"tis the season to look back..

Resolution.

Is a terrible word. Once you've made one, you're sure to break it. Just like how I made one, here in blogworld about how I was going to write something here once a week and till now, I haven't. In fact, am doing the very opposite. Am putting off writing anything.

The year's coming to an end and I'm taking stock these few days.

On my relationship with God:

I think it's improved by leaps and bounds. My prayer life used to be limited to zoning out at mass every Sunday. I didn't want to talk to god, blamed him for everything and shut him out for so long. But this year, things are different. I spoke to him again.. as in really poured my heart and soul out and he replied! I could actually hear him although it was only 1 simple sentence. It was like coming home after being lost in the darkness. Am much happier, even in times of frustration, disappointment and hurt. I never knew my faith could be this strong.

On my relationship with my family:

I'm home! Been away for so long, shut them out of my life for the last 3 years and now, I enjoy dinners with them every other night. Despite the nagging and stickiness, I'm kind of glad and grateful. But I miss my sister. The other biological half that shares everything with me and yes, " I'll never be alone in my weirdness becos of you.". Countdown till she comes home from Japan.

On my relationship with my other half:

We're doing well. At least I think so but baby if you disagree, feel free to add your comments. He's helped me through so many trials since we've been together. Accepted me for who I am, my past and been such a positive light to my pessimistic nature. He's taught me to believe in my abilites, been patient and loving. One cannot ask for more. I hope we continue to grow old together in love, warmth and affection.

On my friendships:

My girlfriends. What can I say? The rocks that I lean on, the shoulders I've cried on, the laughter we've shared and of cos, the coffee and shopping expeditions. I treasure each of them dearly and though some I don't see very often these days, I miss them and hold the memories of our youth close to my heart. The ones I see more often, I always look forward to more. I don't make many new girlfriends these days. Hardly in fact. Becos I'm not comfortable with mere strangers and opening up to them. So all the more precious they become, my girlfriends.

On career:

There has always been a lack of focus. And I'm always grappling with a lack of one. Perhaps am too harsh on myself for the lack of professional accomplishment but problem is, I only grapple with it when am compared to others. By myself, I'm fine not to be some corporate highflyer. I'm fine not being a mover-shaker type. I like the low profile. I don't enjoy the competition. I just want to find out what my passion is and move in that direction. Am almost 30. I need a career identity. My better half says you can't rush these things, Anne says some people take their whole lives to find out what they do best. God last said to me, " You need to learn patience." So I guess my time isn't here yet.

On last year's resolutions:

Made only one and did not accomplish it. That was to earn my driver's license. And so, it's being brought forward to 2008. Cringe... oh dear..

You and me..

I came across this some time ago and it has always struck me profoundly. I turn to it whenever I have a disagreement with someone close to me, or when my patience is tested or I am hurt by someone I love. It serves as a reminder that no two people are alike.

"If I do not want what you want, please try not to tell me that my want is wrong.

Or if I believe other than you, at least pause before you correct my view.

Or if my emotion is less than yours, or more, given the same circumstances, try not to ask me to feel more strongly or weakly.

Or yet if I act, or fail to act, in the manner of your design for action, let me be. I do not, for the moment at least, ask you to understand me. That will come only when you are willing to give up changing me into a copy of you.

I may be your spouse, your parent, your offspring, your friend, or your colleague. If you will allow me any of my own wants, or emotions, or beliefs, or actions, then you open yourself, so that someday these ways of mine might not seem so wrong, and might finally appear to you as right -- for me.

To put up with me is the first step to understanding me. Not that you embrace my ways as right for you, but that you are no longer irritated or disappointed with me for my seeming waywardness. And in understanding me you might come to prize my differences from you, and, far from seeking to change me, preserve and even nurture those differences. "

courtesy of http://www.keirsey.com/

I came across this some time ago and it has always struck me profoundly. I turn to it whenever I have a disagreement with someone close to me, or when my patience is tested or I am hurt by someone I love. It serves as a reminder that no two people are alike.

The Written Word

On writing.

I used to love to write. It was a saviour to my "tortured" soul; like balm to soothe the torrent of emotion that welled up inside too often for my own good. So that when I let loose, I found perspective, it shaped me, my beliefs on subjects of religion, relationships, family and the like. It was the sieve to the many philosophies and worldly wisdom and religious teachings that one accumulates from being around people, reading too many books and watching too much TV. It gave me insight to where I stood on the boundaries of black, white and grey. Or, on contrary, not to have an opinion at all.

I've seldom ever let anyone read my writing. Yet here I am, blogging for all the world to see. To say I've lost my shyness would be inaccurate for am still painfully shy sometimes. [I hide it well. I think no one even knows.] Especially when it comes to my own work. For I try not to judge lest I be judged. Yet, how can I say I've improved when no one has critiqued? I resolve here and now today that I will attempt to write a piece of whatever-catches-my-fancy-or-not-at-all once a week. Here. About the fog that clouds my mind, the abstract (il)logic/situations/people that draws akin to what seems to have no relation with each other. The distracted nature of mine that drives many people to exasperation, notably my other half. My better half. The one who knows the ways of the world when it continues to befuddle me.

