A critical analysis of my father’s dream

October 24, 2024

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My dad has always hated when a story ends with the cliche, “but it was all just a dream.” He calls it a cop-out that resolves too many plot holes and enables careless writing. In honor of that sentiment and my sister’s meme pictured below, here is a critical analysis of “just a dream” my dad once had.

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OG Fam groupchat: Feb. 15 2024

Dad: 2:29 p.m. —

just woke up from this dream: lolo rented a biiiig red van to drive us all somewhere. we were parked on the side of the street next to a park. i heard something about there being a rice beach. everyone else was hanging out in the park (daytime) and i went through some bushes and came out a moment later on the rice beach (nighttime). also this beach was in japan. it was white sand but there were uncooked kernels of rice all around. “maybe that’s why they call it rice beach 🤷🏻‍♂️” i started wading out in the water and thinking “maybe locals don’t wade. maybe i’m not suppose to do this and they’re assuming i’m a dumb foreigner.” i eventually went back to shore and now the beach was all rice. i laid in it and rice stuck to me. i rolled in it and soon i had a suit of white armor made of rice. i could barely move it was so heavy. then i dried off and it all fell off. i realized i was late for a meeting at work and went to get my work scooter, which was missing. i assumed aaron from work took it. i was miffed. went back to where the van was parked to get my shoes. there was one flip flop and a notepad shaped like a flip flop. i figured i’d make the notepad work as a flip flop and grabbed it. went to see if my scooter was back (it was not). grabbed an unused kid’s bike instead. looked at the address of the meeting and it was some odd number on Wexford Court. had a real hard time peddling up the hill on the street on the tiny kids bike with my notepad flipflop. finally rode past the old house and they put it up for sale. i was kinda miffed. found a house that looked like the picture of where i was supposed to be but the address was different and no one was around. never went to the meeting.

now i’m wondering what it all meant. i wouldn’t be so miffed if i looked like baby juli.

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My father’s dream is divided into two acts and two themes. The first reflects his upbringing in the suburbs of Wisconsin as a second-generation Filipino American immigrant. The second reflects his ADHD, which warps his perception of time, fueling a feedback loop of internalizing missed opportunities and wasted potential.

ACT 1: The Rice Beach

My father is the fifth child of six, all with a first name starting with the letter M. His parents immigrated to Milwaukee, Wisconsin as students in the mid-’50s where, after a few years of moving, they returned to build their final home in 1968. My father, Marcial, was born later that year, and many decades later, he would return to live under his parents’ roof, this time with his three daughters in tow. A middle-class suburb 30 minutes outside of the city is all he’s truly ever known.

The Galangs were an admirable family. A doctor father, English teacher and eventually stay-at-home mother. Heavy accents but perfectly comprehensible, strained out by the second generation, distilled by the third. Galang is Tagalog for respect. Galang is our rare pre-colonial emblem of Filipino heritage. It is the embroidered golden sun and three stars flying alongside 50 white ones on the front porch. It’s my Lolo proudly praising his country and General MacArthur in the same breath (enough times that my younger cousin bears the general’s name). It’s the extension of Kapwa to the Polish and WASP neighbors while still cultivating primarily Filipino spaces. Nowhere near perfect, but full of respect for each other and their communities, the Galangs were the epitome of the American Dream.

My dad’s dream begins by transporting him quite literally into the realm of his subconscious like Charon, except if the ferryman that transported souls across the river Acheron was a tall slim Kapampangan man with a booming voice and a boxy Ford Econoline. He arrives at a park — which my father revealed during our follow-up interview — similar to the ones downtown by the lakefront. There is usually an area of grass, followed by a gate of trees, before an almost immediate drop off a steep cliff. This one, of course, leads to a rice beach instead.

The park may reflect two things. One, his memories of attending countless Filipino community gatherings crowded with University Santo Tomas Alumni and their children, where the pancit was washed down with Coca-Cola, grass-stained blue jeans, and his parents, the alumni association presidents, would make a speech before the prayer. Two, since the park resembles the lakefront and not the suburbs, it may be an homage to my childhood happy place, the riverwalk in front of Lake Michigan. The exact path he walked as a college student at Marquette University and the one we often walked before our financial hiccups, when the Calatrava was my third home. Either way, he leaves us all at the park and ventures through the gate of rice foliage to find this speculative land. This action speaks for itself.

