Family Dinner

Sauce-drenched rice with crispy pork and vegetables to sop up oil. 

And the one rice granule that gets left behind in the porcelain bowl. 

My grandpa tsks jokingly, relaying the familiar Chinese superstition, 

“Each one you do not eat becomes a mole on your future husband’s face.” 

I scoff, but continue to eat as he piles more vegetables into my bowl.

Chopsticks ring against half-empty plates, interrupting the flow of chatter.

I glance around the table at the faces that resemble my own,

With broad shoulders and unkempt caterpillar eyebrows, 

And sunscreen-laden skin that tans much too easily.

My impatient hands cause noodles to fall astray

and scatter across the ever-rotating turntable. 

They disregard my messiness, 

“She's just the baby of the family.”

Steaming tea is refilled into respective cups,

Scorching my tongue upon contact.

There is a strange beauty to dinners like these.

A family seemingly disconnected, yet together interwoven

through threads hand-stitched by Grandma’s knitting needles.

I have learned that humour is developed, a skill to be honed.

Only in the clamorous atmosphere of a Chinese restaurant

can one vulnerably roar of laughter and not be heard or judged.

Waitresses slink by, precariously balanced platters on each sturdy forearm,

too preoccupied to be swayed off track by those who call for their assistance.

A bustling restaurant of chaos, coherent only to those who take the time to understand it. 

I urge the goldfish residing in my brain to remember moments such as these. 

Of conversations over Chinese food as we gather together for a family dinner.