This blog is Not Dead

It's not that I haven't anything to say, just not the time to express it well enough.

I have not become too lazy to post. No, no, no.

I've just been so surrounded by activity over the past month, from Drunk Before Dawn finally being performed, to the KK trip (and more performances), to Christmas and New Year's, not to mention that fun time of month when we close the magazine, that anywhere that I can have peace and quiet is most welcome. Even if it's only my blog.

So I'm only breaking this silence for a while.

Drunk Before Dawn was superlatively good. For some odd reason, I feel compelled not to blog about it because the total experience defied words. There were nasty parts along the way. There were uplifting parts. But on the whole, as I said, it was good.

Since the year has only just begun, and I've had little time lately to reflect on all the good things in my life, I shall take a moment here to thank the Lord for...

... my new niece, Natalie Toh Tik Chu, much-loved firstborn of my cousin and his wife. There's nothing like a little baby to make you stop and rediscover what the important things in life are. According to Natalie, at the moment, they are food and sleep. Haha. No. I know there's more to life. Which is why I would also like to express my thanks for...

... the year just ended, which if I were to sum up with a theme would have been The Year Of Inward Travel. Not in some off-the-wall, dude-what-have-you-been-smoking way. Just, very rationally, that I was given so many opportunities to contemplate my life in sum and detail during the year, and as far as I can help it I'm going to use that to my benefit.

... the opportunity to perform on stage once again. It's something I've really missed, and I enjoyed it so much. Wardrobe malfunctions notwithstanding.

... the many friends I've made and deepened friendships with in the past year, and my faithful old friends.

... all those moments when for a split second I wished I had a camera (still or video) to record the occasion. I ended up with better than pictures; I ended up with memories. (I'm starting to sound like a photographic paper advertisement. This could be worrying.)

Childhood comfort foods: Tea

I know. Tea isn't a food. But I plan to make this a series (like Cats In My Life, which unfortunately I've never expanded beyond Whiskey, the sweetest cat ever to walk this wicked earth) and "Childhood comfort foods and drinks and anything else that can be tasted" is just so... prosaic?

So. Tea. The story is, this morning I was jauntily walking to breakfast with my colleague when The Unthinkable happened. You know it's not really your day when you can't even get as far as the office door without bleeding. I opened the door without noticing that my foot, inadequately protected by a strappy sandal, was in the way. I actually heard a disgusting "sqqqsshhhhssss" sound as tempered glass and metal sliced through toe flesh. And yet somehow I still thought I could walk to breakfast and deal with the "scratch" later. Until I looked down and noticed the blood oozing. Then, as I walked to the bathroom to rinse it, really oozing.

I turned around and walked back to my cubicle. If that's what happened when I was just walking around indoors, who knows what I might get up to on a road with real traffic? My kind colleague went down to buy our breakfast since our attempt to walk out for food got aborted.

(Yes, this is about tea. I'll get to it soon enough.)

One and a half bungkus of nasi lemak later, with the toe still extremely tender and bleeding, I went to the pantry cupboard, took out a teabag and made myself a cup of tea.

And lifted the steaming mug to my lips. I happened to breathe in just then, and as I smelled the bitter scent, I paused.

The toe still hurt, but I suddenly felt better.

Tea.

When I was growing up, most of my days were spent at my nanny's house. Before I was old enough for the formal education system to claim me, those days were bliss, mostly spent playing with either Poh-poh, Auntie (when she wasn't busy with housework or cooking) or one of my older "siblings" from the Lim family. Or sleeping. Or watching TV. Or sleeping.

Somehow, even when I was too little to understand much else, I knew that 4pm every day was a special time: teatime.

It was a ritual that now, on those rare occasions when I'm with the Lims at teatime, I miss participating in regularly. From boiling the water in the whistling kettle to scooping just the right amount of tea leaves into the strainer in the green enamel jug, it all screams "home": not home the place, but home, that time in childhood when I was secure and happy. To this day, I find cream crackers dry and tasteless but still enjoy eating them. The only reason I can think of is that teatime always involved cream crackers and butter, not just tea. And tea was always with real milk ("the kind you can pour," I thought as a child, "not the powdered kind.") and lacings of sugar, before Auntie sternly told me off for putting my dental health at risk.

Ah... tea. One whiff of it can bring back so much in faded photographic colour. And take my mind off the pain of a deeply cut toe.

A post about many things

I think this article should be required reading in every secondary school and college in the country. Girls should read it because I think, most often, it's married women who give up their "selves" for the sake of harmony or "happiness". Boys should read it because it might still happen to them, and because they have to learn along with the rest of us that along with everything else in life, the primary purpose of marriage is not one's own happiness.

If our school system valued educating students with real life skills as much as it does mouldy, regurgitated facts, we'd see a lot more happy, healthy adults. Mid-life, quarter-life or any-other-fraction-of-life crises would be few and far between because we'd all, male and female, know what we want and do whatever is within our power to get it, while trusting the Almighty to get us there.

It's been almost eight months since I ended my last relationship, a painful decision mostly because I hate causing pain to other people. I am still sorry for hurting him but don't regret my decision. I know marriage is about sacrifice and servanthood, but I still firmly believe that it's about sacrificing and serving while being yourself, not the other person's ideal. Not a suppressed version of yourself who laughs at jokes you don't really find funny, bites your tongue when you're being insulted or put down, or keeps quiet when talk of a life vision that really doesn't match up to your own comes up.

