I’m a Washington girl (the STATE, not the city) born and raised, but moved to East Asia from Seattle almost eight years ago to teach English to university students and study the national language in a backwater town. In many ways, it still feels like home to me, though I lived there for a mere four years. Afterwards, I lived in Boston with the intention of staying there for three years to recruit new graduates to teach in East Asia. However plans changed and I, in turn, moved to the Midwest to follow this wonderful man whose dream was to pursue his passion for business by returning to school for his MBA. Since Dan was willing to move his life around for me to East Asia and Boston. I thought I should be willing to do the same for him, all sight unseen, even to the Midwest in the “middle of nowhere,” as the school’s recruiting DVD emphasized three times.

I started this website mostly because of Dan. He wouldn’t stop bugging me about it. While in college, I discovered my love of writing. Unfortunately after my few years of language learning and being out of the country for a few years, I found it difficult to write as I did before with the same sort of abandonment and creative freedom I used to enjoy. In some small way, I hope to reclaim some of that through writing here. I’m dedicating this place, this website, to writing again. It’s my hope that it’ll change into something reminiscent like my J. Crew sailor-stripe boatneck sweater —something luxurious, keeps me warm, is soft and cozy, and reminds me of wonderful things like my grandmother who bought me my first cashmere sweater.

There are a few things that are dear to my heart, my faith-though I’m a rather poor emulator of Christ, my marriage, my family, and my friends. Of what I’m fond of, well, the list is quite a bit longer, but to name a few—drinking decaffeinated green tea at all hours of the day, watching TV, Starbucks, thumbing through the J. Crew catalogue, reading the latest Real Simple mag, sushi and with a bit of luck soon I’ll also be fond of writing this blog (because right now, it feels a bit like a chore).

And in case you were wondering, I’m a two and a half generation Chinese-American who married a big, tall white guy with blue-eyes and all; and I am very much in love with him. My mother was born in the suburbs of Chicago, my father was born in a village near Fujian, but mostly raised in Hong Kong. They met at Southern Illinois University while my father was in graduate school and my mother was studying as an undergraduate. And the rest is history…

Email me: cashmerepapers at gmail dot com