“We all see that in you, and we all feel sorry for you, but everyone on the island was hurt in those terrible years. You more than some but also less than others. They did this to me. They did that to me. A woman who thinks that way will never overcome her anger. You are not being punished for your anger. You’re being punished by your anger.”
I listened, but Shaman Kim wasn’t telling me anything I didn’t already know, because of course I was being punished by my anger. I lived with that every day as well.
I left my offerings and, dissatisfied, walked to Gu-sun’s house. It was still early, but she had already built a fire and heated hot water. We sat together, drinking tea. I felt I could be direct, so I got straight to the point.
“How did you forgive Gu-ja for Wan-soon’s death?”
“What else could I do?” she asked me right back. “Gu-ja is my sister. We share our mother’s and father’s blood. Gu-ja may have been at fault, but maybe it was Wan-soon’s fate to be carried away. Maybe it was even her choice. I’ve heard the rumors.”
“Not that it matters, but I don’t think they were true.”
“Do you say that because Yo-chan is now your son-in-law?”
“Hardly. I say it because I believed what my daughters told me.”
“Min-lee I might trust,” Gu-sun said. “But Joon-lee? She married Yo-chan.”
All these years, I’d never had a sense of Gu-sun’s feelings about Yo-chan. She’d kept them very well hidden.
I surprised myself by saying, “I still believe my daughters. Whatever happened had nothing to do with Yo-chan.”
A faraway look came to her eyes. “I guess you know I was full with child before I was married.”
“People gossiped.”
“Before my husband agreed to marry me, I wanted to die, so I understand if that’s what happened to Wan-soon.”
“Maybe it was just an accident. That day the current was too strong for a baby-diver—”
“Maybe. But if she was pregnant, I wish she would have come to me. I would have told her that once her father and I were married and I gave him our first son, we were both happy. I would have wished that for her. But I understand it’s my destiny never to know what happened to Wan-soon, or why.”
The sadness of that lay in the silence between us.
Finally, I said, “About Gu-ja . . .”
“I will tell you this,” she said. “There are days when I think my sister has suffered more than I have. She will never forgive herself. How can I not love her for that?”
“Mi-ja blames herself too,” I admitted, but I didn’t go into all the ways she’d tried to help Joon-lee. “But that’s not enough. I must know why. How could she have turned on me that way? How could she have been willing to let all of us die? I begged her to take my children, and she did nothing.”
“Then accept that, and go and meet your granddaughter. She is the baby of your most beloved child. Once you hold her, you will love her. You know that as a halmang.”
I let out a long breath. She was right, but I just couldn’t do it.
“I can’t see that baby, let alone touch her,” I confessed. “If I looked at her, all I would see is the grandchild of a collaborator and perpetrator.”
Gu-sun’s face filled with compassion as she stared at me. It pained me to know I couldn’t change and I couldn’t forgive, but I had to hold on to my anger and bitterness as a way of honoring those I’d lost.
* * *
About six months later, the mailman delivered the first letter from America, unsealed, with the stamp torn off.
“It looks like Joon-lee’s handwriting,” Min-lee said when she brought it to me.
“It has to be.” I shrugged, pretending I didn’t care. “Who else would be writing to us from there?”
Min-lee pulled the letter from the envelope. I peered over her shoulder when she unfolded it. Most of the written characters had been blacked out.
“The censors,” Min-lee said, stating the obvious.
“Is there anything you can read?”
“Let’s see. ‘Dear Mother and Sister . . .’?” My daughter’s finger traced each row, allowing me to follow along. “?‘We’ve been here for . . . Yo-chan’s job is . . . The air is brown . . . The food is greasy . . . The sea is right here, but they get nothing from it . . . No sea urchin . . . No top shell . . . Their abalone is fished out . . .’?” Then several lines were completely crossed out. The next paragraph began “?‘I went to the doctor and . . . Wish it was slow . . . Fast . . . Time . . . This foreign land is not home . . .’?” Min-lee stopped reading to say, “It’s like they only want negative things about America to come through.”
“I was thinking the same thing. What about this part?” I put my finger on the last paragraph, which seemed to have the fewest characters inked out.
“It says, ‘All mothers worry. I worry about what will happen and how Yo-chan will get by. I wish you . . . Please . . . If I could be home on Jeju . . . You would . . . Always remember I love you, Joon-lee.’?” Min-lee looked at me. “What do you think it means?”
“She sounds homesick.” But the letter was more troubling than that.
“What should I write back?”
“What does it matter what you write back, if the censors are only going to black it out?”
My daughter set her jaw. “I’m going to write to her anyway.”
I nodded. “Do what you must.”
* * *
The next month, we received another letter. Again, the envelope had been opened, the stamp taken, and most of the letter inked out, but the handwriting was different. Min-lee read, “?‘Dear Mother Young-sook, This is Yo-chan. I write for my mother.’?” That’s as far as she got before I rose and walked away. Later, Min-lee told me that there was no real news. Just a word or phrase here and there. “It’s like trying to understand the ocean floor by seeing only ten grains of sand,” she said. This time, Min-lee did not write back.
After that, a letter came around the first of every month. In those days, they always arrived unsealed, but I didn’t pull them from their envelopes. I hid them in a small wooden box. It comforted me to know that whatever lies Mi-ja and her son wished to send me were hidden in the dark, where I wouldn’t have to hear them. It made me feel that I’d won.
In spring, the rapeseed fields bloomed yellow, stretching from the mid-mountain area all the way to the gnarled coastline. The ocean kept its relentless movement. The deep blue waters frothed one moment and became almost serene the next. I did my farming work and went to the sea. When I dove I was able to push my daughter and granddaughter from my mind. Often I was reminded of Dr. Park and his search for the mystery of why the haenyeo could withstand cold better than any other humans on earth. I think I now knew the answer. Not only did I have a coldness at my core that would not thaw but it had become as hard as ice. I could not do what Shaman Kim, Gu-sun, and so many others had told me to do. If I could not forgive, then at least I could wrap my anger and bitterness in an icy shell. Each time I sank into the sea, I stretched my mind outward, away from that shell. Where’s my abalone? Where’s my octopus? I need to make money! I need to make a living! I would continue to strive to be the best haenyeo, even if I knew it wouldn’t last.
Day 4 (continued): 2008