for school then we'd sit outside on the concrete wall of the culvert, waiting for his bus.
We'd talk about stuff, and sometimes I'd point out some of the stars and planets still visible in the brightening sky. I don't know that many but can point out one or two constellations - ‘Look there’s Orion the Hunter and you can see Orion’s belt and the bow’ - and the brighter objects in the sky.
I recall we also did talk about the separation and impending divorce and what life would be like after.
I also remember little things. Things that seem meaningless and even insignificant to others, and sometimes I do think they are indeed inconsequential in the greater scheme of things. Things like the little snack cakes he liked which I always bought for him to take to school. I don’t even remember the name of it now, but I do remember he liked them. So I bought them.
Those were very nice times which I missed terribly when I eventually traded places with his mother and I moved out instead.
“Before you go to sleep,
Say a little prayer,
Every day
In every way,
It's getting better and better,”
It wasn't a conventional father-son relationship but we managed. And through the years of playing computer games together, teaching him to cycle, scolding him for not doing his homework (I once threw his homework out the door, I really did!), bringing him in to my classroom when I was lecturing in Design and Communications one night a week, and talking about a whole heap of stuff, we somehow managed to maintain our own version of a father-son relationship.
I wasn’t always there, of course, and sometimes when I was there, I wasn’t maybe wholly there too. And of course there were many things I think I could have done better. But we managed, I think.
“Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful,
Beautiful boy,
Out on the ocean sailing away,
I can hardly wait
To see you to come of age,
But I guess we'll both
Just have to be patient,”
There was a period when he kinda drifted away. Late teenage years. I did too, in my own way, with my parents when I was his age. And though I wished it wasn’t that way, I accepted that I wouldn’t be able to see him as often when he was 18 as when he was 8. And I wished I could be there to ease him through any bumps and potholes like the ones I crashed through when I was in my late teens. But I accepted too that this is not something one pushes.
I wasn't around when he went off to the army (I was overseas working on a project) but I wished I was there and I wrote about it here.
I was glad to be around for one or two other significant moments though, like the day he moved into his hall at the University. Or when he decided to go to East Timor on a short charity trip and I arranged it with my East Timor-based brother and a friend who had ties to the country.
And I was also glad that when Mei and I got married, we merged all our lives seamlessly.
When he’d finished with the army, we managed to cobble together a short father-son roadtrip and though it was not as encompassing as I would have liked, it was still rather fun. The poor young man wanted to save me money and used his own towel in our hotel in Melaka as he mistook the sign on the back of the door to list usage costs rather than what they were - replacement costs for lost items. Like towels.
Except for a short while went things went quite well, I’ve never been very well off and the kids all know that so we’ve always tempered our expectations of what we can do or where we can go together. So I was very touched by this little gesture of his then. Again, not very significant in some ways, but it sure meant a lot to me.
“'Cause it's a long way to go,
A hard row to hoe
Yes, it's a long way to go
But in the meantime,
Before you cross the street,
Take my hand,
Life is what happens to you,
While you're busy making other plans,”
So now, my elder boy has turned 25. At this point in my own life, I had moved to another country to live (my second foreign-land-become-home), worked for someone then came out and started a business on my own, and a few months after turning 25 I got married to Mark’s mother.
Mark’s certainly not on the cusp of a mirroring life and for that I am really rather grateful. He’s taking things in his own time and that’s how it should be.
He isn’t standing still though - he’s lived overseas while doing an exchange programme, he’s travelled extensively through Europe, he’s acted in plays and now has his own theatre company! OK he’s got partners, but still. His own theatre company! How cool is that!
So the little 8-year-old looking along my pointing arm up towards the constellation of The Hunter has begun to hunt down his own dream. No need for anyone to point out the stars for him, for he’s well capable of searching them out himself. And he’s proven it time and time again.
I’ve told him many times of how proud I am of him, but this is probably the first time I’ve written it in print.
So, Mark, yes, I’m proud of who you are. Of your intelligence, your conscience, your sense of right and wrong, your ability to speak up when things aren’t quite right. I admire your talents and am proud of how you’ve put them to use. I respect that you understand your limitations and I respect too how you try to push some of those boundaries out.
So on your 25th birthday (still a few minutes of that left as I type this) let me wish you once again wisdom and strength. And I’ll throw in happiness and fulfilment too cos I think that covers just about everything.
And remember, as you add on the years, you’ll never stop being my…
“Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful,
Beautiful boy,”
with thanks to John Lennon for the beautiful lyric.
