Season 2025: Episode 5. It took Richard Hsung's ten years, but he finished his mother's memoir telling about her tumultuous life in Communist China

Jean Tren-Hwa Perkins was born unwanted during the 1931 Yangtze River Flood, adopted by medical missionaries, brought to the US for a few years, then trapped in Communist China. She was neither American nor Chinese "enough," yearning for acceptance and home her whole life. Her memoir, finished by her son, is an eyewitness account of Chinese history and her own harrowing story. 

Richard Hsung's life has spanned two continents and cultures. His mother survived turbulent times in China, living through the start of Communism, and being separated from her American adoptive parents. 

She asked Richard if he would tell her story, and she passed her notes and writings on to him. It took much longer than he thought it would and it changed him.

 Richard Perkins Hsung promised his mother he would complete her memoir. It took him more than ten years. He meticulously compiled and edited her writings, adding family photographs and historical details to create the 3-volume Spring Flower, spanning the 83 years of her life (1931–2014):

Spring Flower Book 1: A Tale of Two Rivers

Spring Flower Book 2: Facing the Red Storm 

Spring Flower Book 3: Torn Between Shifting Worlds

The books have 5-star reviews on Amazon, and are the result of years of work by Chemistry Professor-turned-author Richard Hsung.

At this time in history, his mother's story reminds us of the human costs of the decisions made by the world's government powers, and the painful decisions some people are forced to make.

Find out more about Richard and the books on:

