The mother who cried “carpet cleaner”

Mandarin in italics.

Ernie’s phone: ring, ring.

Mom: ERR-NIE.

Ernie: Did you read my email?

Today I spent the afternoon writing a Google Doc in two languages, to be carefully copied and pasted to an email. While the research only took two or three hours, it doesn’t count the dozen or so hours with my aunt as we tried to find assisted living facilities: price points, locations, and whether or not there were too many white people or not.

“They should also have female aides,” my aunt says. ”Your father hasn’t been responding well to the one we found. Your father is a charmer.” I think she’s making a joke. I’m not really here for it.

After the references to care centers are done, I default to a combination of both English and Chinese. I try to use Google to translate the entire email at once, but reading it out loud, the mandarin seems “off.” You know, that whole uncanny valley thing, except instead of CGI hair, there’s a Chinese robot lady talking about memory care. But I must rely on Aunty Google — that’s what I will call her from now on — because I don’t know the Chinese word for “incontinence.”

Mom: I did. Don’t look anymore. It was too expensive. I’ll take care of him myself.

Me: You told me to look for senior homes because he was pooping in his pants.

Mom: Well, I had a headache then because he was peeing and pooping all over the place. It was disgusting and I almost threw up. But I don’t have a headache now and I just reminded him a hundred times a day and now he doesn’t poop in his pants anymore. How about this: I’ll call you when I really need help, okay?

Me: You told me you needed help a week ago.

Mom: Well, that was then. And we need to save money.

Me: Well, what about the carpet cleaners? Do you want me to still get quotes?

Fun fact: I never knew how to correctly say “hallway” in Mandarin. I would always use Chinglish, like “爸爸走的 HALLWAY 太慢,” Dad walks in the HALLWAY too slowly.

It’s 走廊, zǒuláng, by the way. God as my witness, I’ll never forget that word again. 走廊. 走廊. 走廊. Thanks, Google Ai-Yi.

Mom: The carpet? It’s not so bad. I cleaned it, it doesn’t smell bad anymore. Everything is fine.

Internal voice #1: Is she serious?

Internal voice #3: Oh yeah, she is. You should completely lose your shit.

Internal voice #2: No. He shouldn’t.

Me: How about this: next time you need a carpet cleaner or a home service, you should call yourself, because I don’t know when you’re serious or not, alright?

Mom: Who’s going to translate for me?

Me: … I SWEAR TO GOD, I…

Internal voice #2: Be cool.

Me: …

Internal voice #2: Don’t yell at her. You can’t change her.

Me, out loud: Okay.

Internal voice #2: I’m serious, Ernie. Be fucking cool.

Me: Okay.

Mom: OKAY OKAY OKAY. Why are you talking so fast? Stop talking so fast. Are you… are you mad at me?

Ernie: (voice shaking out of pure rage.) Of course not. I have to go.

Ernie: [calmly hangs up the phone, proceeds to open up a text file, and begins to write]