Lam had one entry from his journal. He didn’t get too far with it, but he tried. He also wrote this on September 27, 2002 while laying in bed at the hospital trying to recover from his illness.
-Maily Dinh
September 27, 2002, 9:48am I’m sitting quitely with D’Angelo’s “Untitled” playing on my laptop as
I journalize
my thoughts on this simple but useful notepad application. I still have a stinkin tube stuck up on the side of my right lung. The doctor ordered an X-ray to be done of my chest because he’s starting to realize that I do want to go home and start to feel better. The hospital I’m staying at isn’t too bad, Fountain Valley Regional Hospital.
There we go…
I just changed songs and guess what’s playing? Charles & Eddie’s “Would I Lie To You.” It’s such an upbeat song. One of my favorites and most classic songs to play whenever I’m in a down mood. Jenny came to visit me yesterday. That was really sweet of her to do that……
FVRH is a nice hospital, food is descent, service is better than I thought it would be. Everyone here is really nice, so staying at the hospital isn’t as dreadful as I thought it would be. Its also nice to have a really big room so you don’t feel so confined and alone. I felt that way the first time I was admitted to the oncology unit in april/may. That wasn’t a pleaseant stay. Well, what i have i decided to do today? First, I’m going to finish eating my peaches for breakfast. Next, I’m going to start the family tree that i’ve been thinking about for the past month. after that, hopefully, i’ll find enough motivation to sit down and talk to my mom about
her experience growing up in vietnam and the family she grew up with. Yes, I might try and start a freaking book. Hey, I got nothing else better to do than that. Ok, no more peaches, i just ate a bad one. If there’s anything else that comes up today, i will make sure i log it down. thank you for listening.
Life graph Talk
Every man and woman lives a life only she can tell in his/her own words. No one can put on his shoes and trace back what has happened to him or relive those precious memories he has experienced. Sometimes it’s even difficult to look back on your own life and face those hardships you’ve gone through yourself.
To know where we are now, we must look at where we have been, and where we came from. Each person has his/her own story to tell. Every single one of us are similar in many ways in that we live a life and in the course of our lifetime we experience obstacles that either challenges us or enlightens us. These obstacles can even change our lives. Later I am going to ask you to graph your life, but before I do that, I am going to share with you my own life graph.
The farthest that I can remember back was during elementary school.Growing up as a kid was pretty tough for me especially throughout elementary school. I was your typical loner, I kept to myself and tried not to associate myself with the people around me. I had no friends; I had no one to hang out with, teachers sometimes didn’t even know I existed in their class. There were times that my name wouldn’t even show up on the role sheet. My yearbook would only have two signatures, my own that would say, “this belongs to lam” and my teacher’s signature. People would pass me by and not even ask for my signature and when I had the courage to ask somebody to sign my book, they’ll look at me, turn around and ignore me. That hurt my feelings, which only forced me to seclude myself even more from everyone else, I didn’t like people and people didn’t like me. To add to the loneliness, I was horrible in school. I wasn’t cut out for school in elementary. I never raised my hand, never participated in class discussions, and was that only person that missed 9 on a 10-point assignment. I hated myself for doing so bad in school, especially when my little brother has to help me in my times table. So throughout my whole elementary experience, I would designate it as one of my low points.
Getting out of elementary was one of the best things that happened to me up to that point in life. And when I found out that I was going to Junior High School with my cousins, I couldn’t have been happier. Knowing that I was going to leave everyone in elementary behind and start a new beginning at a private school with my cousins definitely got me excited. See, the great thing about this new environment was that my cousins were very, and I mean very popular at this school, so I was a shoe-in at this school. A person just knowing them automatically makes him popular, can you imagine what it’d be like being their cousins. The first day of school, I received hellos without the “dork” hanging behind it. Something like that would even put a smile on my face. And from then on, my status as a human being shot through the roof. People liked me and I liked people. Everyone wanted to talk to Lam. Everyone wanted to eat lunch with me, hang out with me, even the ladies wanted to go out with me. I received telephone numbers from girls and let me tell you right now…that was unusual, though right now I have to admit that I am piling up with them numbers…well anyways I didn’t even know what to do with the numbers. I want to mark [this] period of my life as one of my high points because of the respect I was getting from people…
Being the most popular guy in the 7th grade, and at times even more popular than my cousin, became a difficult title to maintain. You have to do certain things in order to keep this name and you know how it’s like…you have to date certain girls, be the best athlete, keep the suave look everyone has learned to like, and be the biggest and baddest boy in school. Though I was still horrible in shcool, that didn’t bother me. That didn’t fade me one bit, cuz I relied on people to do my homework and people just relied on me to hang out with them. I was eating it all up and enjoying every bit of it. As I was saying about doing certain things to keep that popularity title…rebelling against authority always and somehow drew more attention to your name. And since it did, why be good, when being bad can make you popular. Being this new and rebellious person brought out a different side of me that I never knew I had inside of me. Aggression was on my side and if there was anyone out there that was irritating or annoying, they would literally taste the end of my foot…
