Working customer service feels a little like being both the bouncer and the stripper at the club. I have to make sure people act right, don’t abuse employees, and don’t scare other customers. And when people pay, they sometimes toss crumpled bills at me like I’m part of the show. Debit cards too.
What I’ve learned is that people either really like me or are a little afraid of me. There doesn’t seem to be much middle ground. But even the ones who are afraid of me at least respect me. I guess that’s just customer service.
On a busy day I can have 400 conversations. On a slow day, a couple hundred. Most are forgettable, some are kind, a few are rough. My coworkers can remember people’s names and what they buy every day. I used to be able to do that too. Now, between law school and life, I just don’t have the mental hard drive space for all that trivial nonsense.
But I’ve realized something important. People want to feel cared for. They want to feel seen. They want to matter. With everything happening in the world, especially with an administration that reduces entire groups of people to “the worst of the worst,” it’s easy to become numb. It’s easy to flatten people into one-dimensional images. Standing behind that counter reminds me every day that I don’t know the life someone is going home to after they buy their gas, energy drinks, or cigarettes. All I know is that in that brief interaction, I have a chance to make someone feel human.
And it goes both ways.
I’ve had customers yell at me and then come back later to apologize. I never asked for it, but I appreciated it. Not just the apology, but the self-reflection that came with it. I try to do the same. I’m the first to apologize when I know I’m wrong. I’ll even apologize to a door if I bump into it. Very Asian of me.
I question myself constantly. My opinions, my assumptions, where they come from. I’ve always been deeply self-reflective and far more self-critical than most people realize. Nothing in my life was handed to me. Opportunity only matters if you’re willing to take risks and do the work.
I’m 51 years old, working at a gas station, and going to law school. That says a lot about who I am. Some days I fail badly. I disappoint myself. I disappoint others. But more often than not, I’ve given more than I’ve received.
No matter how tired or frustrated I get, when I fall, I lie there for a minute, and then I get back up. I keep trying to do better. For myself. For my community.
Some people have been part of my journey. Some have dropped off. New folks join along the way. At every point, I’m grateful for the people who showed up when they did. But gratitude doesn’t mean you have to keep everyone forever. It’s okay to outgrow people who want you to stay small, stay stuck, or stay silent.
Growth requires different company. And that’s okay too. Some people get to be part of that journey. Others don’t.
Asal was 6 months younger than me. She would have turned 51 this year, but instead she will always be 36. Friendships are strange like that. For reasons I never fully understood, she really wanted to be my friend. She saw something in me that she felt she was missing, something she needed in her life. Maybe I gave her a sense of legitimacy. Maybe I made her feel more anchored. I don’t know. I just know that the connection mattered to her, and eventually, it mattered to me too. I’ve been thinking about her with her birthday coming up, and with everything happening in the world right now.
Grief doesn’t go away with time. It just changes shape. Some days it’s sharp and heavy. Other days it’s quiet, almost manageable. Sometimes it shows up as anger, sometimes as clarity, sometimes as questions that don’t have answers. Birthdays do that. They remind you that time kept moving, even when someone you loved couldn’t.
Asal and I talked almost every day, about everything, but especially about politics. What’s funny is that in my late twenties, I wasn’t even that into politics yet. She was. She paid attention early.
She once told me that the Kanye West and Mike Myers moment during the Hurricane Katrina telethon was one of the most honest snapshots of where the country was at. Mike Myers, clearly uncomfortable, is pleading with people to care and to help. And Kanye saying plainly that Bush didn’t care about Black people. That was 2005. She understood then what a lot of people would spend the next twenty years arguing about.
To her, Katrina was never just a “failed response” by our government. It was about us ignoring the truth about climate change and poor infrastructure. It was about power. It was about who was considered disposable. She was good at spotting patterns and cutting through the official explanations when they didn’t hold up. What’s harder to talk about, and what feels more honest now, is that she was also a deeply flawed human in ways that didn’t always line up with that clarity.
She wore strength well. Too well, sometimes. She hid her brokenness behind intelligence, conviction, and a tough exterior. She wasn’t unique in that. A lot of us do it. We learn how to look competent, composed, principled, while quietly panicking that if anyone sees the scared, messy parts underneath, they’ll turn away.