https://richardperkinshsung.com/

Reach him on social media: @RichardPHsung

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Transcript

Unknown: 0:20

Foreign. Hello and welcome to the storied human today. My guest is Richard Perkins. Sung. He was born in China in 1966 and was one of the first teens to leave China legally under Mao's Cultural Revolution. He earned a PhD in chemistry from the University of Chicago and became a professor at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities and the University of Wisconsin Madison, retiring in 2022 he spent 10 years editing and completing spring flower by his mother, Jean trenwa Perkins. MD, the three volume memoir chronicles her life as an adopted child of American medical missionaries, a survivor of China's brutal communist regime, an ophthalmologist, an immigrant and a mother sung lives in Madison, Wisconsin with his wife, where keeping squirrels from digging up his backyard has become a daily scientific obsession, and I'm sure we can relate to that one. I can't wait to unpack your story and hear more about it. Welcome, Richard. Thank you so much, Lynne, for having me on your show. It's so good to have you. So there's so much to talk about. How old were you when you were allowed to leave China legally? So I was 14, and then I turned 15 shortly after we arrived in the States. Yeah, that will be 1980s so young, and that must have been, like, ridiculous, like, such a change, right? I know I, I often thought I was a grown up at the time, and then now that they look back on I was definitely just a kid, or it was, it was age where a person understands pretty much everything, but also, at the same time, understands next to nothing. And I was right at it. Yeah, it's so true. It's like you're smart by then, right? But you have no experience, yeah, you, you, you have, you have a good sense of whereabouts, but then you try to grapple with what, why and how and where, yeah, what was that like for you? I mean, it's such a change. It's such a huge change from one culture to another, yeah. So it was a it was a storm that blinded me, and I was not prepared for any of that. And of course, the leaving China and coming to the states completely changed the changed my life, and changed the trajectory, or a path, on my life. And essentially I had to start from ground zero because I didn't know a word of English at the time, even though my mother spoke English as if English was her first language, right? So, wow, that's helpful anyway, right? So did you live with your completely, yeah, so you, did you live with your grandmother here? So by the time we by the time my mother returned home to America and brought me in 1980 her parents, or my American grandparents, had long passed away. One passed away in 1958 and my American grandmother passed away in 1961 or 62 I forgot 63 maybe, and so. But we have a lot of American relatives and for for responsible for getting us out of China, right? So thank God for that. I So, did you find it? I mean, you obviously very academically oriented, and you did well in school. Did that help? I mean, did you did you find a refuge in school and you learned English? Yeah, so it was bizarre, right? And I guess I was in junior high Hong I was uprooted from my classroom, and most of my classmates in China had no idea where I went. I just disappeared myself and on this Pan Am flight in route to JFK. So. In 1980 and while on the plane, my mother was trying to give me a crash course in English and also her life. And so by the time I got to New York, and we spent some time in New York, and then we settled down in Boston to where she was a research fellow at the Mass General Hospital. So I was quickly enrolled in this woman, actually more prestigious high school called Middletown Academy, Massachusetts, right? It was bizarre that how they try to figure out where I should be. So I was sitting at one point with ninth grader, even though I supposed to be a 10th grader, I guess. And then pretty soon I was in third grade English class trying to figure things out. Yeah, so I, before I left China, I I was becoming pretty good at writing. I love the history, and I wanted to be a journalist. And of course, coming to America effectively ended that. And I I couldn't, I couldn't write any sentences, you know, properly at the time. And so pretty soon I figured out, you know, math is international language science is yes. So I was sort of forced into that track because easier to deal with. And so eventually I took a took a path, took a career in chemistry was also because, well, you know, it was easier to understand, and so I'm very grateful to have a career like that for about almost 30 years teaching chemistry, teaching, teaching and researching chemistry, but it was not what I had in mind 40 years ago. 50 years ago, yeah, I think that's pretty amazing, that you could make that shift, and that you were that good in chemistry. I mean, in math, a lot of us couldn't, right? I mean, really, I'm a writer, and I don't know if I could become a chemistry professor, excuse me, so that's amazing right there, that you have those talents and that you can make that shift. And I think that, I think a lot of times, education can save us. It really can. It can give us a refuge and and I think, you know, we're lucky to have people that are able to do what you can do. So tell me how much of your mother's story did you know then when you were a very