My son, Yujun, turned 18 yesterday.
On the day of his birth he was found by some villagers at the side of the road, still crying as rain poured down. He was taken to an orphanage, assigned to a foster home, and given a good Maoist name — Yu Jun, which means Rain Army.
When we went to China in 2005 to adopt him, his foster mother and her english-speaking daughter impressed upon us how special Yu Jun was, how smart he was, how everyone around him knew these things. He was so beautiful it was hard to register what they were saying, but in the days and years that followed we came to understand what they meant.
Being Yujun’s dad has been the most important experience of my life. I don’t necessarily think of the person I was before as fully human, so even when he in his current teenage version makes me want to croak with frustration, I am grateful to him for opening the doors of my heart.
More than any other person I’ve ever known, Yujun is who he is. He is profoundly unique, brilliant, and unswayed by the expectations, criticisms, and desires of others. He is so deeply rooted in himself that whatever he does seems normal. When he read the LOTR and Dune trilogies multiple times at 12, when he started fixing and then building computers at 14, when he went from straight A’s to leaving high school to become a sushi chef — it all made sense because it was him.
I envy him his absolute rootedness, the relentless pursuit of his interests and passions. I cherish the memory of the time I got to spend with him as a child, walking him to sleep, talking with him about sci-fi and technology, teaching him to drive… I feel proud of him, and lucky to be his father. And I’m excited to share his life as an adult.
Happy birthday, guy. I love you.