Seventh grade had past and a whole new and more destructive me was born in the 8th grade. I was reckless and out of control. The Sisters and Priests at the private school didn’t like me at all; I gave my family a bad name. But I didn’t care. All I cared about was having fun and staying popular. School was out of the question and authority, whether it was in school or with the public, excited me whenever I broke their rules. Since that was the case, I decided to bring a little more excitement in my life, so I started to steal things. It was petty at first…going to liquor stores and slipping that small Reeses Pieces Peanut Buttercup in your pocket, and walking out the store knowing that the cashier had no idea that you just stole a whole Reeses Pieces Peanut Buttercup. At that point, there was no greater feeling than to outdo dumb grownups. Chocolate Bars and Candy became a bit boring to me so baseball cards were next on the list. The profit you can make stealing baseball and basketball cards and selling them amazed me. Getting a Shaquille O’Neal rookie card for free and selling it for 30 bucks was incredible. In about a day or two, I could clear out all the baseball and basketball cards in the store and make about 100 to 150 dollars profit selling them each week. This inspired me to make more money, but to make more money; you have to have better merchandise to sell… I was never caught and that was the exciting part. It’s just the fact that I was able to outsmart grownups and fool the police. My motto became: “It’s only stealing when you’re caught.” Then one day while my house was being renovated, I heard some older guys next door yelling out racial slurs and making fun of the way my parents talked. That really pissed me off… that point, I didn’t even care if I killed them…. but being the stubborn person I was, I couldn’t let it go. I couldn’t let them win. The only idea to get back at them was to [steal some of their stuff]. And at that point, I was used to doing that and being caught never crossed my mind. After it was all over, it would just add to the fact that I just outsmarted another grownup and got away with it… We were caught. We were outsmarted by a 5 year old. I ran to my friend’s house and we stayed there for about two hours. I called home and prayed to God, and funny how we only pray to Him when we are in need of something or when we’re in trouble; well I was hoping that everything at home was ok. My little sister picked up the phone, and all I could hear was crying, yelling, and a little girl all alone with 20 neighbors cursing her at the door. I told her where I was and my cousin came to pick us up. When we arrived back at my house, and right when I stepped out the car, a policeman grabbed me and he threw me on the ground, cuffed me, and told me to shut the hell up. While on the ground, I was crying, I was scared. I saw my little brother’s eyes….he looked up to me so much…and I saw his eyes, filled with disappointment, sadness, fear, tears. My mother not being able to do anything was pushed away by the policeman and seeing tears running down my fathers face only made me cry more. Neighbors were yelling and cursing at my parents…. I brought shame and embarrassment to my household. I went to court and was threaten to be sentenced into juvenile hall. This became the lowest point of my life ever.
Though I wasn’t sentenced to Juvenile hall, coming home from court and facing the rest of my family with the fact that I have to attend a Shortstop program for delinquents and do 100 hours of community service was even scarier. I didn’t want to face my parents with my situation. After that incident, my parents lost all trust in me. Wherever I went out, I had to lie to them so I could go and if that didn’t work I snuck out. I kept sneaking out almost every night and wouldn’t come home until 2 or 3 in the morning and let me remind you, I was still in the 8th grade. My parents never knew about it and months would pass by until finally they caught me. I knew they were up waiting for me, so I decided to enter the front way. All I heard for the next 20 minutes were yelling and cries of desperation to cure me of my problems. That incident didn’t bring one tear on my face. After that event, problems at home got worse and it got to the point where I packed my bags and left and didn’t come home til a week later. When I came home, the joy and sadness seen in both my parents face still didn’t convince me that they loved me. In my heart, I knew they did, but denying their love was the only motivation for me to do the things I did. They apologized to me…to me! When I should be saying sorry to them, and being the very insensitive person that I was, I accepted the apology and never once said sorry about bringing shame to them, bringing them the pain and suffering that they went through, and running away. Me not apologizing to my parents and blaming them for everything seemed right and felt right but as I look back now I see this episode as a low point in my life.
8th grade was now over and High School now became a new challenge and a new chapter in my life. My parents not knowing what to do with me sent me to a Boarding School, a seminary to be exact. An all Boys’ School, that centered its learning on philosophy and religion. It took me about a week into school to realize that my parents wanted me to become a priest. A priest…can you imagine me becoming a priest! I had a hard enough time in the beginning of school just knowing that there were no girls around for another 10 miles and the fact that my parents wanted me to become a priest was even harder to swallow. Though I faced both predicaments, it was one of the best years of my life up to this moment. I finally found peace with the world, with myself and with God from the love I received not only from Him, but also from the brothers I have made in that year. Like the love from God and like the love from your family, this brotherly love was in its own world. It was a love that I never felt before. It was a love that I needed to realize what I have around me. I started as a freshman there, and I also finished as a freshman there because it closed down that same year…till this date I still thank God for enabling me to experience that year before it finally shut its door. This is considered to be one of the highest points in my life.