young man? Yeah. So after we arrived, settled down in Boston, and then, I guess within the first few years, she started to contemplate about writing, writing her her memoir for her, for the stories of her life, down on paper. And she had a lot of encouragement, ranging from our American relatives and so on. This is amazing story. You gotta, you gotta write a write a book about it to a lot of people that just from her work, working place and so on. And then so she inherited boxes of letters her mother had written back in the 1940s and 40s. And then she had, my mother herself, had this incredible photographic memory of her childhood also. And then so it's and then also her, my American grandmother was an amateur photographer, and took many 1000s of photos of China. And so she had all those materials, and she started to to organize them. And then I I had nothing better to do, so I was helping her at the time. And then through that process, I started to learn more about what how she was adopted by American medical missionaries, and how she spent some time in the States during the war or two, and how she was trapped in China for 30 years prior, oh my gosh, states and bronia over also, yeah, so that was, that was my first, I guess, lessons of her Life. Yeah, yeah. 30 years, my God, yes. 19/5 1950 1950 to 1980 she wasn't allowed to leave. Yeah, there was no way. A lot of people actually tried. And many, many while trying, right? He attempted to, but she was talked about out of it by my father, because of Swiss, right? So. And what did your father do? So, my father was a professor agriculture, I guess, agronomist, and he specialized in Rice Research, and he was among the earliest generation in the 1950s and understood how to do false breeding hybrids and actually genetically modify the rice so that it will have more it will be bigger, fuller and more nutrition, I guess all that stuff, wow. I mean, it's commercial too. But point is that he was, he was very ambitious. He wanted to solve a world of hunger for. Album, at least famine was an issue in China. So yes, and and he became a world renowned agronomist by by 1980s and 1990s so, of course, yeah. So that was pretty much his, his life and career. I saw very little of him, of course, by the time I, I knew I, I began to get to know him. I was on a Pan Am Flight, right? So, oh, I didn't really have much of a relationship, unlike my mother and I, yeah, yeah, sometimes that happens, but still, you must have felt like you had big shoes to fill, right? Yes, especially at my mother's. I know my father. My father was was quite reasonable. Whomever he and I had an opportunities to interact, he didn't have that high of expectations, and but my mother did. My mother had helped me to some of the highest, most unreasonable expectations, especially during our time in the States, I guess, yeah, I was to fulfill her dreams, I guess was that, did you feel like, Did that feel natural, or did that feel like a little bit of pressure? I still feel the pressure. Over the years, I've been trying to shed this burden brick by brick, but I still got plenty of bricks in this bag. I'm still on my shoulder, right? So, yeah, I think, I think some somehow, writing, completing her memoir, has helped. It was a very good exercise for me and and in some ways, I'm hoping that she's up there somewhere, right? I'm hoping she she will be proud of me, and I'm sure she is. So tell us, when did you when did it occur to you that you could finish this, and when? How much did she have done when she passed away. So she spent about 12 years from the early 1980s to about mid 1990s or early 1990s and then by the time she passed away, my father handed me three boxes of her manuscripts and notes, and it was over 1000 pages. And just lots of stuff to go through. And that would be 2014 spring, or 2014 and that was just about pretty much when I thought, when I began the process. And of course, at the time, I thought I could continue my career and doing this at the same time. And within a few years, it became impossible to do both. I had to start consider maybe quitting my career just to finish her memoir. So it took me about 10 years, just little south of 10 years. Yeah, well, it just sounds like so much of it in the beginning was like being an archivist, right? That that takes so much time organizing and, you know, comprehending what you have and categorizing. And I don't think people understand that kind of work takes such a long time. Yeah, I love the work archive. And then, and that was pretty much her style of writing, which was very annoying, actually, and I follow that style. She it was, it's much less a memoir. It was more archive or a Chronicles, or chronicles of history, chronicles of our life, very detailed. And so I had to read through all of that, which was good, because I needed to find a voice before I started writing, writing and also completing it. And so, yeah, 1000s of pages to thumb through. In some ways, had a good start, but there were so many gaps I had to fill. So I had to interview a lot of people, and I interviewed my father was my father was one of them, and I had to ask many for many stories in at least from 1950s and 1960s prior to I was born, and you had your father like sometimes, I think that's if you wait too long to tell a story. Everyone's gone, right? It's just really good. You had your dad, and sadly, he was gone shortly after he was telling about that. So