Writing is a cleansing process. Much like crying. Does well for melancholics and depressives. But it only works if you acknowledge that you're one. And how often are we that self-aware?

Sometimes, I wish I were more proficient in numbers rather than language. Then perhaps I would less of what I am now, and more of someone the world in general would approve. Not that I have a self-loathing tendency, but more because the numbers-inclined me would've been less of an emotional/sensitive being and more equipped to survive in this concrete jungle. But whenever that thought crosses my mind, I wonder, how do you express anger and joy and anxiety or excitement in numerals? Like 996736352 to the power of 33 gives you "happiness" while the square root of 55883312 equals "really-pissed-off"?

I write openly here because only a few people know of this page's existence. And you guys are the closest to me so I can be myself. Plus there are no photos (neither will there be in future, not of my face at least) so no blog-voyeurs will know who I am. I feel safe like that.

So sensitive

How does one refrain from being sensitive and emotional?

Why is it such a bad thing? Does it make me a bad person? Or a lesser one?

If not, why ask me to change?

bye bye ah sai... sob!

We're back from the airport. Just sent off ah sai (a.k.a. my sister) and feeling rather sad. Have not cried yet.. we did that at mass yesterday already. But there's a funny feeling welling up in my chest that has not found the surface, upon which I think would mean, active tearduct activity.

She'll be gone for a year and I will miss her dearly. My sister is my best friend. Like she said, amongst other things (unflattering and flattering) written on my birthday card, "I'll never be alone in my weirdness becos of you." She alone understands the dysfunctionality of our family, my own strangenes that so mirrors her own. We are very different, from our looks to taste in fashion, food and habits but somehow, we are also the same. Is this what blood does to you? Bind you in some inexplicable way, making you recognisable only to blood.

Ah sai and I share a bond. I know she feels it too but she's less vocal than I am about expressing emotions. The past few months have been a countdown to tonight but this morning, it was here. The day finally came. And she only finally got packed at 7pm. We had dinner at Soup Restaurant and ate a ton. I thought I would cry at the airport but I didn't. Instead, I was the naggy cow. Remember this, remember that... I can't help it. Am just naturally protective of her. Like when we were young and our then-maid would lock her and ah sai in the room to make her take a nap. She'd be wailing her guts out and I would worry.

So much so that 7-year-old me would climb outside our 6th floor window ledge and peer into the next room to spy and make sure she was ok. There was a time I nearly slipped but God had other plans for me not to die early. But this is how fiercely protective I am about that dodo. And I miss her already. She's very noisy at home, blasting japanese music and crap that it's oddly silent.

Rain rain, go away, come again another day

It has been raining incessantly. Maybe not in Sg but we just got home from Krabi and boy, did it rain non-stop throughout our entire trip from Monday. It was punctuated by a couple of hours of lovely lovely sunshine on the second day but those hours were but a passing blaze.

All too brief.

It rained today as well. The day after we came home, prompting my sis to christen me "The Rain Attractor".

It was nice to spend time with MA. alone for 3 days but I think Mr City Boy was bored. We ate, slept, watched telly and ate some more. I think you will always be able to identify Singaporeans abroad by what they eat and how much they order. It's always alot and we always manage to finish everything having brought up on the culture of, "You better finish your food ah! Think of all those starving children in Africa!"

It was kind of sad not being able to soak in the sunshine and partake in all the watersports and I did want to rock climb badly but overall, it was all right. No complaints.

The Basic Instructions Before Leaving Earth

A.k.a The BIBLE.

No, I didn't come up with that. Father Johnson said it but I don't think he coined it either. I'm writing about it cos 1. I think it's catchy and 2.Because it was Bible Sunday yesterday. This is the weekend of the year where they tell you that it's time to stop using your bible as a door stop or a very comfortable wrist rest and start flipping those pages cos they hold the key to your salvation after you leave this dodo-land.

I think God must not have thought very highly of his creation to leave such a thick instructional manual behind. He really could've helped us out by summarising it but no, knowing the masochistic idiots that we are, we need to pain it out before we start appreciating anything, before we value it.

I read somewhere that there is no mistake in this world that someone else hasn't walked it before. That you can always learn from someone else's mistakes. But there are some like me that refuse to listen, to learn the hard way, whether by ignorance or sheer stupidity and foolishness or plain old stubborness. People like me learn the hard way. We pay the price of course, and sometimes the cost can be too high but we have to pay it anyway.

I used to blame God alot. For the mistakes that were my own. I realise now they were necessary to break me. To get rid of that terrible rebellious streak. I have heard him say to me that he loves me very much but I have to learn obedience. At any other period of my life I wouldn't have listened but I am at this stage in life where I am tired, weary and he chose this time and moment to speak to me. Because he knew I would listen. And I have known peace. For the first time in many many years, I am at peace. I am happy. Still restless in terms of job fulfilment but within, I am at peace.

