this time of year, i blog my yearly stocktake of the year, a looking back of how the year has been. traditionally i read through all the blog entries of the year past and relive some moments. some angry, some sad, some tearful, some peaceful.
this year instead, i decided to read through the past few year’s closing entries.
well, 2007 snuck up on me like a memory of an old lover, a quiet benign presense that just came to be; an odd familarity, and somehow looking back in the year it merges with the year before and the year before they all feel like big chunks of time just put through the potato masher–try as you might to pick the peas out of the potato salad, the smell of the darn things cling to the rest of it, cueing of course in my case the gag reflex.
the festivities from christmas till now have been nothing more than disappointing, and that is giving it some credit. as soon as christmas left the calendar last year i’ve been looking forward to this year, like a hound on a blood trail, like a child wide eyed infront of the pink candy floss machine. but this year’s christmas snuck away from me, as a thief, leaving nought but a quiet sadness, which i cannot and will not attempt to explain.
if i saw things in colour, i know i do, but bear with me–if this season were a colour it would be grey, or mud brown. none of that fancy magenta or cyan or lime green like i wanted it to be; but mellow grey and dirty brown, ordinary even almost repulsively un-sexy colour; think of the sludge that is left in a water-and-ash filled ashtray–the dirty brown grey mix that smells as foul as camels; pun unintended.
2007’s birth or days leading to its birth has brought with it: swollen eyes, burnt fingers from sparklers no less, slight fever, sake induced headache, powder induced vomitting (don’t ask), itchy scratchy scalp from having those aerosol streamer sprayed into one’s hair, not to mention the Cramps, capitalised because it was a real bitch.
so as you discerning people can tell, i haven’t been one happy puppy–and 2007 looks bleak to me; again cue connotations of sludge brown-grey. i would like for 2007 to be a year of hard work and achievement; though realistically i don’t need for big bamb! explosive achievements, but small ones that warm the very cold heart would be nice. i don’t ask for manic laughter, just hold back on the tear-jerking will be enough for me.
i don’t remember 2006, i’m sorry dear year; apart from finally being licensed to drive, i’m quite through with 2006.
but i will remember how you stood with me in the rain, and how you held me in my sleep.
2007 has been a remarkable year of learnings and growings, of knowing and accepting, of loves and hurts, of truths and deceits, of laughters and tears, of crazy fun and spiraling lows. every year on the last few days of the year i find somewhere quiet and think of the year that will soon go by, and as i am not fond of resolutions being the fickle being that i am, this year, the passing of 2007 swept under me as a quiet goodbye, and before i even registered its dying breath, it slipped away into death and the dawn of a new year broke.
it has been a long year. a long year of yearning and wanting, a long year of despair and heartbreak, long nights of fearful wonderings and wanderings, of tearful phone calls and long emails. the word isn’t quite bittersweet when i think of the boyscout–it is ginger. the end of the heartsong, the breaking of a two year dream. we weren’t meant to be what we wanted to be, we couldn’t find our way out of the labyrinth we stumbled head-first into. it has taught me many things, this story which had to end somehow, about strength, and love, and hope and support. gingerly i pen in the last lines of the story, it does not read “and they lived happily ever after..” and though heartbreaking and as tears smudge the words slowing forming at the tip of my pen, i know this end is a fitting one, and a right one to write.
it has been a long year, one of loving and appreciating, for in times of great distress, does the candle in the distance burn the brightest, and i feel blessed, beyond blessed for the people that surround me. for a few passerbys whose presence gave me a reprieve from thoughts, even for a little while, it made a difference. for those i carry in my heart, the friends who stuck even closer, even while i was slapping at their hands that tried to drag me up, i thank you.
hufflepuff: for all the times you drove by to drag the covers off my head and refused to let me wallow, for letting me scratch at you when i was hurting and holding my hand anyway, for the news updates and the movies and the activities you planned just to distract me.
hufflepuff boy: for being more than just the huffle’s boy–for being my friend, for the words when i was at my lowest, for never complaining about sharing the huffle, for rushing down when the wall hit me in the carpark.
bar top dancer: for your hugs and your talks, for always being on my side and for those crazy ktv moments of tears and laughters and shouts and screams, for being there whenever i need you.
pina colada: so quickly, so soon everything fell into place for us, thank you for the crazy fun you injected into life, for the long talks and the honest words, for the efforts and the long drives.
white duckling: so much unsaid between us, we’re getting better. you have been an amazing friend, without complaining without fuss you’d be around, and listen, and talk for hours in the parks or just chilling. you’ve seen me carry the roll of paper around, and picked me up half drunk from the sand. thank you for all the late nights, your presence made me stronger.
brown duckling: what a whirlwind year for us both. you’ve truly shown me the meaning of “friends don’t judge”, remembering the moment you said ” is that all you can throw at me, cos i am still here”. so much has happen hasn’t it? for all the phone calls, and all the crazy fun of buying telephones and calling cards. thank you for being back in my life, i’ve missed you much.
twinkletoes: what a year it has been for you as well, so much growing and so much feeling in the past year. thank you for being around–to be the beacon in school, to be the shoulder i know i’d always have whenever classes dont go well. for sharing your family with me, and discovering my ability to understand your language.