he passed away in 2015 so they, they passed away about nine months apart, or 10 months apart. Sorry. Headline. Oh, thank you. But I, he gave me enough headlines, and then I could interview a lot of I went back to China. I made many trips to China interview a lot of people there just to fill in the gaps and understand the history better, I guess. So, yeah, yeah. So it was, it was a lot of work and plenty of moments I, I regretted, Richard. It's a killer commitment, right? And like. Sometimes we make these commitments in the best of frame of mind, and then we're like in the middle of it, and we say, What did I get myself into? But I just feel throughout your story that there was this enduring connection to your mother, and this, you know, obligation in the most loving way, like you were compelled to finish for her. Yes, I think so. It was, it was a promise I made to her, but although not casually, but of course, at the time when I promised her, I had no idea what this was about. So, so yeah, so she was dying in nursing home from dementia. So, so I was wondering why she was just hanging on and not just go right. And then so I saw, how about, I know you probably just wonder, who's ever going to finish your memoir? And if, if anyone, it will be me, right? Nobody else will be able to do this, even my father, before he died, he said, You know, I should try. I try to write this more in Chinese, and I couldn't do it after a couple months. So then, you know, so it will be up to me. And so I did that. I thought, yeah, I'll just do that. You know, on the weekends and nights have fun, that was very naive, yeah, well, these things do tend to take over our lives. I mean, she has such a, you know, what a huge story, and there's so much historical backdrop. So why don't you just tell me briefly, I'm wondering, how did she get stuck in China? Like, how did that happen? Yes, so I will start from there. Maybe I'll backtrack a little bit. So that will be 19 that'll be January 1951 really, I should January 119. 51 her parents were driven out of China overnight. Within three days, they were shipped to Canton, and then across the harbor went to went to Hong Kong, and because Korean conflict was reaching its peak, and and that was a proxy war between America and China on Korean peninsula, and even though it involves 17 Other countries, but the point it was mainly China Americans. Yeah, so, right? Korean War on Korean peninsula. And so my mother at the time, when her American parents were on a train en route to Canton, Hong Kong. My mother was a freshman in an English speaking College in a city pretty close to Shanghai, Conan Kim, but 300 miles away from her parents, so she couldn't make it. And even she made that in now that I knew, I know her story. She wouldn't have the proper paperwork, like a passport at the time to leave the country. Her parents did, right? They were Americans, and so, yeah, so then she was trapped. And then, you know, at the time we thought they thought that. She thought that would just be a short term, right? A couple years later, the war will end, and she will be reunited with her parents, but maybe a blink of eyes three decades and so why was she back in China all when she had spent three years living in Yonkers, New York during the war? That's because her parents were just totally dedicated, you know, medical missionaries when the when world war two ended, or at least for the VE Day, when the European Theater ended in 1945 in May of 1945 her parents uprooted her from her classroom in Yonkers, New York, and she found herself on a battleship in route to India and and so, make a long story short, 1946 say they went back to China, and her parents just want to continue their medical missions and so, but they didn't know China was going to endure through a three year period of civil war between communist armies and and at the time the the government is called National Republic, nationalist. And so they fought, fought each other for three years, and the communist then won the war, swept through, through South and next thing you know, her parents were thinking about leaving China. However, communists at the time in 1949 were they were quite reasonable. Of course. They needed the physicians, right? They needed the competent doctors and hospitals. So they allowed my grandparents to keep on. Operating the hospital to a hospital remained open. But a year later, then was Korean conflict, and that was a no no. So anti American fervent was all time high, and and you are and you won't be safe as American living in China. So so they were, they were given the paperwork and driven out of China overnight. And so my my mother was stuck, yeah, and she wasn't allowed to go with them, yeah, so she couldn't make it. By the time she made it back, it was spring of 1951 oh my gosh. And these are, just want to make sure we understand, these are medical missionaries that were American that had adopted your mom? Yep, right, yes, a little bit. So yeah, my grandfather, American grandfather, was born and raised in Hartford, Connecticut and from a very blue blooded New England family. Right, wealthy beyond belief, and powerful too, skipping through the details, somehow, he was looking for a meaning of life and decided, after he got his MD, decided to become a missionary in Asia. He chose China, and along with his wife, they built a hospital in the small fishing village on the banks of Yangtze River, one of the