Q

Awhile ago Stella asked me this:

“what are your top 10
a) regrets
haha okay just that actually”

It’s interesting because i don’t have many. Not because i make all the right decisions, but because i consciously avoid thinking about what could have been done right. Now is probably the time to think about it, though.

1.

This one comes easily. I know i’m quite a callous friend, in that i don’t see the importance of constant contact.. and i have a cruel need to withdraw at times. I hate it about myself too, but most of all i expect my friends to understand – which means i don’t feel as guilty as i should be.

But there’s one close friend i’ve had through primary and part of secondary school. I don’t know why i did it, but consciously distanced myself from her until we became just acquaintances. She didn’t do anything, i still liked her a lot. And even if you ask me now i don’t know why i did it, it just happened. If i had to point out myself at my most repulsive behavior it was then. It was borne from illogical and pointless cruelty, and i’m not proud that i had that in me. The guilt settled in pretty soon. And it never left, now when i think about her it’s just guilt and shame and guilt and, seriously. I regret it so much and i never got to apologize because no one talks about it.

While i regret it, i suppose it made me want to prevent anything like that from happening anymore. I still have issues with my bouts of needing space and time alone, but i try not to deliberately dilute any friendship because losing a friend is the dumbest thing to happen.

2.

Alright this may partly be for aesthetic purposes, but it’s not shallow k.. I wish I had taken better care of my eyes.

When i was 8, the teacher sent in my parent because i squinted all the time and seemed to have trouble reading off the blackboard. So we visited the optician and the startled optician was shocked i had waited that long to see him – i was at a frightening -3.60 degrees (for a primary two), which means i was semi-blind all the time but never noticed. Not sure how i lived either. And it seemed like i never learn because after getting my first glasses, the next time i visited i had shot up to -6.50 which means i walked around blind for awhile, again. Now i’m about 7.00/8.00. I also have terrible floaters.

The thing is, i was reading like a madman before schools even found it necessary to feed us with all the myopic eye-care education. And i read everywhere. In the car, in the bathroom, in the dark, under the sun, on my bed, on the couch, walking around, at the dinner table. Literally everywhere. And all the time. For the entire stretch in primary school i may have read more words than i have looked at the world.

When i got older and started with contacts (while performing at the Arts Festival) it struck me how obtrusive and troublesome eyeglasses were, especially when you do theater or sports. I wanted the feeling of waking up with perfect eyesight, and not having to grope around for glasses in the dark (although it made me feel like Harry Potter). My glasses are always either too loose (case in point right now), crooked (because i’m violent with them), or frustratingly grimy/scratched. That’s why i’m permanently on contacts. Which is fine until it dries up on me or hurts towards the end of the month.

Basically, it’s a huge hassle i could have avoided if i’d just read in proper settings. Now i’d have to do lasik. And live with floaters.

3.

Been nicer to my sister. If i were the one more adept at picking up social nuances or reading people, my sister is the complete opposite – she can’t pick up social clues for nuts because she is “not manipulative like you” /quote.

She’s a mawkish, sentimental, gullible, naive, idealistic and, /quoteagain “sensitive” person. This also means she’s incredibly nice to her friends. Too nice. When she was a toddler she was pretty fierce, one who did outrageous things like slutdance to milkshake and scream at people. Now her friends can swing her around and she’d swallow it until it gets too bad. Sometimes i think the years of having to live with me killed that part of her.

I think my dis-compassion towards her comes from being an only child for too long, almost six years – by that time i’d somewhat grasped who i was as a person. And there was the me who already knew the best ways to pander to my parents and the Grandma, it also doesn’t help that I’m a lot smarter. That meant i almost always got my way.. and that she didn’t. When my sister went through that phase as an annoying preteen – i was in my cruel psyche obsessed phase; i unleashed upon her some mind-screwing experiments and could never consistently be the older sister that she could ‘go to’ (a barf-y concept). As far as i was concerned i was still the only child.

So she grew up to feel slightly inferior, though i never intended it to be that way. She also became less annoying, and a lot nicer and made less of a racket all the time. My mom pointed out once that although i was obviously more intelligent, my sister’s lack of actually made her a much kinder person. It was quite a sad thing to be told, but i totally agree. I stopped bullying her after awhile, but never had the patience to be one of those let’s-talk-about-your-feelings-and-i-will-be-your-guardian type.

My sister is considerably kinder to friends and she loves younger children and younger children love her. She’s also a complete geisha – she’s had five years on the violin, went for flower arrangement classes, has her own tea set where she holds tea ceremonies occasionally, she dances to Korean music and she bakes. Also she is stick thin despite eating like a maniac. I don’t know how she turned out culturally superior to me, but she did. So good on her. I’m glad she didn’t turn out to be a complete whacko under my reign.

But i’m responsible for making her susceptible to external bullying and i don’t think she’s kick up her confidence level any time soon.

–

These are the only few significant regrets i can think of, actually. Told you i don’t have much.