There are times when the ugly stuff catches up but it doesn't render me totally useless anymore. The pain and regret used to be debilitating, so much so that I can do nothing but cry and blame myself and wallow in self pity. Now I face them better, the tears still roll but inside, it's not so bad anymore.

I try to read the Bible more these days and there are some really interesting characters in there. It makes me realise that I am not alone in my humanity, in my mistakes and my fallibility. That since time immemorial there have been others like me and God loved each and every one of us. Material things seem so unimportant and distant when you're filled with peace and blessed with his love. Everything is put into perspective. I think people still think I'm queer but I don't care anymore. It doesn't matter anymore.

I am blessed.

The bane of my existence

Is without a doubt, my skin.

You know that living, breathing organ they say is the biggest one you have?

Yah, that one.

And blessed are the ones who hath good-skin genes for they will not spend plenty of money and waste precious time agonising on why their arses suddenly grew a red, shiny monster when you need to wear a bikini bottom the next day. Or why they would wake up with new "family additions" when you have a bloody interview that same morning. In prominent view of course. But more often than not, they just ambush you for no bloody reason.

I am ranting. Which tells you that I have no good-skin genes but instead have inherited from my father's side of the family the extremely sensitive, eczema prone, acne prone skin genes and the freckled spatter of my mother's side. Whoever said you can't have freckles and zits at the same time obviously did not research extensively.

Oh. Like it was my mother who said that.

Sometimes I fantasize about having perfect skin. Like Sammi Cheng or Cate Blanchett in those SKII ads. I wonder if you can buy it off ebay. You can anything there right? Unlike a secondhand liver, which once sold or donated, you can't grow another one, this organ is self-rejuvenating isn't it? It'll grow again what. If I had perfect skin, I'd advertise. You make a buck and your skin just grows again. It's like an organic mass production factory!

But of course if that were medically possible, some smart-alec derma doc would've done so already. And me being not-so-smart only thought of this now.

I refuse to resign myself to my genetically-imposed fate. That's why all these derma docs make so much money from me. And yet, despite my diligent persistence and rigorous routine , I still have skin that even the Salvation Army wouldn't take as a donation, much less ebay.

=( mo

blogger's block

I should be taking a bath now. Am smelly, sweaty and I really need to wash my hair. But what I am doing? Eating kimchi, drinking tea with one leg crossed under me on the chair and typing in here at the same time.

Note to self: Cannot buy this brand of kimchi anymore. Not spicy or crunchy enough. Isetan's Jap supermarket still has the best.

I am having blogger's block. Ever since I wrote the first post on the 20th June, I have not been able to write anything which I deem is of enough interest to my dearest friends for whom I started this blog for, since these days we don't have much time for each other while some are far far away.

So I am going to tell you about my latest love affair with Mr Bean. Not the Rowan Atkinson version lah... eeeeee...I mean the soybean-everything kiosks that have been popping up islandwide, even here in my little HDB estate and near the office. Am in luuuurve with this one drink that I crave and must have everyday. It's like a soybean slushie with tapoica pearls in it. They call it "Pearly Soy Milk" and you have to tell them to "jiao bing" with alot of "bing" for it to be slushie and frappacino-like. Plus it's soy! Healthy! The soy ice-cream is not bad too but nothing beats this on a hot and humid day, of which we are suffering from alot these days and causing my bl**dy eczema to act up again. But that's another rant for another day.

Right now, I'm going to only talk about my latest edible obsessions. Apart from this soy milk slushie, am utterly in junk lust with seaweed. Not your ordinary seaweed lah. It's this korean brand of which I haven't even managed to commit the brand to memory but I can identify it in Watsons and my office building mama-shop a mile away! It's cut into bite sized strips -lovely, crispy, flavourful to the max and once I stuff that first piece into my mouth, it's no turning back honey! I ate 3 packs in a single sitting last week and lost my voice. Only managed to get it back after I kicked back 4 bottles of the green concoction from the chinese medical hall. And they just released a new flavour today!

Now I really have to bathe. Am damn gross man.. Ta-ta!

okie dokie, here we are

Heh... here me are again.

I'd thought I'd never return to this. But here I am. And I did this all by me 'lil old self. No Mikey to help me out here. I deserve the pat. Especially since techie-phobey moi still belongs to the dark ages where email is (still considered) a godsend and not taken for granted and eBay is a mystery *gasp* "Sacrilege!" I can hear my dear Pammie, who is probably ringing up the tally on the shopping cart as I type.

But yes, this will now become my 'lil space for my dearest friends, plus a whole lot of cyber voyeurs to peak into the machinations of my sometime incredibly-complex-but-still-no-sense mind and more often than not, the workings of mon coeur (according to babel fish, this actually means 'my heart' although it looks more like 'my cur' than anything else. See? This is what happens when your Chinese tuition teacher tells you to "you bian du bian" when she gives up on her cheena-illiteratto.

So welcome to my mo-ments. The insane, cynical, hopeful, emotionally-charged paragraphs of whimsy where I (will try to) share pieces of my fractured mind and over-active heart "mon coeur, mon coeur" in this place i christen Dodo-land.

mo