longest river in Asia or in China. What do you mean in this world? And my mother was born directly across on the northern banks. And then few months later, since it will be 1931, couple months later, the river flooded, became one of the worst natural disasters in 20th century, killing upwards of 4 million people. But somehow, my mother wasn't one of those 4 million people, and she miraculous lived because her biological mother was kind enough that didn't throw her on the roadside, let her die, because girls were not valued in China at the time, but her biological mother was looking for a home for her and and they found this medical missionary couple. And then, what a story. My God, grandparents adopted my mom. My mother was one year old at the time. What a beautiful story. You know, I have a friend who is Korean, and she was found in, literally, in a garbage can, and taken to an orphanage. And a wonderful woman who had done a lot of Korean adoptions, arranged for her adoption and then for her brothers. And she's had a wonderful life, and she's gone back to Korea, but it is such a sad part of the story, the way the babies were were handled, and very sad culture. High School with this woman. She's my friend. I worked with her in high school. I know her well, and I didn't know this story until you know we're all older now and we're connected on Facebook. I didn't know this story until the last 10 years, and it broke my heart. It broke my heart to think of my beautiful friend that that's how she started her life. But she prefers to look at it as positive as these beautiful angels who found her and and took care of her, and she had a very beautiful trip back to Korea. So there is this, this unification, this, you know, getting back with your family and understanding that they all took care of you. They're all, they all care about you. And she's connected, yeah, my mother, my mother would agree. Would agree with her, totally, completely, yeah. But what a way to start your life. My god, yes. But you know, starting from that point, she she had the fortune of a meeting with many, many extraordinary human beings, and wonderful human beings, or angel in disguise, if you will, and helped her get through some of the worst time. Particularly, I'm not just even talking about my grandparents, but just for 30 years in China. So that's a lot of time. Yes, get through those tough times. Yeah, and, you know, you know, you can't help but think about how we're at the whim of a government and what they decide to do, and we're just trying to have lives. People are just trying to live their lives peacefully and right. And, you know, it's just we don't we were, yeah, and most of us, we don't need much. We don't ask much. We just asked to be be left alone. And in spite of all that, your mother was, you know, triumphant, she she got educated, she got married, she built a life, she raised you. It's kind of. Amazing. It was, you know, she didn't know. So she was 19 years old when her parents left China, tripping out of China. And she was wondering, up to that point, she had a pretty charm, charm the childhood, right? And so then she was wondering how she will survive. And then immediately after, so immediately at the moment, Chinese government made a rule that they needed they need physicians, they need teachers. So she was already a freshman sophomore in college, right? And so they decided to turn all these people into physicians or her teachers, whether that's right or wrong, my mother became a beneficiary of that policy, right? And then they either waive the tuitions for this first generation of, I guess, kids post communist regime and so, yeah. So then she, lo and behold, became an ophthalmologist, and then that also helped her during some of the worst time in China. Because, just like how communist government allow my grandpa, grandparents, allow some of the Americans to stay, to keep the Hospital Operational, because they they need physicians. They need competent physicians, and they need a hospital. And so my doesn't matter how it didn't matter how they were persecuting my father or my mother. My mother actually got, got, got off a bit easy, relatively speaking, because she was allowed to work in the hospital. Then they need to keep the hospital. So, right. Yeah, ironic, but it is you wonder too. You look back and realize all these twists and turns and how fortunate some of them are, and they didn't even seem on purpose. They're just sort of Lucky accidents, in a way. No, right, right. So did she keep in touch with her parents this whole time she was able to? So there were piles and piles of letters, and she could sort them through by saying that, actually, I received them, these, I never received them, right, because they were all censored. Oh my gosh, early 1950s when communists just took over, they censored all the letters, right? And then, so they were able to correspond at least here and there fleetingly for about three or four years, until my American grandparents decided, if they can't go back to mainland China, they can go to Taiwan and they can continue to help Chinese people. And that sounded wonderful, but that Taiwan was enemy of the state, right? So by the time they went to Taiwan, my mother didn't dare to write anything to them, and whatever they wrote never got never got through, right? So, so they lost touch with one another around 1954 to 55 so, and then, yeah, that's a sad part of the