Q

like i’ve said before, i devote an abnormal amount of feeling to inanimate objects. by that i don’t mean i love an object very much for the purpose it serves or can’t live without it, et cetera. the object itself, to me, takes on the characteristic and value of a living entity. in some cases i unconsciously personify these objects, believing them to have feelings (of jealousy, fear, joy).

i know i sound like a serious psycho now, haha – this post has the potential of irrevocably marring my image, but idrc. so, RIGHT. i’ve done my bit of research and the closest description i’ve got for this strange obsession is OCD. which i think everyone has mildly, including myself. on the spectrum of type-writer neat handwriting to arranging my books parallel to my bed or anything, i’m on the occasional urge to tap my other knee if i tap one/need to knock on a surface before i leave a place/inexplicable compulsion to count to a particular number/uncontrollable want to reread the previous page of a novel for no apparent reason range.. OK MAYBE I SHOULD STOP HERE.

so yesterday after i woke up in the middle of the night and thought WHERE IS MY HEATHER GRAY UNDERWEAR I HAVE NOT SEEN IT FOR A LONG TIME I MISS IT, i woke up the next morning thinking, hell. i’m weird. so throughout the day i’ve been listing things i’ve had a strange level of preoccupation with, in descending degrees of cuteness and ascending degrees of creepiness.

a) soft toy(s)

ok this started out as a cute, common thing. i had this yellow teletubby that i brought EVERYWHERE and by everywhere i mean to school and malls and restaurants. before that there was a dog, and in between a slew of other toys i paid extreme attention to as a child. BUT NONE OF THIS WERE, YKNW, ~REAL. until Dinky Danky Ralphie Stein came along. when i first saw it – i know this sounds really dumb but – i just KNEW i had to get it. like it was destined to be mine, i just knew. yes, yes the psycho vibes are reaching from your monitor and molesting you with my oddness, but seriously k.

THIS is where the real psycho bits begin: once ddrs was mine, i started attributing hominal characteristics to it. when G was being crazy and twisted its neck i felt actual FEAR that it might get hurt. i’m slightly ashamed to admit this, but since the entire drama class have witnessed this already – yes, i cried. i mean, my sane side told me it doesn’t really matter, but that creepy inanimate-loving side was just like NOOOO HE’S IN PAAAAAIN~~~ ikr.

i didn’t really take note of my preoccupation any further, since soft toys are very often the subject of obsession (especially in st. nicks, strange). but sometimes i’d catch myself unconsciously placing ddrs strategically among the other toys so IT WOULDN’T BE JEALOUS (that I was favoring the others) WHAT EVEN. also i can’t sleep very well without it, but that’s ( i think) what many struggle with. right? like mr bean. and. others..

b) pet rock/pet ball

at this point i’m thinking – DOES THIS HAPPEN TO EVERYONE, or is it just me? i’ve always assumed having a pet rock is ordinary, because it’s all over Enid Blyton and Beverly Clearys. in fact those were where i got the pet rock idea from. so yes, i stole a rock out of the stone painting kit my mom bought me and just kept it around with me all the time. it was quite a long time ago so i don’t remember exactly what i did to it – but i do know for certain that 1. it had a name 2. i HAD to have it with me at all times 3. i was pretty damn obsessed with it – now when i try to search for that obsession, i can almost feel a tiny spark of intense protectiveness and love i had for.. the rock.

then again, i was young and foolish and that phase passed soon enough. there was another that preceded the rock, in primary 1 i remember. it was a pink rubber ball with a smiley face on it i might have acquired off the road for all i know. i named it Jezebelle. at that time i didn’t know that meant whore (come to think of it, that was scarily accurate in portending my future self). again, i’m not sure what i did with it – many, many things (none sexual), and like the rock i can remember clearly my passionate belief that Jezebelle was a precious, precious thing that understood me and experienced emotions (joy, primarily, for that’s the only expression it was capable of).

i’m surprised i still had (many) friends back then. more surprising is that they remained my friends despite what happened later on. we’re coming to that.

c) a bubble

right. the bubble was just a one off, cute episode i’ve artfully slipped in the middle so you’ll remember that behind the slightly deranged self i’m now projecting is an innocent, sweet, conservative, virginal asian girl to be likened to Spongebob. in fact i was kind of glad when i watched the episode with spongebob and his bubble buddy because it made me realize i’m not insane. spongebob saved my life.

so anyhus, a friend told me how wonderful it was to make soap bubbles while bathing. so that one day i tried and randomly created a small, solid little bubble that i thought was the most beautiful bubble – nay, thing – in the world. (HELL YEA I JUST USED AN ANCIENT SPEECH PATTERN SPONTANEOUSLY. who in hell besides horses says NAY anymore!?) so entranced was i by it’s simple, unadulterated beauty i sat there immobile for what felt like half an hour – which i think was actually five minutes in a non-9-year-old time frame – with the bubble on my hand because i was certain it would burst. it did. actually it was because i breathed so hard it popped. so..

cute right.

d) pokemon

i know all kids were once (or will always be) obsessed with pokemon – the game. i don’t know how many are preoccupied with the pokemon themselves. the game became so real to me, each pokemon i had, i channelled all my maternal love and compassion and consideration into. as proof, you can go though my archives if you have no life and find the post where i went on fervently about how i was so glad my kyogre ‘seemes to like (me)’ apparently stated in its stats, and how i’d never allow my pokemon to faint in battle, ever, because to me that’s betrayal yadda yadda geek. also when i witnessed my swablu’s first evolution through my sister (who borrowed my ds) i was terribly upset because in my thorough emotional entrenchment towards pokemon i wanted it to be a ~special moment between the pokemon and i.

