Month: February 2010

dear xx:

we’ve both been through alot, whether it was an overpossive girlfriend who was unreasonable and sticky, or a boyfriend who disappeared for hours on end who might have enjoyed girls on the side. its all over and done with. sometimes i wonder what you say about me to your friends, just as i am sure you can guess the details i reveal to mine.

what makes the truth? our memories of our time together, and after all these YEARS, we both probably only remember the bad and not the good. the long sms-es. the epic fights. the door slammings. the talks @ the drain. and i have to admit, alot of my memories are of these. long time friends remind me whenever your name comes up. but i remember, now, the good times as well, the sailing, the long walks home from the mrt station, blading, cooking @ grandma’s, the fishing with the boys, dinner with your family. how much i loved your family.

i heard some things you said about me from a mutual friend. needless to say, i did not appreciate it. but i stop to stocktake, and realise i’ve also given my own friends similar impressions of you. i forgive you. i guess you dont feel you need it at this point. i am not trying to be big here. i am just tired of this ugly side of the both of us. we had good times together. we were good friends once. alot of my past blog entries were full of anger directed at you. i want to let it go.

let’s both stop it. good luck with regina, i hope it works out.

we were such great friends once, lets go back to that.

one thing you need and nothing more

 Be still my soul
Be still my soul
Cease from the labor and the toil
Refreshing springs of peace await
The troubled minds and hearts that ache

Be still my soul
God knows your way
And He will guide
For His name’s sake
Plunge in the rivers of His grace
Rest in the arms of His embrace

Be still my soul
Be still my soul
Though battles round you rage and roar
One thing you need and nothing more
To hear the whisper of your Lord

Be still My child
I know your way
And I will guide
For My name’s sake
Plunge in the rivers of My grace
Rest in the arms of My embrace

Be still, be still my soul

quiet nights

and left with my own thoughts..

on nights like these, i wonder, ever so often, if i would ever find my place in the world.

i’m stuck between two worlds: one of dreams and one of responsibility.

nights like these, i can’t run away from wanting to run away, to foreign lands and foreign sights and foreign smells. with my necessities in the luggage and the world at my feet. i wonder who would buy my stories, or who would worry about my safety. but these thoughts in my head, are but dreams, and like the wisp of smoke, its gone before it was truly there.

nights like these, i can’t run away from needing to be here, where the roots are of my own, where there’s love and concern over every sneeze. i can’t divorce the fact that whatever it is, i was the cause of all this. that it was, for me. that it is, for me. 2 am and the lights in the cracks of their door were still on, and i can’t help but feel my failings.

i do not shed tears, even as they burn. they catch in my throat– and hopefully they die there.

i want more. more than this life. more to this life. more with this life.

this transient moment on the spectrum of forever. i wish it would pass faster. fast forward. fast fast forward.

but alas, we are but mere mortals, and for some, a dustspeck.

shirts and berms, love is in the air.

images courtesy of zenith stills

there’s nothing quite like CNY that makes everyone ask “so when are you and the pea tying the knot”, and i usually brush it off with a “oh yea, he’s still doing his masters, after that its pupilage and what nots.. ” but lets be honest, i am a girl. a girl who has been thinking about that perfect day. i had it all planned– from the music to the colours to the flowers.  plug and play– my fairytale.

but last week, dad asked me the same question, and i find myself considering the possiblity of actually having an outdoors wedding. i know. horror of horrors. this is cecilia-argh! sun! hand me an umbrella quick!- lim, not to forget my sweatophobia – would be quite funny if i absolutely refused to get near the pea.

anyway. my cousin directed me to this photographer, zenith stills to just check it out. and i absolutely fell in love with these images.

sueann(dunno if  she reads this), stephie and i in our cedar days, absolutely loved the button-down shirt and berms look.  (ok, i admit, a that time we were very into checkered shirts and berms) but same difference. oh my. how this couple Sophie & Augustine’s photoshoot totally rocked my socks.  i love love love the blue timberlands & red heels look. absolutely love it.

maybe i didnt realise then how mad i was for the look. even as i think back, my first boyfriend wore button downs and berms. stef’s super-talented-with-the-piano boyfriend is still donning the checkered shirts and sue’s (then) crushes were all checkered-and-berm-ies. perhaps it is time the pea started to think about a new casual dressing theme — is this an obvious enough hint?

button-downs and berms and timberland boats — still my favourite after all these years.

maybe we can opt for one of those advant garde weddings where i get to wear flowers in my hair, and sneakers on my feet. tiger onizukas, baby.  how cool would that be.

its my party.

the inability to shut up

 

pause a moment.

your good friend, like H, comes up to you to say his then-gf broke up with him because he lacked ambition, and drive, and that he was childish. then finds out she’s already sleeping with someone else, and he finds out more details than i think its appropriate to share here. further the gf, with a good twist of linguistics and perhaps a mind that was over-hurt by the crumbling relationship, makes it out to sound like it was all H’s fault that she slept with the other guy.

 To what would you say to H? as his friend. as his friend, angry that your friend was hurt, this badly.  

at this time the pea and i took time to be there for him, and comfort him, and in the process of that, like how everyone says encouraging things to the cheated and say dispparaging things about the cheater, we said some things to him. not with the intention of insulting the cheater, but to be comforting to H. to cheer him up, we joked about what’s the worst things H could do to her, things about her past that we knew. all these said to merely cheer up H, not to attack her personally. why would we? we werent the ones cheated on, and H is old enough to make his own decisions.

but H, then goes and spills everything out to the gf– from the comments we made to our ludicrious (and influenced by too much alcohol & mosquitos & happies) suggestions.

can you imagine the backlash?

now H has done it again, over another girl.

on the borderline of twenty four

at twenty-four the decisions you make, wont be written off as “oh, she is too young to know better”. there is no time left for the excuses of “give her time to grow up”. this is grown up. this is the real world where the decisions are real, and irrevocable.

a month has past since the new year, and i realise i havent quite been able to say i’ve stood by my resolutions. in fact, i blatantly flount them and blame the situations i find myself in and the many screams of the world for my attention. i am unable to sit here, proudly, and look at the achievements we’ve made these 2 years. but rather with a very sad heart, i look at the bankbooks, accounts, suppliers, customers, the mountains of files we’ve accumulated, or the mess the office is in because we moved it around again (and again and again)– and i cant help but wonder if it has all been worth it. i cant help but think, “take this cup from me”.

there is one common factor in this mess: me. my poor leadership, my out-of-control temper, my lack of follow-through. more glaring now than ever, my inability to be organised, my constant excuse that someone else (mum perhaps) will deal with this– or i’ll do it when the time comes because its not crucial now.

arun’s voice plays in the background, as i listen to the recording of “still” that he made for me many moons ago. maybe its time to be a little still, and hear.