fear is essentially about death. That is, of course, a big one. I had no answers: I just gave this to God. As in the first round of worries, insights would just come: sometimes in church, and more often in the cafés where I tended to do my work. A thought came to me amidst coffee and a pile of work that I was not with David either of the times he had his spells. One time, a friend was there; the other time Dave was alone. As it was, I travelled a lot as dean. Right around that time, someone told me the story of a man who went down to the basement to get a bottle of wine and had a fatal heart attack. It dawned on me that things could happen any time, in or out of my presence, regardless of where I worked. The key is to trust God, to know that David is in His care as much as in mine.
We should always be prudent, sensible, and responsible. I am not the risk-seeker type: chasing storms, bungee jumping, and extreme sports hold absolutely no thrill for me. But it was also clear that we can allow the worry about death to clutch us so tightly that we give up living. We take risks daily, every time we cross a street or get in a car. I had to trust my CRS colleagues: if they designate a country or region as sufficiently safe for operations, then it will be safe enough for me. The big question really is: do we trust that God is always with us? That we are in the palm of His hand?
There was a final message that came to me. While death is loss and loss is painful, our Christian faith tells us that death is not a punishment. It is the return to the Father who made us and to the home where each of us was promised a place. It is life continued in a different form, where we finally know love for all that it is and not through a mirror dimly. Whatever loss there is, eventually we will be together again. Another mentor for me is Fr. Theodore “Ted” Hesburgh, C.S.C., the legendary President Emeritus of the University of Notre Dame. When he spoke of death during a homily, his eyes sparkled, and he recited the verse “Eye has not seen, and ear has not heard … what God has prepared for those who love him” (1 Corinthians 2:9). How long we are meant to be on this earth is God’s call, not ours. I was able to put the fear of mishaps for Dave and me in God’s hands and felt a sense of relief.
Fear of Change
The third set of worries that woke me up was kind of silly: a leap from the sublime to the mundane. I am a creature of habit, and I do not like to spend a lot of time attending to daily logistics. I keep the same doctors, dentist, dry cleaner, beauty salon, seamstress, fitness club, shoe repair, car maintenance, grocery store, and Chinese supply store. I am also not a great driver and have a poor sense of direction. Navigating in new cities is always Dave’s job. A new location would require me to start all over again. By then, we had also decided that if I were to be offered the job at CRS, David would stay in South Bend. It wouldn’t make sense for him to move to Baltimore with me because I would be traveling so much. So I would be on my own quite a bit.
I woke up tied in knots over the most trivial matters. Should I move my car to Baltimore or keep it in South Bend? Where will I take my dry-cleaning? Where will I exercise? Should we drive back and forth or spend the money flying back and forth to South Bend? Who will cut my hair? Where will I take my clothes for alterations? I felt like Gulliver as each strand of his hair was pinned down by his tiny captors until he was immobilized.
In the daylight, I recognized these concerns for what they were: about change, about giving up what is familiar, about meeting new challenges, and about leaving one’s community. I felt an attachment to the people behind those services. These individuals — like Karen who did my alterations, Laura who cut my hair, the Sisters of Holy Cross who welcome us every Sunday to worship with them, our faith-filled and gracious neighbors John and Jan Jenkins, my colleagues at the Mendoza College — are friends who care for each other. I did not want to let them go.
Leaving would be hard, as I knew only too well from experience. For me, it would be akin to removing old contact paper from drawers. When the glue of the liner has bonded with the wood fiber of the drawer, the paper does not come off easily and jagged pieces remain.
As I dealt with this, one word from Jesus was lodged in my head: “Go.” It seemed that every reading in scripture at that time echoed that invitation: Abraham, Moses, Isaiah, Jonah, the disciples, St. Paul, and so on. “Go” — a simple enough word; I got the message.
Then there was another word — joy.
Chapter Four
Joy: A Journey
Joy did not come through night visitors, nor did it seize me with exuberant song and dance. It came from a sense that God may be calling, that He had been leading me on a journey where the past revealed its purpose in a specific invitation for the future. I did not grow up in a particularly religious family and would not consider myself to have good prayer and spiritual habits. Yet in my earlier departures from Hong Kong and Purdue, I was moved by some force bigger than myself for reasons that logic cannot explain. And, in hindsight, I saw how every step in my journey led to where I stood that day and was enveloped by the grace and the blessings of these experiences.
My Parents, Peter Woo (aka Ching Chi) and Hung U-Lan
I was born on April 19, 1954, in Hong Kong, in the neighborhood known as “Happy Valley,” which got its name from the iconic horse race course built there in 1846. My Western name, “Carolyn,” was chosen by my father. My Chinese name is Woo Yau Yan (吳幼仁), with “吳” (Woo) as our family name. “幼” (Yau) is the character for “delicate,” which comes from my mother’s given name, and “仁” (Yan) is the character given to all the girls in my family. This character represents the Confucian teaching on how people should relate to one another.
I was the fifth child of my parents, Peter Woo and Hung U-Lan. More importantly, I was the fourth daughter who arrived when my parents were hoping for their second son. My father wanted two sons for “an heir and a spare.” There was talk that if the fifth child were not a son, my father would consider taking a second wife — legal at the time. Both my maternal and paternal grandfathers had multiple wives. And that was a possibility as this fourth girl arrived, much to my father’s chagrin. Fortunately my mother conceived fairly quickly afterward, and my younger brother arrived twenty months later. In a twelve-year span, my parents had six children: Helen, Paul, Irene, Maureen, me, and William.
My parents’ personalities and backgrounds could hardly have been more different. My father was born around 1916 in China. As an infant, he was purchased by the third wife of a man who would technically be my paternal grandfather. My father didn’t talk much about his family as he had very little memory of his early years, and I don’t think he ever felt like he belonged. As a boy, he was sent away to St. Joseph’s boarding school in Hong Kong. It was there he became Catholic. My father was sent for university studies in Germany but enjoyed himself too much to master German, so he transferred to schools in Scotland and received a degree from the Royal Technical College in Glasgow in architecture. The plan was for him to serve the family shipping business located in southern China.
Peter Woo was smart, urbane, daring, and had little experience of family structure. He had always been on his own, made all his own decisions, and did things on his own terms. He loved dancing, bridge, drinking, and probably European dames, as he gave Irish names to all his daughters. In the midst of World War II, he returned to Hong Kong and started work as a naval architect: a profession in strong demand given that Hong Kong’s most distinctive asset is its harbor. My father apparently enjoyed his life as a bachelor in this British colony with his Western flair and full command of the English language. Two incidents, however, disrupted his life: one, he was introduced to my mother; and two, he was summoned by the Japanese, who by then were occupying Hong Kong, to serve its naval interests. For a Chinese man, that would be an act of treason.
While my father grew up on his own, my mother was a hothouse flower protected from all the challenges of life. She was also from China, the