story. Yeah? Well, it's, it's war, right? It's, yeah, it's good for us to hear about the human part of, like I said, what, you know, governments do what they do, and then human civilians, people like you and I, yeah, we're just collateral damages, right? So it's important to remember that, that there's humans just trying to make a go of their lives and just to survive. So I'm assuming she graduated and became an ophthalmologist. And when did she meet your dad? So they met in college. They had known each other, actually when they were even younger, but again, World War two separated them, right? So they got rekindled, I guess, in in college. And then I think looking back on even though they would tell me it was true love, and I could tell that it was probably a marriage of convenience, also, there's an element of one, because my mother, my mother was my mother was still a foreigner in her own country, even by the time we came back, we came to the States. But night back, back in 1950s my mother was Chinese, was really bad, and she's she spoke with an accent. And I, when I got older, I was always wondering why all kind of funny, Lee, so it's like, what? So now I'm not completely understand so to I think is was partially she realized she needs to assimilate and blend in, right? So marrying my father was the best way of blending him. There was that element, but maybe it was also love, right? So they. They were married in 19 I could, I guess right around 1955 when she first realized she couldn't respond with her parents anymore. So did she ever get to see her parents again? They passed away, 1958 1963 respectively. Hansel, yeah, see that. That makes me sad, I know. And I guess the last time she saw them, she was 19 years old, just hard to imagine. And it reminds me of what we take for granted, right? Yeah, especially, you know. So there were some analogies, I mean, similarities there, right? So I came out, I didn't get to see I have my older sister, so I didn't get to see my older sister till 20 some years later, let me get to see my father till sometime in later 1980s and so, about a decade or so. So, yeah, so it's like, I mean, I actually to to look back on, I didn't, I never wanted to come to the States right, because I prefer who wouldn't right, who wouldn't. Prefer just be together with family. Why would you want to be right? But sometimes you do that because you're in a dire situation you want to run away from. You have to do it right? I don't think people understand that who are safe and never had to consider something like that. It's really important to remember sometimes we have to leave right? I mean, no, no humans will be in the right mind. Will be you want to be uprooted from their homeland and then try to go and speak a different language, meeting different people, comparing a foreign surrounding, right? They will much prefer to stay where they're familiar with and speak their native language. So I think that's a really good point and something important to remember, and especially for Americans who, you know, I've traveled a little bit, and I'm maybe not as insulated as some. Some Americans are really insulated. They haven't traveled much. It's a big country. Maybe they live in the middle of it. You know, it's hard to understand sometimes, what it's like to change cultures, to be forced out of where you are. I mean, some people have been here. Well, your grandfather was an exception, because he left, but are your you know, your great grandfather, some people have been here for hundreds of years. You know, they just don't, can't comprehend making such a change. And it's important to realize that it's not the same everywhere. And there are reasons why people have to go, and it's drastic. I mean, the things you're describing are so drastic, the shifts in government, yes, separation of family. I mean, you included, right? But you included your great, great grandparents or your ancestor came from somewhere, right? Migrated from somewhere because they were free to fleeing something, right, everybody, or they were also M or they're also looking for new opportunities, opportunities to actually, yeah, I never talk about this, but my family's been here since the 1660s and they they were fleeing religious persecution. There you go. There you go, right? What would drive you to do that? I mean, I get it. There's strong reasons. And we're all immigrants, except for people that were brought here as slaves and Native Americans in America, we are all immigrants, precisely, yeah, totally. It's such an important point nowadays, and I'm so glad that you brought that part of the story. So now that the book is done, what does that feel like? I can't even imagine. Uh, well, I feel relieved. I guess that's, that's, that's a minimum, minimum feeling, I guess, minimum, minimally. I I think I'm well to, to put it bluntly, it really changed me. I think the point where, well, because What's so surprising about that, well, I no longer look at things the same way, right? Anyway, for 30 some years, including training, maybe even longer than that, I just thought about one thing that will be chemistry and later, teaching. Although teaching is is a career. Word, worthy, worthy, worthy of pursuit. And I'm, again, very grateful I had the opportunity, but I was very tunnel visioned, right? I was just, I was just looking at, what's my next research papers publication, what's my next student's lecture? And one of