Running is an addiction. It’s difficult to start but as difficult to stop.
Took to the ground again this morning, ran my favourite route over to Serangoon. I take my time but compensate with stamina. It’s pretty much the only time my thoughts are slower than I am going, and that’s pretty fucking relaxing.
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I know my brain works in strange ways. Not illogical but by its own set of logic. And sometimes all I want is someone who gets it – wholly, instantly. Yes i’m lucky to have so many friends who do get it – appreciate it even – after i explain to them. But.
But it’s like I have a set of legos that’s meant to be built in a certain way. Somehow i find myself creating something entirely different, with the same pieces. People would go w t f? Friends would listen to why and how i pieced it together this way, and go: ohhhh, i see it now. But explaining can be exhausting. Sometimes i wish someone would just look at it and think that that’s the way it’s meant to be too, without even realising it’s not the norm.
Guess what i meant to say is, everyone is strange in their own way. And i wish someone was strange in exactly the way i am. Like a twin or something, except fully mine.
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I’m down to the last chapter of A Little Life, and find myself unable to continue. Because it is too painful, knowing what has happened and what is bound to come. But hands down, one of the best books I’ve ever read.
Never have I been presented with such a convincing narrative for self-harm, self-hatred, and beauty. Everything is surreal but so real. On a micro-scale, it has gems of excerpts i’ve been hoarding in my notes. As a whole it’s just a wonderful, skilful, epic piece of work. Bildungsroman? But not really – that cheapens it.
It’s about love, about pain, and life, about friendship. It’s just … aiya go read la.
I have this weird automatic mental mechanism, that makes me extra nice to people I dislike. Specifically, those who annoy me on either a justified or irrational basis, and whom i’d be encountering again. By nice i mean smiling, thanking, indulging, the works. Or whatever I know they’d take well too.
Case-in-point #1:
Black face dessert store woman near my place. She has gotten my order wrong SO MANY TIMES and is consistently unapologetic. Once she even scolded me for not specifying my order earlier. She is absolutely cheerless and stingy with the liao. But i perversely enjoy being excessively polite to her. Like bowing slightly while getting the change. Or using 不好意思 and 谢谢 a shit ton.
Case-in-point #2:
Someone in class who just has a kiampah face/demeanor. Yes i admittedly am extremely prone to finding others KP without good reason. I remain unapologetic about my strong evolutionary instincts towards charming individuals. Anyway, it follows that i’ll be overtly indulgent to whoever this is. Maybe so much that it seems fake idk i can’t help it. Say i know this KP person enjoys having their ego fed – i’d make lots of references to what they said in discussion, agree, compliment, listen intently, shit as such. It’s not deliberate either.
So what’s going on amirite? I’ve thought of several explanations for my bizarre behavior.
Extreme niceness to mask or offset my otherwise repulsion. As a non-confrontational person who also wishes to be liked (even by people i don’t particularly fancy), i’m unwilling to openly dislike someone if it would lead to future conflict. Plausibility: Very, since i’m obviously capable of showing contempt, as any nose-digger on the train who’s been subject to my glares can tell you.
As a strange version of the Benjamin Franklin effect, i’m psychologically forcing myself to dislike a person less. By acting nice, i’m essentially creating cognitive dissonance that propels me to like the person so it’ll match my action, thus reducing dissonance. Plausibility: Not very, because how would i benefit from disliking the person any less? Ok so perhaps it makes me a better person – but that’s great for the rest of the world not me. Adaptation screams bullshit.
This is an attempt at getting the other person to believe I like them, thus lowering their guard against any hostile acts on my part, also/or so they’d grow to reciprocate my seeming good feelings towards them. And then when they’re all unwitting and vulnerable with their trust in me I’D CRUSH THEM. Plausibility: Diabolical, but probably true.
My dad is truly amazing. He works hard for us, never complains, is incredibly easy-going and kind. Over the years i’ve gotten hints of it – his students sharing on social media about what a good instructor he is, him being the confidante of troubled friends, his readiness to give to charity – but because he’s my dad it’s difficult to tell if he’s a great guy or just, yknw, being a dad.
Recently our apartment underwent a huge upgrading renovation and the house was an absolute mess after. Dad, who once told me that cleaning was therapeutic for him, took a day off just to clear the overwhelming filth and clutter. He did it all in good cheer.
Older now, i’ve come to know him more as a person than a father. We go out, have long talks like adults, about everything. He never judges, always shows interest, and usually has a wise word for me. If we knew each other in another context, at the same age, we’d definitely make close friends. So lucky to have him. He inspires me to be the best parent to my child in the future.
One of my greatest obsessions (goals/dreams/concerns, it is many things) since adulthood is to be a mother. And with any other obsessions, it comes with its own set of neurotic fretting.
