I checked my email this morning and found an email from a stranger with the subject:thank you thank you thank you. I thought it might be spam, but opened it anyway.

It wasn't spam.

It was written by the Japanese/American mother of two girls. (the oldest whom is named mia) Her Japanese mother just passed away suddenly from cancer. The lady writes:

"She moved into our home just before she died, but she declined so rapidly and unexpectedly once she came here that I was never able to write down details of her life that I grew up with, such as the odd little lullaby she used to sing to me every night."

It turns out that lullaby is Nene corriyo, one of the lullabies I had N record and posted on the website Mia's Bicultural Bedtime that I made for an Ed Tech class I was taking when we lived in Togane.

She writes that now her friend will be able to sing the song at her mother's memorial.

So now I'm wondering if my life's purpose was to marry a Japanese man and have children just so I could post this lullaby online. I have had about two or three other emails in the past years thanking me for posting those Japanese lullabies, though none as poignant as this.

Anyway, go tell your surviving parents you love them. You never know when it may be too late.