She lied sometimes. A lot, actually. She crossed lines. She hurt people. She took things that weren’t hers. And in the end, she chose escape over accountability. I don’t say that with cruelty. I say it because pretending otherwise flattens her into something simpler than she was.
People like to believe humans are straightforward creatures. Good or bad. Right or wrong. Victim or villain. But we’re not. We’re complicated systems of fear, desire, trauma, love, and denial, all stacked on top of each other. We can see injustice clearly in the world and still be unable to face our own pain. We can call out power while being terrified of being truly seen.
I wonder what she’d think now. About Iran. About the U.S. About women’s bodies being controlled everywhere under different justifications. About masks getting heavier instead of lighter. I think part of her would be furious. Part of her would feel vindicated. And part of her would still be afraid.
I miss the version of her who could cut through the bullshit and name uncomfortable truths. I also mourn the parts of her that never felt safe enough to come into the light. Grief holds both at once. It lets memory shift between love, anger, tenderness, and disappointment without asking permission.
Her story reminds me that strength without vulnerability is brittle, and that hiding doesn’t make pain disappear. It just waits. And waits. And grows and grows until it becomes an unbearable burden you no longer can live with.
On Asal’s birthday, I don’t want to sanctify her or condemn her. I want to remember her as she was: brilliant, flawed, perceptive, scared, and very, very human.
And maybe let that be a reminder to the rest of us to tell the truth sooner, ask for help earlier, and stop pretending that fear makes us unworthy of being seen.
I love you. I miss you. I wish you were still here. And sometimes I’m glad that you are not. May your soul be at rest wherever you are.
“God does not burden a soul beyond what it can bear.” — Qur’an 2:286
** If you or someone you know is struggling, you’re not alone. In the U.S., you can call or text 988 for support, 24/7.
Recently at work, I’ve been called “sir” more times in the past two days than I have in the last six months. New year, new masc energy?
I was joking with my coworkers that I don’t think I’ve done anything differently, other than allegedly looking like my coworker Brian, who is… a totally different kind of Asian than me. Honestly, I don’t know who should be more offended. Me or Brian. 😂
I joked to my boss that maybe I’m just exuding a lot of big D energy lately. To which my boss, a gay man, immediately replied, “That’s why I’m so attracted to you.”
Honestly. Iconic.
No one ever says, “For my New Year’s resolution, I’m going to be less active, gain 30 pounds, and really commit to being cruel and insensitive.”
Probably because we already spent most of the year perfecting being tired, busy, overstimulated, and occasionally unfeeling jerks. Uncomfortable, but not inaccurate.
I’d like to think that, in my own small existence, I try to be a better person every day of every year. I don’t need resolutions to be unhealthy or mean. That happens effortlessly. Being kinder, healthier, more present, more loving, more intentional, more courageous? That actually takes effort. It takes work.
So maybe we stop waiting for January 1 to be better humans. If we want to be happier, healthier, more connected, more mindful, more grateful, more useful in the world, the best time to start is always right now. At this very moment. Let’s at least try to be more kind. More soft. More gentle.
This last year has been about letting go of old versions of myself and paying closer attention to who I am now. Not in a dramatic rebirth way. More like a quiet recalibration.
For the record, I’m doing well. I’ve been back in Rochester for over a year now, living a familiar life with a very different mindset. Same place. New lens.
A lot of this year has been spent rethinking what it actually means to be friends. Who shows up. When they show up. And how much it matters when they do. Sometimes we find ourselves in people’s lives exactly when we’re supposed to be there. The real choice is whether we tap into the magic of that serendipity or keep moving through life on autopilot. Whether we risk making the unthinkable real or stick with what’s comfortable and familiar.
I read The Alchemist in my early thirties during a period of deep soul-searching around identity and purpose. What stayed with me wasn’t the romance of the journey, but the reminder that the treasure we’re chasing is often where we started. The quest matters, but it begins with us and ends with us.
Along the way, we meet different people. Different characters. Eventually you realize they’re all mirrors. Different versions of ourselves, showing up to help us understand who we are and what we actually want from this one strange, ordinary, beautiful life we get to live.
Life is weird. Growth is quieter than we expect. And sometimes coming full circle is the whole point.
Every day is a new day to do better.
New year. Same you.
Cheers. 🍻❤️