There is my superstitious fear of jinxing it – I’m mortally afraid that by pure virtue of claiming a future status of mom would exclude me from the fortune. I’ve come across too many accounts of women who have had a hard time conceiving or carrying their child to term to be assured of a smooth pregnancy. At the same time, women give birth every day, every second, all around the world. So is it difficult or easy to have a child???
There is the self-doubting fear of would I be a good one? If I had a choice in what my magnum opus would be, it would be my child(ren). It is also the lifework I most don’t want to screw up. But what if I do? Raising a child is difficult. Your child is a living, breathing human being – and also the most variable object to work with. Having a child is to concede and adapt to losing control over the thing you’re supposed to control.
Another crippling, consuming fear is that my child may be [this is very politically incorrect] handicapped in any way. I have felt pangs of horror thinking about the possibility of Down’s Syndrome. Even spelling it out makes me antsy. Now this is very, very unfair of me to say and parents of handicapped children have my greatest respect. My fear is stemmed in a belief that no matter what I find out, I would bear the child – and potentially live with the guilt of watching my child suffer. Nuuuu.
These are typically the worries of heavily hormonal pregnant women. Here I am, fetal-free and 22, already praying for a safe and healthy child. Omg, what a wreck I would be when pregnant.
On a not completely unrelated note, I have been lambasted on ‘feminist’ grounds for placing motherhood above many of my goals. That instead I should think about what I want, not subjugated by societal ideals. That is so far one of the most ridiculous claims I’ve heard under the guise of ‘feminism’. Please. Being a feminist is about what I want to be, independent of patriarchal and societal pressures – EVEN if it coincides with societal ideals. Anyone who thinks I want to be a mother because the world wants me to must not know me very well. Anyone who thinks motherhood is an anti-feminist concept is just –
It’s that time of the cycle again where my maternal desires awake.
Have been thinking recently that out of all my ambitions (to open an omelette shop, to be in the police force, etc), none has been as constant as my goal to be a mother. Came across a card by a pre-schooler that said “Mommy you are so soft” – my womb started aching from emptiness. I want so much to have a child of my own to love and protect and call mine. To teach and nurture and watch him/her become a human being.
It’s scary though. Maybe i’m being paranoid, since motherhood is incredibly prevalent (understatement? it’s the very reason for our existence and overpopulation lol) but i fear the many things that can go wrong. Will i be healthy enough to carry a child? Will my child be healthy at birth? Can i provide a stable environment for him/her? In a decade’s time if i reread this i hope to already have a toddler clamoring for my attention. But it may very well be that i’m barren and still yearning.
There are women out there who are doing amazing things with their lives, mother or not. They have all my admiration. I didn’t mean for my ideals to be so closely aligned to what is expected of women in say, the Victorian era – but it so happens that my evolutionary instincts to procreate is damn strong. Deep down i know it’s not a female thing tbh… even if i were male i’d be as inclined to be a father.
Want a cute chubby child of mine in my arms gazing at me and calling me mommy so much.. omg.
Right at the heart of the pool yesterday, a gripping numbness seized my lungs.
Some background might be useful. Months ago, i attempted to swim with a budding cold. I kicked off a few times, but was struck with a giddying breathlessness each time. Admittedly, this is where i should have quit. But hey, i was already there – and a tough swim seemed more appealing than shaking on the windy benches waiting for J. So i gave it one good go, ignoring the pressure expanding against my chest, threatening to burst.
In a disorientating moment i lost the easy movement of cutting across water and started grappling aimlessly, sputtering chlorine, my throat narrowing to reed-thin. What ensued was almost comical: a well-meaning but untrained tattoo-ed uncle coming to my rescue, succumbing to my frantic flails and ending up pushing my head underwater; stunned lifeguards sluggish from long periods of disuse; a very confused Justin finding his girlfriend dragged ashore like a dishonored, wilting seaweed.
Since then i’ve gone to the pool once more. Much of the time was spent toe-ing the water warily. I finally found comfort in trailing by the length-wise edge, my toes scraping the wall in each stroke for luck; for safety. It worked: i could pretty much swim full laps across the deep with my pal, the pool edge.
Alright, here’s where my foolhardy (more fool than hardy) made it’s determined entrance again. Eager to find my independence from safe walls, i ventured to Lane 2. I gave one solid push, tingling with awareness that sole against tile was the last concrete contact i’d have before i was alone, water all around me: man is now an island.
I trained my eyes on the tiles below me, exhaled to the saturation of blue. For awhile, it worked. My mind ran through flip-cards of distracting thought: school tomorrow, food later, punctuated with ok keep calm, ok. By then, a seeping, hollowed-out darkness was taking over my body. Believe me when i say this is not hyperbolic: the phobia was thoroughly physical. My heart went so quickly it was a negligible buzz, my muscles resigned and went slack – and that horrid, horrid consuming emptiness.
