Essay for "Cruise of Love"

What A Family is Composed of

“Blood is thicker than water”.

Everyone has heard this saying at some point or another. Highlighting the idea that blood ties are stronger than any other ties in life, this phrase is used universally.

It can indeed be true for many individuals. Yet, as with anything else, this phrase boxes out the outliers.

As a young child, hearing this simple phrase stumped me more than arithmetics or learning to play the piano ever could. I never seemed to be able to wrap my head around the concept of the distinction between blood and water.

The idea of blood was foreign to me.

I grew up knowing that the blood that ran through my veins were not a match to the blood that ran through my mother and father’s veins. My genetic composition was not the same as that of my parents. In this way, I was not like the rest of my classmates and friends. I was different.

This distinction as an outlier stuck with me and was present at nearly every moment of my life. Being different became a part of how I personally identified myself.

I remember the day I was officially told that I was adopted as if it were yesterday.

My mother and I had gone to the California Science Center to watch an IMAX movie about human life when I was in the second grade.

After the movie, we sat on the curb of the parking lot as we waited for my dad to pick us up. As she brought up the topic of adoption, I distinctly remember her gentle but firm, confident demeanor.

“Although you weren’t born from your dad and I, you were born from our hearts. You know that, right? We love you,” she said to me in a soft voice.

I recall nodding and replying to this with a voice just as soft,“Yea, I know…”

That was simply that and our lives pushed forward.

Finding out wasn’t a shock to my system nor did it provoke a meltdown or an inquiry, despite the common misconception that when you tell a child that they are adopted, their world will flip and flop all around.

Every child is different but for me, it was just what it was. I didn’t blink an eye and I suppose the root of this reaction can be tied to my family’s open book-like upbringing.

Deep down, I always knew that I was adopted. My adoption was never a secret of any sort. The annual adoption picnics that my family and I attended together as well as the casual talks regarding adoption gave that much away. After all, it didn’t quite take long for an inquisitive nearly seven-year-old girl to piece two and two together.

Although knowing that I was adopted had no physical effect on me, it did have an effect on my internal thought processes and feelings.

Dinners with family friends and meeting new people prompted many comments. I specifically remember friends of family stating their observations one after another.

To my dad, they’d remark, “She looks just like you. Your foreheads are identical and so are your eyes!”. To my mom, they’d exclaim, “Wow! She really has your hair”.

I felt that these were always the strangest and most confusing comments to hear. I could never wrap my mind around how family friends and strangers could claim that I resembled my parents when there was no DNA correlation between us. How could I have my mother’s hair or my father’s forehead if genetics played no role between our appearances?

They say that “blood is thicker than water”. Yet, for the longest time, this was a concept I couldn’t understand because I had never experienced blood. Blood ties were nonexistent in my life and as a result, this proverb was lost on me as a child.

However, the older I am becoming, the more I am beginning to understand what family truly is.

I had been so focused on what society, media, and the world tells us a family should be. Books and movies make it seem as if family is depicted by similar facial features and blood; but, this couldn’t be any further from the truth.

The family I know and grew up with is one of sacrifice and love. It’s a selfless and all-encompassing love that gives and gives and gives and gives until our hearts are full. My parents didn’t give me their blood or their physical features, but they gave me love and compassion. They taught me the true meaning of family.

My father never fails to support me. He has never missed a single voice recital, a performance, or any event in which I needed to lean on him for support. My dad is the kind of father who sits in front center of the stage at recitals and award assemblies with a big smile on his face and a camera in his hand. His unwavering confidence and pride in me is inspiring and a testament to the love he gives to the family in any way that he can.

He is always willing to engage with me in conversations about life at any time of the day, whether it be at midnight or three in the morning. My father never makes me feel as if I am a burden or as if he has something better to do. He pours out his loving heart in all interactions with me and for this, I am forever grateful.

My mother is a woman full of light and love. She nags about my health and wellbeing constantly, but does it out of love. I am always grateful for the care, compassion, and love which she shows me. My mother makes my world a better place with the joy and love she puts into it. Without her, I would be lost.

My family is the greatest, most precious treasure that God has bestowed upon me. They are the best friends that I have, my biggest supporters, and the greatest love that I have ever experiences.

The family I have was one created and sustained from love. Whoever said “blood is thicker than water” never knew family the way that I know family.

Love is the underlying theme of our lives.

Esther Cho

1615 W. Pacific Coast Hwy. Apt. 165
Wilmington, CA 90744

213-700-6183 (Cellular)

아침마당

아침마당

Essay for "Cruise of Love"

청취자 게시판

행사/소식

사람찾기