I had Chinese restaurant dinner last nite with my parents for my mom’s bday. Yes, yes, her birthday is days before mine. I consider myself a belated 24th birthday present to her. My mom said that she bought 3 pairs of slippers for me. She’d called me Saturday morning when I was at Diana’s house to ask what shoe size I wore. Basically she saw that I was wearing beach flip flops when Mr. W and I last visited my parents, and did not like the huge height difference between me and Mr. W, so she took it upon herself to get me flip flops with some heel. She says that she got them for my birthday. Interesting. I haven’t seen them yet. And then she offered to do a banquet dinner to celebrate my 30th, have 2 tables in a nice Chinese restaurant. That’s just weird, it’s not like I’m turning 50 or getting married. Then she said she had a big 30th birthday banquet in Taiwan before we emigrated to the U.S.. Both my dad and I didn’t remember that. Of course, I was only 6 at the time so I may have thought it was a goodbye for us dinner. But a banquet just seems way too formal and ceremonial. And it seems too adult. “But I still FEEL like a kid,” I said to my mom. “I know, you are a kid,” she said. “That’s because you’re not married,” my dad said. I didn’t know that that’s another thing I have to sign over if I’m married — my youth.