them different, their thesis, and then. Writing this memoir made me sort of look up and reading, thinking, seeing things, and so once I started doing that, when I was in our library or looking at the Internet, or sort of searching on the internet, or reading what my mother wrote or reading other people's writings, and again, learning, I suddenly realized I could never go back to to the, I mean, to teach chemistry the same way, at least minimally, at least and and there were moments I even found myself standing in front of class. I actually want to tell them I don't want to talk about this. I want to talk about something else. But of course, I know, I knew that would be wrong, because they didn't sign up for a history class. You signed up for chemistry class. So so then I knew that was also a factor, or in part, why I decided I need to, perhaps terminate my chemistry teaching career. So yeah, so I know I think I look at things and think about things in a very different way, from very different perspectives. So I think that's amazing that you one, that you, first of all, that you finished your promise to your mother, that is so beautiful. And second that you expanded your mind that way, like you really, literally said, I'm gonna really learn, really research, and so you expanded your viewpoint and your mind, and you're not the same. You're not the same at all, I know. So that was kind of unexpected, because I thought, okay, so it's a story about a human life, a person's life, and so that person was born, that person lived, that person died, right? So that would have been sort of the gist of it, but yet, delving into, deeply into her life, her stories, her stories are unique, not because of her, but because of events, historical events that she had the Fortran of of encountering or unfortunate encounter, and but are all the people that she met, and all the people that made a difference in her life, and that was rich so well, there's so many Wonderful levels, right? Like there's that back, that historical backdrop that's fascinating, yes, unto itself, but then all those other levels, people that came along and helped her and her personal growth, and her, her education and her, her, the connections that you made were really interesting, probably things that you probably never connected was there were, there were there just some surprises in there that you didn't know about your mom. Yeah, so we were talking about my mom, and I was telling you that even though I believe we loved each other deeply, but but most of that probably was due to the we were against the world, so to speak, after we, we came, after I came to the States after she, she called America home. So she will often say, after I return home, right? So, so for those initial years, you know, so we were, we were very close to one another, because I was hanging on to her short tail so but she was very strict, and she was, of course, smart, brilliant. And again, she would hold me to these lofty expectations, right? I hated it, right? And then she has a sort of one side of her persona that she will show me, and just not a very loving readily to show her love, right, very different side that she will show other people. And but, you know, you know, and I thought she was also courageous, brave, just this person I have to put on the highest pedestal I know, I know of but you know, writing this memoir, or completing her memoir, is like, oh my goodness, she's human. She's just like rest of us, like me, made many mistakes, and she was afraid. Yeah, she cried, she struggled. So it's so I, I, I enjoyed that part, because now I put a face to this human being that I was putting on some kind of pedestal unnecessarily. Of course, of course, I was a kid, but we do that, and what a gift to get to know your mother in that way? Yes, right? I know. And also I wouldn't want to give the book away, but I could also, I knew that she had deep friendship with several people back in 1960s to the point where sometimes I wonder if my father was my father. Other so, oh, no, these are all things sort of bug out and notes she was unable to finish, stories that she was unable to finish. And, you know, she sometimes she will have a photograph stuck to a piece of paper and with an arrow point to a face. Could be a guy, it could be a could be a gal, and she's, she will say, I gotta talk about this person. It's just like, Who the heck is that person? And that's all you put things together, yes, yeah, yeah. Now, what about your sister? Does she live in America, or is she in China? She's now living in Boston. She finally liberated here in early 2000s with her son. So her son, at the time, was about six years old. And now, now it's a grown adult, young adult, I guess. And so my sister suffers from a cerebral palsy, and she was born early in 1960s I guess, precisely from 1960 I keep forgetting her age. She's about six or seven years older than me. So and at the time, they thought was polio, but it wasn't a virus, right? So then they finally, by the time they figure out was cerebral palsy, and shoot, there was no way I'll try to help her or save her, trying to mitigate her such a situation. So she she has a physical, physical handicap or physical challenge in terms of speech and walking and so on, but she managed to ultimately finish college in 1980s and became a librarian for most part of our life before retiring and coming to come into immigrant into the states. Yeah. So, like