How close we are?

In psychology, a concept ‘communicative distance’ is supposed to determine the comfortable distance between two people. It is said distance less than 0.5 meter is only good for couples or families, which makes me think if I’m that close to my parents?

If you remember, I mentioned in a former blog the first time I said ‘我爱你，妈妈’ was the day I knew I passed my college entrance exam. And that was the first time I hugged her. I was already 18 years old at time. It didn't mean that we didn't love each other. I will say it’s just not something we will do to show how close we are.

When I tried to figure out the reason, I realized I couldn't. It’s too complicated. It’s about all those culture for 5000 years. What I can do is try to tell you how that works in my life not the reason. My family is a pretty typical working class family. I think although my parents tried to be close to my life physically, they keep a distance from my mental life. For ‘physically’, I mean they take good care of me including my food, my clothing, my education and so on. But ‘hug’ is another thing. It’s not just physical touch. It’s a way of ‘loving’. I will say they are too shy to express ‘love’ although they do everything they can to love me, to protect me. That’s an important part of Chinese culture ‘implicit’ (I don’t know if I use this word right.)

I love you without saying a word.

But time is flowing, things are getting different. If we go back to 200 years ago, a father was even not supposed to smile or to praise his son or daughter. At least my father always smiles to me. And now a lot of families are more westernized. Younger parents are braver to show their love to kids. They kiss their kids, hug them, say ‘I love you’ to them. So do kids.

Sometimes, I still feel regret. I felt so warm when I hug my American family and friends. I hope I can do same thing to my family. Unfortunately I can’t. It’s just too stranger. However, I know we still love each other without saying it.