Though I’ve found this peace within myself and with the world and with God, there was one item in my life that was still incomplete…my family…. my parents especially. It wasn’t until a terrible incident that I finally realized my parents’ love for me. That next year as a sophomore, I found out that my mother had lymph node cancer. I never knew anyone that had cancer before, and out of all people, why my mother. After finding out that she was diagnosed with the cancer, I started to question God’s existence. Why does He play these games with me? First he enables me to find peace within myself and He earn my trust and I trusted Him watching over me at all times, then he plays these stupid games on me and puts me in a situation I have no control over. I stopped praying and started yelling at God, and at that point, I wanted nothing to do with Him. The next couple of days I visited my mother, I even ditched school to visit her. And every time I visited her in the hospital, I remember seeing how beautiful her smile was and I thought to myself “what if something happens to her?” I would wake up to nothing. And then I would think back to how supportive and loving she was to me and despite all the pain and suffering I put her and my father through, they were still there for me through thick and thin. I actually lived out that motto: “You don’t know what you have until you lose it.” Before her first operation she even apologized to me, and in tears I asked her “Why? Why are you saying sorry” and for the first time in a long time with tears in my eyes I finally said sorry. It took her 2 operations to remove the cancer. From then on I’ve never appreciated my family more than I do now. I finally gave them that unconditional love and respect from me that they deserved for such a long time, and though this period of time was one of the most difficult for me to handle, I mark it as one of my high points because it is this incident that made me realize how much I love my family and how that love is unconditionally returned to me each day that I live.
Throughout High School, I matured a great deal. I left everything behind me. I wanted to start a new life, a new beginning for myself, but without God. I was unable to trust Him. He had no part in what I do. The funny thing was that I did better without Him. It seemed like I did worse in school, worse in life, and worse with family when I believed in Him. During my High School years my academics was among the best in the whole school. I graduated 5th in my class with a GPA of 4.0, but I didn’t thank God for it. I soared in my athletics being among the top volleyball players in Orange County, but I didn’t thank God for it. I was also named Prom King for my High School, though this isn’t a big thing, it showed me how people appreciated me and how much they like me to choose me, but I didn’t thank God for that either. I’ve accomplished so much in High School, I couldn’t have been happier on the outside, but inside I was missing something. I needed God, call me crazy, but having this empty feeling inside me or having no faith made me feel incomplete about life. I didn’t want to admit that I needed God in my life. I was afraid to trust Him again and afraid that He will let me down again. There are times where I would wake up in the morning sit in one spot for the whole day and then go back to sleep. I was depressed; it was a mysterious feeling I’ve never felt before. I felt lonely again and this marks one of my low points of my life.
My mom noticing my fits of depression and noticing the lack of attention I have for mass decided to send me on a retreat. Kairos II, it was called. I never heard of such a thing, I’ll ask stupid questions like, “There was a Kairos I?” and “Is Kairos a Persian word?” I remember the first day at Kairos too. I was trying to do anything that would keep me from going on the retreat. I tried to act up so that they would kick me out and give me my refund, but they tolerated everything I did. I didn’t want to go on some retreat that helped me learn more about God and myself. First, I already knew myself, and second…I didn’t want to learn about God. But I soon realized how weak I was without Him in my life. During that weekend, I opened up and shared to people I thought I would never talk to. They listened to me and I realized at that point that God was using them as tools to help me renew my faith in Him. I knew that I could trust Him again. It was the most powerful experience in my life. It was Him that sent me on that retreat. I thank Him to this day for allowing me to go. I mark this journey of discovery as a high point in my life and quite possibly the Highest point in my life.
When we look back at what we’ve done, we tend to regret certain things in life, some people might hate me for saying this, but I don’t regret a single thing I did. I am at my happiest state yet and it is because of my past that makes me the young and happy man I am today. For every low point in my life, a high point follows it. Sometimes, it takes these low points to actually help us reach that high point in our life. I’m hoping for my graph to slope up for the rest of my life at this point on, i want to stay happy for the rest of my life and I’m sure everyone here would wish the same, but it is God to decide what he wants from us, and I have learned to accept that. He has a place for us all, it takes time, trial and error, tears and smiles to finally figure out where we all stand, but at the end you know…you just know.
I’m going to share with you a short story before I end this talk. There was a man stranded on an island for 10 years without anyone to talk to and no way of getting off. The man was depressed, alone, and hopeless. One day the man left his hut to catch some fish for his dinner. 2 hours later he came back with a smile on his face and a bag full of fish to only realize that his hut was burning. He sat there and saw everything he had collected and made for 10 years slowly burn down to ashes. He looked up at God and started to yell and curse at Him. “Why did you do this to me?” the man asked. He fell to his knees and started crying. Later on that day, an airplane came by and saw the man on the deserted island. The man was so happy and delighted to see another human being and was so happy that he was finally saved. The man was confused and quite lost, so he asked the pilot, “How did you know that someone was here to save?” the pilot responded, “The smoke led me to the island.” God works in mysterious ways, and though it seems hard at first to accept the path he has given us; happiness, joy and salvation is at the end.
To God:
“Now that I come to know your love for me, No reason to look any further, Now that the sun has come and set me free, I will stand and take your hand”
Now, I’m going to ask you to graph your life in this similar fashion. End your graph at where you stand right now in your life…
By: Lam Dinh
August 17, 2000
Speech he made to adolescents in Kairos