a silly little piece written for my own amusement. when i have a daughter, i shall name her alia.
The dream is about the future. I am in a dining room. I feel, in fact, I know, that i am at my parents' home. I know this intuitively, the way one already knows things instinctively in dreams. It is a given fact. The light is cozy, warm, dim, yellowish in tone. The familiar food smells of basil, pepper, rosemary, garlic, olive oil, tomato, and wine fill the air. I am seated at a long table at the far side end. At the other end of the table are my parents. At the head of the table is my father, and at his left, my mother. I do not see them, but i know they are there, smiling and nodding affably, serving platters of food, insisting that a certain dish must be tried, just as they always have. Across from me is my sister. She is considerably older than she is now, which is 13. On her right is her guest. I do not see him, but I know that the person is a 'he'. I know that he is my sister's boyfriend, if not fiancé; I can sense something between them that only they share. Beside me, on my left, is my husband. I do not see him either, so I do not know what he looks like. I do not speak to him, but I can feel his presence. I also feel a great love deep inside of me. I know he is there. I do not look at most of the people present because I am fussing over one person in particular. I focus most of my attention on her. She is seated around the corner of the table, on my right, at the end of the table. She is my daughter. She is a small child, between the ages of three and five. she has shoulder-length hair which is dark and fine, with wispy curls framing her face. The curls must be something inherited from her father, or else I had curled it for the occasion. She has fair skin with rosy cheeks. She is not round and chubby as some children are, nor is she thin and sallow. She is perfect and ethereal, smiling contendly at everyone. Her eyes are alert, watchful, merry and mischevious all at the same time. She is beautiful. I delight in watching this child, this daughter of mine. My sister is holding a platter laden with colourful vegetables: zucchini, tomato, broccoli, new potatoes. She doles out generous amounts onto my daughter's plate which I just notice already holds two slices of lamb with whole black pepper. She hands me the platter which my husband soon takes from me; I do not eat because I am occupied with my fairy-like daughter. My daughter will not eat the lamb; the pepper is too spicy for her. I cut off the pepper-coated edges and she takes a slice with her hand and munches happily. She eats meat, another thing which she must have inherited from her father. She does not use forks or knives; fingers are easier. I follow her example, sampling chunks of juicy, bright red tomato. I notice that she does not eat her vegetables, only the potatoes.
"Ai-ya!", I cry, not because of the fact that I am Chinese, but because I say it out of habit, a habit which I learned from my grandmother. "You can't eat only potaotes! You must eat some vegetables too, or else you won't grow. It's not healthy." I scold her in English, because she, like her father, does not understand Chinese. I coax her into eating some vegetables. She picks at them, eating some broccoli, a bite of tomato, ignoring the zucchini.
"Don't make her eat so much or else she'll get fat like you.", my sister says, emphasizing the 'you'. She says this with contempt. I flinch and my husband puts his arm on the back of my chair as if to remind me that he is there, as if to say he doesn't mind my weight, although in the dream I am not fat, but then, nor am I thin. I feel comfortable in my rounded body. I sigh and ask my daughter one last time if she would please eat her zucchini. Her eyes wide and her mouth full of potato, she shakes her head vigorously, curls flying. I laugh, because in her, I see myself when I was a child, also refusing to eat. But for me, it wasn't zucchini; it was bananas.