I've had quite a rocky life in terms of relationships... not only romantic ones but those with both parents and some of my relatives. I learned from a young age to be the "peacemaker", pursuing peace at all costs even when it wasn't healthy for everyone involved. Looking back, and even now at one of my relatives now who's still trying to stir up trouble from last millennium (literally), I think everyone involved just needed to grow up. I mean, yelling at your spouse in public; swearing at family members (well, swearing at all); throwing silent tantrums when you don't get your way... if that isn't immature behaviour, tell me what is.

Anyway, I'm not posting this as an excuse to mouth off on those members of my family who aren't likely to read this. That's a little bit like pushing an anonymous poison-pen letter through the mail slot and then running away. One thing I decided when I began this blog is that it won't be a channel for attacking people with. I do occasionally criticise behaviour or actions that I don't approve of, but it's never a deliberate nip at the person behind the wrong.

Wow, talk about random stream-of-consciousness rambling... I know it's uncharacteristic of me to put so much personal stuff on my blog, but today feels different.

Oh yeah, while I'm being random (when am I not?) let me just say that I don't blog to get a reaction or because I'm desperate to see my work published. Not that I don't value everyone who reads [thanks for dropping by :o)] The biggest reason why I do this is because I want to, and hopefully somehow my words will achieve some good. That's all.

Discovering beauty

The Journal Formerly Known As An Ugly Notebook

Thank God I'm not Irish

Maybe it's one of these "attraction of the Other" things, but I've always had a bit of a thing for Irish culture... though I don't know much about it.

So I really like this "Irish blessing", but unfortunately, I think it's now more often found on mass-produced printed wall hangings and coffee mugs than on the lips of people who really mean it.

"May the road rise to meet you,
May the wind be always at your back,
May the sun shine warm upon your face,
And rains fall soft upon your fields,
And until we meet again,
May God hold you in the hollow of His hand."

Granted, not many of us have fields these days and because of skin cancer phobia it's not very PC to wish for sunshine on one's face, but it's still a nice sentiment.

I'm glad I'm neither Irish nor in the habit of cursing people, because if I were it would go something like this:

"May those who love us love us;
And those that don't love us,
May God turn their hearts.
And if He doesn't turn their hearts,
May He turn their ankles,
So we'll know them by their limping."

I hope everyone in my life can walk with a clean conscience and straight ankles ;o)

Finishing up

With just over a month left to 2006, I've been contemplating how well I've used my year's worth of time. And, of course, hoping I can do a better job in 2007. I have all sorts of lofty plans, but I'd rather commit to just a few and do them well than become the embodiment of one of my mum's favourite Hokkien sayings, which translates literally into:

"Catch dragon, catch phoenix... at the end of the day, not so much as half a dead rat!"

In other words, don't make big plans you can't follow them through. Wise woman, my momma.

Listless? No way!

List.less: Lethargic; lacking energy

That describes me quite well, now that I'm on Day 5 1/2 of my flu. To compensate for my seeming listlessness, here's a list. I know, no connection whatsoever. Isn't English a beautiful language?

1. If nothing else, the benefits of having a bad cold and cough are: being able to sleep all day on a weekday and not feeling guilty; knowing who really cares for me; exploiting the healing properties of ice-cream; being able to eat the Thai fried rice at Section 17 that has eluded me for months because whenever I get there after work, they're already sold out; doing nothing and feeling good about it.
2. One of my fish died this morning. "And then there was one." Requiescat in pace.
   
3. I am sick, sick, sick of the bad English I see in local "English"-language papers. Also sick of being told, "Give [the writers and editors] a break, they're only human." In my book, if you're being paid to do something, you'd better be good at it. Ever told a doctor, "It's ok if you're not that sure how the human body works, you're only human"? I believe in grace as much as anyone. I'm continually on the receiving end of it myself. But I still say, at least look as if you're trying.
   
4. It's true, you can never go home. Or back to your old Latin dance class, wishing it were just as it was five years ago. I don't know which has changed the most: the studio, the class or myself.
5. I am simultaneously reading two biographies (well, Fashion Babylon IS more or less biographical) and I can't help marvelling at how strikingly different people can be. From the guy who gained what he cannot lose to the countless people who seem to be tossing away all their life and energy for what they can't keep. Why?

What makes a day worthwhile?

"Believe me, count as lost each day you have not used in loving God."

— Brother Lawrence (1611-1691)

Thoughts, statements and observations (randomness alert)

1. No, I will not observe a Halloween dress-up code at work, even just for fun.
   
2. There is a family of mice living in my office photocopier-printer-scanner.
3. For some reason, the theme song from the 1980s Cantonese slapstick comedy Teppanyaki floated into my head early this morning and it just won't leave.
4. I need more sleep so my head will stop pounding.
   
5. Cats are adorable but not when they sing to each other outside my bedroom window at 4am.
6. Mouldy bread that has no appearance of mould on the surface, only on the inside once you've bitten it, is not part of the ideal Morning Experience.
   
7. I need more sleep so I don't snore at work and make my colleagues think the mice have morphed into Gremlins.
   
8. I am banned from entering any stationery shop with more than RM5 in my wallet.
9. I wish I could transplant the mice from the office photocopier to outside my bedroom window at home. They could then get the attention of the singing cats and lead them, in an authoritative and stylish manner they learnt from the Pied Piper, far, far away from my home.
10. You can't have your cake and eat it too. But you can get a cookie after the cake.
11. I need more sleep because the deficit is affecting my memory and I keep repeating myself because I can't remember what I've already said.