The speculations are true, and he arrives in what he understands as Japan. My father is an avid media consumer. Japan’s successful rebrand after WWII greatly enabled Western media’s homogenization of Asian culture to be popularly associated with East Asian culture. Why he recognized the rice beach as Japan and not the Philippines might have to do with his higher exposure rate to Japanese media than Filipino. The Japanese continue to occupy the minds of the residents of Manila, Macabebe and beyond, generations past direct contact and conflict.

As he wades in the water, he asks, “Maybe I am not supposed to be doing this, and (the locals) are assuming I’m a dumb foreigner?” Although he has identified this location as Japan, the typical feelings of imposter syndrome can be interpreted in many ways, whether it’s the internalized ostracization from East Asian communities for being darker and perceived as laborers, or for being the bridge between the world where you were raised and the country you have never stepped foot in but cannot escape.

The suit of white armor is beautiful but ephemeral. An attempt to assimilate into the more commonly understood culture, whether Japanese or White, as a way to protect and strengthen one’s self; however, instead, it weighs him down and quickly deteriorates, leaving him back in the state he came in. To his credit, the armor fell off because he chose to dry off. We’ll assume a positive interpretation and deliberate choice by his subconscious to return him some agency. Growing up in the suburbs, he and his siblings were often the only students of color in each class. Of the 15 grandchildren, there’s not a single full Filipino in my generation. My sisters and I are half Peruvian and my cousins are an assortment of European and American.

Assimilation is a delicate concept swept under the dinner table and shoved in between stacks of Crate & Barrel’s bland beige fine linens that swaddle babies with round eyes and light skin. Some armor held together better than others, a protective method created to comfort the wounds of being other; who can blame them? Now, their children wear white armor that cannot fall off. Thank god my father’s did, though.

The first act lays the foundation of his psyche, as they all primarily could be manifestations of his childhood experiences, cultural ties and struggles with identity. He arrives with the assistance of his father and acknowledges family ties before leaving to journey alone. In solitude, he must confront the dissonance between the self and the two (if not three) cultures, decolonizing the conscious in the process.

ACT 2: The Meeting

Authors Note: The term disability is used to convey the scope of his condition, the severity with which it restricts his ability to execute basic life functions and the detriment it has left behind.

When my dad was in third grade, his parents got him tested in fear of him being some sort of — as he puts it — clinically slow. To their surprise, he was revealed to be a savant of sorts, who just wasn’t interested in completing his assigned work. It wasn’t until college that he was diagnosed with ADD or nonhyperactive Inattentive ADHD — colloquially known as daydreamer syndrome.

Aaron (my father’s coworker) is an opportunity to blame the external. Everyone faces misfortunes, whether caused by family, peers, society, luck or God’s will, but how we perceive misfortune and where we place the blame is up to the individual. Losing a job, losing a loved one, lacking opportunities, or lacking executive functioning skills. One could wallow if they wanted to. Or project their cynicism upon others. My dad does neither; here, he is simply miffed. I believe Aaron is an arbitrary character, as my father described in our interview. The two have no notable relationship; he is just one of the employees my father manages during their 6 p.m. to 6 a.m. 3rd shifts at a distribution center. There’s no reason for him to have malicious intentions. So while this might be an initial deflection, my father finds a way to pivot and persist with the resources around him. Instead of a motorized Vespa, he peddles a child’s bike.

The real hindrance comes from his shoes, or rather, shoe. The notepad resembles the funky, eccentric, free, sticky notepads that medicine companies used to gift his general physician father. Patients would take home a leaf of sticky notes in the shape of flowers, furniture or funny faces. A flip-flop wouldn’t have been outside the realm of possibility. Those notepads followed us even after my Lolo passed, my Lola had sold the house on Wexford Court and we had moved with her into a 2.5 bedroom apartment. She would write her lists of groceries on these sticky notes to send with my dad and my sisters when we went to the local Pick ‘n Save. My Lola joined my Lolo in the eternal realm last October. No one handwrites grocery lists for my dad anymore. The notepads stay packed away.

Nonetheless, his lack of functional footwear slows him down, unrelenting throughout his persistent peddling. When he finally arrives at Wexford Court, the same street his family home was on, the house in the picture doesn’t match the address and he never makes it to the meeting. The flip flops are a manifestation of his disability. He works at half capacity, and to many, the notepad’s shape and sentiment might deceive them into thinking he has adequate support, but in reality, it’s a facade. Neurodivergent minds are known for their ability to mask their adversities, sometimes to their detriment.