even i am grossed out, a little. right so in summary i truly, truly loved those pokemon – not love as in i love the game i love pokemon, but they were something else entirely. they were mine, and they knew me and i in turn saw myself as their protector. this is where you may start doubting my cuteness and sanity again.

e) my bed

many times in this space i’ve extolled my bed and its general awesomeness and my love for it. my bed and i, we go a long way. it understands me, i understand it. same story as with the rest, except each object is like a.. different friend. i’ve been avoiding this analogy for really long because not only is it clichéd, i am automatically illustrated as a friendless loser (i’m a loser, just with lots of friends plskthnx). but really that’s how i feel about these things.

i had a phase where anyone who touched/laid on my bed without my permission immediately gets banished to my mental blacklist of undesirables. i still remember who they are. dum dum DUM. not a very safe thing to randomly mess with the bed of a potential psychopath now huh.

f) underwear

i pay a lot of attention to my underwear and each one has a special significance to me. the type and color and material are #punnypun immaterial, really. it’s nothing much, tbh. i just spend an extraordinary amount planning and thinking about my undies.

g) rulers

RULERS. RULERSRULERSRULERS. i think anyone who’ve sat with me during class or studied with me would know i’m fixated with stationary – not that i like stationary but they are kind of.. oh fine – MY FRIENDS. it started in secondary two, when i felt a bizarre affinity with one of my rulers, just the usual 40 cents bendable gray-transparent ones.

it just occurred to me how beautiful it was in it’s symmetry, in it’s simplicity and instantly it was personified in my books FOR LIFE. i kept this ruler for as long as i could, with the name Theophilus Mortimark (and used it wherever possible). later it got lost and i was very – and i mean VERY – upset.

i don’t know who’d recall this, but at first i thought someone stole it and went berserk. and then i realized no one really would steal a 40 cents ruler, so i concluded i lost it. WHICH INCITED THE MOST IMMENSE RUSH OF GUILT I’VE EVER FELT FOR AN INANIMATE OBJECT. i was genuinely sorry that i’d misplaced it and led to it’s eternal ferment in probably a corner of the science lab or something.

there was TheoMark the II and a series of others. i’ve learnt not to go loco when they are (inevitably) lost, but will put in an unnatural amount of effort trying to get them back (such as sending frantic mass texts to all my friends ‘HAVE YOU SEEN MORTIMARK?!?’ [also i love how by then they all knew what i was referring to]). even now i’ve never rid of my strange excitement and joy upon using/owning a ruler. except now i’m a lot smarter and keep AT LEAST two rulers – which i love equally (yknw, in case they get jealous and.. yes. right) – at all times.

h) a tube of insect corpse

HAHAHAHAHAHA frankly this doesn’t rank in the obsession list, but it’s just here because i secretly enjoy portraying myself as grotesquely as possible. but really, it amazes me in retrospect how tolerant my primary school classmates were. i can quite certainly say that CHIJ oln produces a hell lot of weird but amazing kids (Cleo, Celine, Chloe, Rach Pung, Kelicia and i to name a few).

i assure you it was due to childish, scientific and intellectual curiosity that i pursued this collection. so you know we had those anti-drug pins every year –

A DIGRESSION: (which i wrote an essay about – it explained at length how the persistent campaign against drugs only served to raise awareness of drugs and its many uses, elevating it to a state not possible if left alone. i mean c’mon. you were a primary school child, you get books and pins and talks about how people abuse drugs to ‘FEEL HAPPY’, ‘ESCAPE PAIN’ and ‘EXPERIENCE HIGH’, while the supposed effects were portrayed by scantily sketched cartoon boys cowering in the corner sniffling, wouldn’t you think HELL i wanna feel happy too! let me take some drugs and sit in a corner sniffing like a zombie for a few days – it’s worth it! if they left the cautionary campaigns alone, kids mostly won’t even KNOW about drugs. SO YES which i submitted to an amused but slightly concerned teacher).

– so these drug pins came in tubes with a rounded glass top and a flat bottom which doubled as removable lid. i caught a few ants and held them captive in the tube. they died, obviously, so i filled the tube with water and carried it around for a period of time. it might have lasted a few days. i’m pretty sure my classmates were fascinated by it. i don’t remember any criticism – or maybe they could already tell i was psycho and were too afraid to agitate me.

i have no idea why i did it, or why i even remember this. it’s not that i’m a cruel ant abuser either (though i have several creative and superbly cruel methods of torture). sometime after this episode i actually adopted a pet ant, which i named Anthony. i had Anthony for half a day, and when we were having assembly, CELINE ONG killed Anthony. i cried.

Kelicia initiated a moment of silence for Anthony after assembly in class, where we – THE ENTIRE CLASS – actually prayed a full minute for poor Anthony whose brothers i had held in a macabre aquarium of sorts. (or rather sisters, since worker ants are all female. knowledgeable me.)

in recording my strange obsession for inanimate stuff, i’ve come to the following conclusion, that:

1. i need a pet really bad.
2. i just have too much love for everything and everyone.
3. inanimate objects that are beautiful are worthy of love akin to that towards living entities.
4. my friends are equally strange (or just extraordinary tolerant, but i believe the former), which contributes a lot to my deviation to strange child.
5. i am a strange, strange child.