“…and once again she shuddered with the evidence that time was not passing, as she had just admitted, but that it was turning in a circle.”―Gabriel García Márquez, One Hundred Years of Solitude

When I was younger, my mom’s dad, my nana, would take me to a park 20 minutes away to play baseball, a sport he didn’t know much about from a place he didn’t know much about. He’d be smiling the entire time as though he was watching me grow up. Leaves fell around us as the ball flew back and forth, connecting us, and we didn’t say much.  

My mom’s mom, my nani, has had bad vision for as long as I can remember, but the kindest eyes of anyone. She’d sit patiently with me while I invented games with dice, chalk, or playing cards, following my voice along fantastical stories. She’d laugh with her whole face—her eyebrows would tilt upwards while the thin lines on her cheeks seemed to dance. 

Now, Nana and Nani come down from Toronto once or twice a year, and we visit them just as often. I haven’t seen my dad’s parents in at least six years; I can’t remember exactly how long it’s been. I hardly know anything about my great-grandparents, and I don’t know anything beyond them. And yet, I am who I am because of who they were.

This summer, I read Min Jin Lee’s Pachinko, a work of historical fiction which follows a family across 79 years, including their immigration from Korea to Japan. The novel spans five generations of struggle, curiosity, and beauty. Each character in the family is deeply connected to one another; the story is not one of an individual’s growth, but rather of everyone, collectively and simultaneously. 

For example, Pachinko starts with a fisherman and his wife who take lodgers into their home for extra money in the town of Yeongdo, Korea. It ends with the life of their great-great-grandson Solomon, a businessman who grows up in Japan and attends university in the United States. Despite their extremely different lives, their stories center around the same hope, motivation, and loyalty to those around them. Solomon’s decision to return to Japan to be a part of his father’s business, a chain of Pachinko parlors (a Japanese game somewhat similar to Western pinball and slots), echoes the same unwavering love that the fisherman and his wife had for their son, Hooni—Solomon’s great-grandfather. I imagine that the two would’ve been impressed by each other if they’d somehow been able to meet. 

Since finishing the book, I’ve found myself wanting, more than ever, to know more: I want to trace out my own family tree. I want to define my story with the stories of those who came before me, collectively and simultaneously. I don’t mean this in a traditional AncestryDNA /23andMe sense though. While knowing where my ancestors were from, and possibly some of their names, is a start, it isn’t an answer to who they were. In a way similar to the omniscient narration in the novel, I want to know what they did, who they loved, and who they wanted to be.

Pachinko also explores themes of language transition, loss, and the strong connection between cultural and linguistic identities. Though it begins with a Korean-speaking family, Solomon speaks primarily Japanese and English. Despite his Korean heritage, he ties his identity much more strongly to Japan. Solomon’s great-uncle, Noa, also studies English in an attempt to escape his culture and become someone else. He eventually separates from his family, breaking contact with them and pretending to be of Japanese descent for the rest of his life. 

The best way, I think, for me to gather the stories of those who came before me is by asking as many of them as I can. However, doing so raises questions and conflicts within my own cultural and linguistic identities. Now more than ever, I feel disconnected from my grandparents—not just because of distance, but also and especially because of my lack of language. 

It’s easier to learn a language when you are younger because you lack shame. There’s no perceivable downside to conversing with a family member when you don’t fear appearing detached from a culture. I find myself afraid to speak my parents’ native language because, though I completely understand it, I lack the confidence to try to improve. I, like Noa, find myself stuck in a frustrated middle ground between two versions of myself.

So, I find myself hesitant to approach my own history—not out of embarrassment, but because of the barriers of words that take time and practice to overcome. I fear being unable to pass down my culture and a language I grew up speaking to those who come after me. I fear losing the stories of those who came before me. I fear losing my own story. 

Perhaps because of this fear though, and perhaps out of a desperation to understand myself, I can’t give up on this. 

When asked in an interview about the omniscient perspective she writes from and the timeline of her characters, Min Jin Lee responded, “I want to write community novels, and the interconnections of themes and multiple characters are far more important to me than one character.” Maybe this is why I can’t surrender this idea: the unshakeable interconnectedness of my community, family, and culture. The way I have grown up and continue to grow up is based on these (seemingly) unreachable stories, held away from me by time and space. And yet, I can feel my connection to them. 

So, even if I can’t reach these stories, I want to write them into existence, to turn stories of ghosts into stories of the people they were born from, and to connect them all together. I am who I am because of who they were. 

I already know how much Nana loves London, that he used to smoke, and that his hearing loss comes from years of work in cold warehouses in Brockville. I know that he loves small, nice things, like engraved pens. When I see him this winter, I’ll ask him about his immigration to Canada, about the things he has seen and the places he has gone. I’ll ask him about the places he dreamed of going when he, too, was 20, and I have a feeling that his answers will be similar to mine. I don’t think that’s a coincidence. 

I called my Nani today, and in my unconfident but stable words, asked her to tell me more about her family and where they came from. She said she doesn’t have many stories, but is happy to share the ones she does. She recalled names, places, and people as they came to her mind, and I heard the lines of her mouth move into a smile as she spoke. I’m grateful to be able to listen to her after she has given so much of her time patiently listening to me. We’ll talk more this weekend. 

I’ll see them soon too, hopefully—perhaps this winter. I’ll listen and write while they speak, and I know I’ll feel an unshakeable sense of familiarity. I’ll be remembering stories I wasn’t born in time to experience myself. And I will become who I will become because of who they are.