Often mistaken as simply laziness, there are many reasons his daydreaming has inhibited his ability to execute daily tasks in real life. The deficit in dopamine makes him prone to indulge in short-term gratification. The correlated warped perception of time further exacerbates his inability to conceptualize the future, making it extremely difficult to complete long-term goals. His mind is the miscellaneous drawer filled with pieces of something you swear were useful but are too ashamed and overwhelmed by the clutter to confront, so you toss it in for future-you to figure out. Home of the hardened super glue, loose mahjong tiles and funky free note pads. On the odd occasion you do have the courage to open the drawer, hidden treasures and memorabilia remind you why you can’t dump the whole thing out and start anew. Our basement has become an extension of this drawer, hundreds of half-baked projects buried amongst flash-sale gadgets still perfectly packaged stacked upon the ideas that never were. A catatonic man etherized under YouTube’s promise of education and entertainment sits in the center of an ofrenda of lost focus.

Lost momentum, lost jobs, lost purpose, lost time—a living man with many lost lives. And so, despite his ambitions, and he has many, he has watched much of his life pass him by, from childhood to adulthood, much like the meeting that never arrives. Although he tries valiantly to hold on and choose his fate, without the proper support, he’s Sisyphus pedaling up a hill with a child’s vehicle, only one flip flop and a notepad shaped like a fighting chance.

Finally, by not being a “model minority,” my dad’s existence exposes the myth which is a tool yielded by white supremacy to minimize and homogenize Asian American experiences in order to ostracize them from other racialized communities. Homogenization of a community further alienates and invalidates individuals with intersectional identities, such as being an Asian American with a learning disability.

Notably, he claims he didn’t hold himself to high standards not because he was an Asian American, but because he was a Galang. He didn’t bother comparing himself to other Asian Americans in high school, only the other Filipinos that were in the UST Alumni community, where their parents’ white collar jobs were the pillars of the community’s Success Frame. Galangs were no different. All four of his older siblings later became doctors, lawyers or professors. Galangs are smart. Galangs are successful. Galangs are respected. This evidence and my dad’s ambivalence towards assimilation prompts me to believe that he wasn’t pursuing white society’s validation, but rather that of his family and community. He is not only biking uphill to a meeting, but he is also biking home.

In this regard, the notepad flip flop may also symbolize his parents’ support. His father provided it, his mother wrote guidance onto it and my dad made the most of it. In many ways it wasn’t optimal, but it was also their best attempt. During a time when learning inhibitions and mental health were taboo, they tried their best to understand him, albeit not with ease, but with enough loyalty and love they persisted. After our foreclosure, they accepted my father, my two sisters and me back into their home. By accepting their support he also took on the weight of being their caretaker, right-hand man and the stigma of being their black sheep son. But it is a weight he would rather accept than pridefully decline. The notepad wasn’t perfect, but it also wasn’t nothing.

When he finally gets up the hill he rides past his parents’ house, which has been put up for sale. He finds a house that looks similar to the one in the photo but the address is different and no one is around.

I refuse to call my dad a bum. In a state of sobriety, he self-sabotages himself. His addictions are limited to abstract thought and animated shows. He kept us safe, he asked for help. He honored his parents and his family. He cared for my sisters and me the best he could (of course with great reliance on my mother, his ex-wife). What he couldn’t provide logistically he made up in love and thought. He now owns his own house 30 minutes from his childhood home, where he resides with his new puppy, Mochi. His oldest daughter, Julia, attends Northeastern University as a graphic design student. His youngest, Carmen, applies for colleges this year with aspirations of becoming a nurse. And I, his middle, continue my third year at the University of Michigan as an Interarts Performance Major with a minor in Ethnic Studies. Our education is not funded by his wage but by the scholarships and grants that he helped us foster by reclaiming our adversities and advocating for our ideas.

This paper isn’t an excuse to slander my father. However, it might very much seem like it is. By no means does my dad’s disability make him a bad father or make me resent him. Nor does his dance with assimilation. That would be hypocritical — shout-out family loading. After all, alongside the diagnosis and generational trauma, he passed on his ability to dream, how to ideate and create anything out of nothing. He taught me to question everything and to seek knowledge in all forms. I often imagine what life would be like if we had no boulder to push uphill and our dreams were as accessible as free will. He is my cautionary tale. I learn from his sacrifices and strife so I may turn the dreams he passed down to me into a reality. My dad’s life is a story with no cliche or endings. Not because of his warped perception of time or the cycles that he perpetuates. But because he dreams of new beginnings that crossfade into one another, forever reinterpreting and revitalizing the plot holes and unfinished storylines. After all, this was all just a dream, and this analysis is just a projection.