wife: the ever steady rock, the one i run to to give me an honest-no-cuddles perspective. i forget how easy it is to just talk to you knowing you won’t hold anything against me, how quickly you get me without me having to try very hard to enunciate it.
the rest of the cedar crew: if someone told me back in our 2M days how we’d meet up every tuesday (or try to) to talk and laugh and comfort, i’d laugh. how unlike, and yet, how nice on reflection. you all were all such a comfort to me during my dark days, and made school that much more bearable, that much more enjoyable.
its been a good year, a year of maturing, and thinking, and regaining lost parts of me, and i am thankful. 2007 marked a year of forays into the otherwise untrodden paths for me–road tripping in the land i will never forget, solitary drives alone, quiet nights in not doing anything at all, a particularly difficult decision, time at home with family and the 5 monsters, managing finances, being there for the perfectionist when she needed, focusing on school–and through all these, i feel a part of me grows like it never had before.
i’m loving more, i am in control more, i am smiling more, i am singing more, i am deciding more, i am being alone more, i am socialising more (2till4ever babies!) i am reading more, i am thinking more. and all these i think adds up to a pretty new me.
2008 was ushered in in quite a lovely fashion this year, with the family + godbrother and the people closest to my heart, were all at one point in the same house, and for that i thank you.
happy belated birthday wife. :)
2008
2008 has come and gone, and while it snuck up on me and caught me unawares, 2008 has proven itself to truly be a year with a bang, (bang bang!) and i find myself on the edge of 2009, holding my breath, tingling with excitement, waiting for the whistle to signal that i can now jump off this cliff i’m on.
i’ve graduated, and made my peace finally with the institution, donned the black and gold gown and threw my mortar into the air. i’m done, finally with FRS es, acrruals and derivatives. my entire family, including the pea and the bro-in-law-to-be were there for the ceremony, and lovingly held up my tassel so i could eat. funny. at the end of 4 yrs, i look back at it, and am thankful for all the life lesson’s it has taught me, the good and the bad. i know a few ex-school mates read this, forgive my inadequacies, forgive my temperment, i had a good time, thank you for the footprints you left behind. i’m insanely proud of you guys, whether you’re somewhere-in-the-middle-east-writing-amazing-articles, or finally got confirmation at one of the biggest PR firms, or doing whatever they do in the big four.
then there’s the company. so many tears, so much frustration, so many life’s lessons, so many hard knocks, and so many mountains to scale. but you know, as i stand at the window of 2009 i realise its actually been a ride i’d never regret, and a ride i look back on and smile to know everything’s alright. for two, my huffle and my tinkerbel, who cried with me and spent their hours labourously stock counting, even in the midst of their exams. for sitting hours in the park trying to coax me into going back to face work the next day, for kind company over phone calls on long drives to the middle of nowhere, for being my left punch and my right kick, when i had no fight. for tinkerbell, i’m ever grateful for you, for stepping in, for making work so much fun, for weathering the green storms of sweaty bodies and lecherous leers with me, for crazy conversations, for giving me easy sleep at night. who else would sleep with me, and know my car better than me, and spend a whole day at the vet with me.
2008 was a year of mild travel– batam, phuket, genting, taiwan.
it has been a time of heart-heal, a time of regrouping and reaffirmation of my own character and faith. the boyscout and i have been able to remain friends, and are able to laugh and joke about those silly “giap!” times, and yet not suffer the tugs at the heart in the night. we’re okay. it was certainly a period in time i’d never forget, this august was tough, for its own reasons, but everyday it got easier, and now i look back, and sometimes read through the emails i flooded him with during those dark days, and marvel how insanely out of control my emotions were. 2008 saw me close that chapter, and i think its the final closure.
then there’s the pea, for whom i am thankful. for his unwaivering faith, and his unquestioning belief, for his insane conversation topics to keep me on my toes, for his steady presense that makes me feel both treasured, and loved, i am lucky. i truly am. and he’s brought so many new good friends in my life, the brothers, the corderoy boys, the after-party-club, banban & cais, his loving family.
finally, 2008 has seen me grow alot more social, whether its getting to know the frogman, or talking to random pple i meet for the first time. nowadays, it is no longer such a torture to make small talk, or strike up conversations, of attend crazy drunkard parties, or even cuddle babies on my knee. i had the most wonderful birthday this year, my surprise party which actually did catch me off guard, the lovely dinners at house & tea cosy with those near and dear.
i’m thankful for 2008, and i can’t wait to see what 2009 has to throw at me. at the edge, quivering to leap.
Deb Gliori wrote a book called “No Matter What”, a children’s graphic book featuring a fox and a smaller fox.
The book ends this way
Asks Small,
“But what about when we’re dead and gone,
would you love me then, does love go on?”
Large held Small snug as they looked out at the night,
At the moon in the dark and the stars shining bright.
“Small, look at the stars – how they shine and glow,
but some of those stars died a long time ago.
Still they shine in the evening skies
Love, like starlight, never dies.”
dancinglights 