I was saying earlier, after I left the China, I didn't see her for 20 some years. I can't even imagine, but it's nice that she's, you know, somewhat near, yeah, yeah. That's completely and how did you meet your wife? Oh, that's interesting. And I met her in, I guess, 1999 after, shortly after, maybe a couple years after, I was divorced, when I first wife. And my first wife was a was was American, actually born and raised in Indiana, and I actually we had a very good relationship, which is virtually parted our ways. And then this woman, my current wife, is from my actually was born in China and was a graduate student at Tulane Medical Hospital, medical school, and then it was a mutual friend between us, introduced us and yeah, so then the rest is great. And how long have you been married? Officially, probably about 16 or 17 years. We dated for a while, even though we were in two different locations, two different cities. So that worked out, that's right. So I'm wondering if I had spent all this time on my mother's book and it was finally done, I might not know what to do with myself. You were so invested and you were so living that when you were literally you gave up your career and you were living that book. Yeah, feel like you know who you are now, um, no, is the short answer, and the long winded answer is, I'm trying to figure out who I am. I like what I was telling you earlier, I was rambling away, and I'm trying to tell you that forever changed right by by by more, and I no longer look at things differently and and I was also telling you earlier, before I came to the States in 1980 I had always wanted to be a writer of to become a journalist, of Course, writing in Chinese. And at that time that was was on my mind. And of course, I was blindsided by coming to America. And so now I'm thinking, maybe I can go back to become a writer and but to write what I mean, the last thing I want to do is write another memoir, right? So I'm already burned out on that. So this past year or so, I become interested in just writing short stories, like 1000 word 8800 word short essays about event, about story of my life, in my life, or my from my past. And I'm not trying to write a memoir, but just something memorable. And again, I was going to ask you earlier, do you think you're going to write? Because that doesn't go away, that you know that pull, that first pull, when you're young, to what you want to do. And I think you have reflections. You have so many reflections and so many observations to bring to you. Uh, you know, you're a readership. I totally, I completely agree. Yep, I would think I want to do that. I don't want to write another albatross about my No, no, it's my life probably nowhere near as interesting as my mom's, but there'll be stories, you know, and reflections like what you said. Well, you have, you just have this unique, you know, like it or not, right? That's your legacy, this unique, bicultural, you know, awareness of how history, history touches us and changes us. And I would read that book. I think that's a great way to go, is to share your reflections and your thoughts. And those are stories that people need to hear. They need to, you know, the thoughtful kind of, I don't know what the word is. I'm losing my words, like the thoughtful rumination, almost on the intersection of these things that you uniquely can speak to, and people want, they want to learn, they want to understand. And I think that would help a lot. So I think, Well, I think that's why this past year or so, or 10 months or so, here and there, I'm trying not to put pressure on myself, but once, so one, one essay a month, so to speak, just take my time, have a first draft and look at it, and then, and then, you know someone by my American relatives are their authors or writers, and one of them actually encouraged me to collect some of these short stories and their essays, and so maybe someday you can correlate them into a book, and that will, that will be a memoir, like No, not quite Right, like we say, it's, it's a collection of reflections and the perspectives. Yes, those are some of my favorite kinds of writing. Yeah, yes. I love those kind that kind of writing, because it really makes you think and you have a lot to bring to it. So is there anything that we missed? Is there anything you would like to tell our readers that we might have not said any, any piece of advice, or any, anything I didn't get to Don't, don't easily promise your parents anything. What a great lesson. Oh, my God. And how can people get her book, your book? How can people get that book? You know, amazon.com, Barnes, noble, if you type in spring flower and then rain flower, it will pop up. And is there a way to contact you, that if people want to talk to you or ask you questions, or Yes, I finally built a website for the book, okay, for the memoir? So it will be Richard Perkins shown so my full name spelled out letter by letter, and then.com and we'll have all the information there. Yeah, that's great. I'll put it in the show notes too, but some people don't read the show notes, so it's good to say it out loud. Well, Richard, I could talk to you for another day. I think me too. I appreciate so much that you that you told us your story. It's a beautiful one. And I mean, I'm a mom, and it just really moves me what you've done for your mom. Thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you so much for having me. You