look ma! no hands! the other day, i received a phone call suggesting/summoning me to go to china asap. as soon as possible. i was asked on a tuesday afternoon so i would have left on wednesday. as of today, wednesday, i am not any closer to china nor am i planning to be any closer for the forseeable future that spans this upcoming week. the reason for the summons was a family issue back there. it was an issue and a concern, not quite an emergency. or maybe it was an emergency, i don't know. i didn't quite get all the information concerning the situation right away so i was left to speculate.



to walk through the steps in my head of getting a phone call saying "can you go to china tomorrow?" the first thing i was trying to figure out was if this was indeed an emergency. i have nothing to do here in the states for the time being so i have the time to go but i was also not dying to go jaunting off to china at a moment's notice. especially without a really good reason. but a family issue should be a good enough reason right? regardless of if it's an emergency or not.



what happened after the initial phone call was a mild evaluation of the situation. what's going on? what am i going for? what do i have to do? do i have to go? how long would i have to go for? what am i missing out on? is this a command or a suggestion?



are these not shit questions to ask? if people are saying "go to china, we've decided you need to go (for family no less)." isn't that a good enough reason? why get details? why assess the situation? just fucking go bitch. get on the plane with the ticket that you don't even have to buy and go. but no, i made my phone calls, consulted my people, took my sweet time and basically procrastinated on giving an answer or committing to a plan of action. on general principle, in matters involving family, you should just go. but i, in my apparent lack of filial piety and concern, was hesitant to just pick up and run. let me remind you that all i do daily is sit on my ass and unproductive away.



as it turns out, i don't need to go. or at least i've been assured that it's not anywhere near an emergency so i don't need to go. it may have been overreacting from the people who thought i should go, it may have been the situation getting better, it may have been anything but basically the story is that i don't need to go to china today, tomorrow, yesterday. and i'm happy about that. and yet i feel shitty about it. not even effective shitty like this is rocking my world shitty but a creeping shitty, more like shame, in reacting so skeptically and critically to an urgent summons concerning the well being of family.



they ask "what has become of our children today?" and i'm afraid that my personal answer to the question is: i'm sorry.