In an episode of Adventure Time, Finn developed a fear of the ocean after a drowning incident. His fear is personified as an inky, intimidating cloud sprouting from belly — the Fear Feaster. I never quite did appreciate the uncanny accuracy of this depiction until yesterday. Also reaffirming Adventure Time as an amazing show.
Remember trashy talk shows (alright, Maury) when participants face their phobias of the most innocuous objects and they yell like they’re skinned sans anesthesia? I used to scoff and think, uh yeah i believe you’re scared but your reaction is so fake. Now i get that fear is different from phobia. Phobia is irrational, is tangible, is all-consuming. Mine – a specific, baby-level phobia – had already such power over my primal instincts.
Back to the pool.
I ran out of distracting flip-cards, and the Fear Feaster took root in my brain. It was like an full-on adrenaline rush, except one that ran contrary to survival. I just barely managed to snatch at remaining scraps of courage/rationality, dragged myself across lanes back to the edge (was in reality just two strokes haha).
Having survived, i found my mild phobia a source of morbid fascination. Almost immediately after, i latched on to the nuances of fear, squirreled it away for later dissection. Maladaptive as it is, i’m almost pleased this happened. Not as a source of self-pity, but to quench a curiosity for the multiplicity of human experiences.
That aside, i really hope i’d be able to swim freely of my bff, the wall again.
If there’s a fact we too often forget, it’s that humans are animals, too. Our executive cognitive function, our gift of introspection, and need for greater knowledge makes us superior animals. But essentially, we are animals.
Why should we be reminded of that, does it really matter? Yes, because too often we forget our insignificance and limitations. As much as we have free will, we are shaped by circumstances, environment, impulses. There are times we see ourselves as how we are, within the scale of the universe, and be humbled by our smallness and transience.
We should surpass ourselves, but never think of ourselves as more than we really are. The human race needs some humbling from time to time.
Recently i’ve been catching myself holding a breath.
“Oh. I need to exhale,” i’d think – and then do so. As if my lungs were a new, foreign installation i’ve yet to grasp. In a way though, they are. A friend of mine, with whom i share a common enthusiasm for blue-spot-activating facts, once told me our cells regenerate in such a way that – at some point – we’re essentially a different person than before.
Our lungs have a life cycle of 3 weeks; i am currently sporting a brand new respiratory control station.
Why was this a surprise though? I’ve been so changed by years – broken and mended, stretched and shrunk – it’s quite bizarre a belief that i’d be as before.
“You used to be so crazy!” There are parts of that self i miss: the effervescence, the unceasing energy. Now i’m prematurely aching bones and half-caf coffee for early nights.
At the same time, i think about the journey here. There were bumps in the road but i wouldn’t change anything, except perhaps invest in some Google stocks and .coms.
“You’re at a good place,” a close friend recently remarked. I don’t think she meant it the way i took it, but it was very reassuring.
The first vivid realization i had of my parents’ love for me was on a morning before my primary 5 camp. At the time, unlike my bowel-movement-tracking, rabid scheduling self now, i had no idea of organization. Often, i’d find myself stranded an hour before school without a washed set of uniform, without my name-tag, or homework.
That morning, it was socks. On our packing list, “Socks – 5 pairs” was conveniently forgotten until 5.30am the day of the camp. I had to be on campus by 6.45. In a groggy panic, i woke my parents up and told them about my worrisome sock-less state. They were always on my case about neatness and preparedness, so i was understandably steeling myself for a good nag.
But nope. Without a grumble, they set out determined to procure socks. At 5.30am, just woken up, for their daughter’s adventure camp which probably seemed very insignificant in their adulthood. On hindsight, they might have just been too dazed from recent sleep to say anything.
One of them fished out my used socks from the laundry and hand washed them; the other used a hairdryer so i wouldn’t have to squish my feet in dampness.
I remember sitting on the parquet floor at the foot of their bed, trying hard to keep awake, listening to the whirr of the hairdryer. The morning was a cold one, but the warmth radiating from the dryer kept me content. I watched my parents, heavy lidded and silent, but their faces steadfast. There’s nothing my parents couldn’t fix for me, I had thought – and at 11 I resolutely believed in that.
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I was reminded of this a few days ago, when i woke up chilly, but was far into sleep to rise and find the comforter (kicked off my bed, i think). A couple of minutes into a half-hearted slumber grumble, i felt warm fluffiness slide up my legs. My grandma did that almost without fail. She sleeps at ungodly hours, but before she does she’d check in on me. Before i stumbled back to unconsciousness i thought of how uncanny her timing was.
The next morning i asked my po how she knew i was cold. “Tch, I do this every night for you ok. I’m your grandma, who else would dote on you like that?”
And i thought there really isn’t. Friends, even lovers, love you but conditionally – it develops over time with shared experience, favors, understanding. Family loved me once i popped out, imperfect, vulnerable – a squealing useless lump. One day i want to have my own lump to love too.
Q 