2022
Dear Jinhwa:
Out of One’s Own
The First Letter

Dear Jinhwa,

I write this letter after a bowlful of cereal. How is Mangwon? I didn’t even have to ask when we saw each other daily in our bustling office. Haehwa is fine. I’m fine in Haehwa.

It seems a long way between wanting to write a letter and actually writing it. I waited until I was filled with words to open my laptop; now that I’ve opened it, they seem so distant. Now I just long to call you.

Jinhwa.

I often recall our conversation in a café by the beach near the winter’s end. We spoke of building an outside of our own. That we need our own out as much as a room to call our own. How difficult it is to form a new family, make new friends, create new surroundings. I remember nodding my head continuously when you broached the subject. (In fact, I’m nodding on my own now.) Having coveted your words and thoughts for the last few years, I was drawn to your concerns. Building an outside all my own. For me, too, it’s a necessary and daunting task. With a move to a faraway place looming ahead, I find myself going back to your words, mulling over an out of my own.

But Jinhwa, the reason I chew over our past conversation is because of one lukewarm doubt: Did I nod fully comprehending you? Or did I just nod, hungry to appropriate your words because I liked them so much? You said you needed an out of your own. Then what constitutes your interior? Where does it end, and your exterior begin?

My inside, as conceived between my nods, is my body. The stinging sunlight penetrating the window and loud campaign songs. I’m in my room yet feel outdoors. As a matter of fact, sometimes even my body feels outside me. For example, it’s hard to claim my body as my own right before my period. Do you happen to recall how I used to curl up, holding my lower belly in our office? Feverish and nauseous, unfit to do anything all day, I’m flooded with helplessness of not being able to control my own body. Writing makes me realize I leave out anything that pains or inconveniences me.

For me, whose body is occasionally external, an outside of my own is too vast. Holding onto this thought, I’m lost where and how I should set about creating my own out. This summer, will you write to me about the in/outside of your making? I want to know you, in and out.

Outside me,
July