<Begin Segment 22>

IM: The thing that I wanted to ask, I guess, was so you mentioned around the time when you were pregnant and you kind of took a step back, tried to reevaluate who you were, because to be a parent, to be a mother, you had to know who you are if you're going to raise a child, right? I was wondering if, during that period, you mentioned that Mark was still pretty active. Was he supportive of you and the kind of things that you were going through at that point?

KM: I think so. I mean, he never said not to step back or things like that. Although when you ask that question, it's kind of like Mark always did... I mean, there was very few things that he feels strongly about sometimes. I mean, most things he's pretty flexible, but I think the job, the workers, it's like when Mayumi was born, he got called, he was trained to be an airplane mechanic, and he just finished it. And then he call that there was a job at General Motors in Van Nuys, and Mayumi was about to come. And so that first week that she came, he had started the job. And I think it was like a swing shift job or something like that. My mother was sick, she was not able to do a lot, and then Mark wasn't around so I think actually he had, it was like he was gone. So I was like, "What is this?" I mean, no, I didn't feel support after she was born. Before that, I think he was okay with it. I don't think Mark understood what... my reflection in thinking about, even then, was that Mark had these ideas about, I'm going to have two children, a house in five years. I thought, "What are you talking about? What does that mean?" What kind of, what's so important about two kids and a house in five years? I didn't even think about getting a house. But he somehow was like, I said, "I don't think you even know what that means." So it was like, I was very perplexed by some of his thinking. So I don't think he understood sometimes reality, like what was really, was needed. Like having a child, well, what does that mean?

IM: Sounds like he didn't understand the work it took for you?

KM: I think so, yeah.

IM: So who did you turn to for help when you were dealing with this early on?

KM: Well, there weren't people to turn to. My sister was working, my mother was still actually working, and she would bring food over. And even when she couldn't cook, she'd bring over packages of steaks or something, something like that, she was trying her best, but no. But before that, I mean, with the decision not to actually pull out of the League, because I guess I was in it for a brief period because we merged. So not being part of the League, I don't know if Mark really understood what I was trying to say or why I was doing that, but that didn't matter. Someone earlier had said to me, earlier in the movement, like maybe in mid-'70s or earlier had said, "The joy is gone. You don't seem to have any joy." And I thought, "Oh, my god." That kind of stuck with me because I thought, yeah, everything had become very serious and very without any kind of... metaphysical things were no good, that kind of stuff. Things that I thought were kind of, I kind of more related to. So to me, it was like, at that point, I have to really go back to who I really, what I valued, what I think is important, and just check that out. So it's funny because the counselor that I saw, she was just very interested in learning about the movement. So she'd ask me all these questions about the movement, so I'd be telling about the movement, and I don't know if it's therapy I got but it was like, she was learning a lot about the movement.

IM: So the counselor got a lot more.

KM: Yeah. It was kind funny, but maybe that was helpful.

IM: So no one in the League really reached out to you?

KM: I don't know if I told them. I don't think I expressed... I might have said why, but I don't think people understood. No, I didn't expect them to reach out. I didn't really think people would understand, frankly.

IM: Because there were other members in the League who had gone through a lot of other...

KM: Because what I was seeing was so alien, I think, to how people thought at that time. It was not so much about self-care like we talk about now, but... I just really thought I had no center.

IM: Okay, well, thank you for that.

<End Segment 22> - Copyright © 2023 Densho. All Rights Reserved.