witnessed a very touching gesture by my dad while out with the family for dinner
today.
spoke volumes about what true love was.
we went italian, albeit cheap. pastamania at parkway. mum ordered some spaghetti she didn’t like, and dad ordered
some spaghetti that she liked. (me and sis aren’t in
this story =)
mum complained a little about how nice dad’s looked and how gross hers
looked. and dad asked if she wanted to change. she happily switched the plates.
the thing was, dad’s allergic to the squid on her spaghetti, and both sis
and I could see dad definitely didn’t enjoy mum’s original spaghetti from the
look on his face, but nary a word of complaint came from him. went about polishing off the plate of mum-condemned
spaghetti while mum went on to praise how nice her switched spaghetti was.
and while sis and I continued noticing (guiltily – but dunno why guiltily)
how much dad didn’t enjoy his meal, yet without complaint. I mean, they’ve been
married for so long, one would be reasonable to expect dad to merely laugh at
mum for ordering something she didn’t like. especially
since I’m sure mum would have done the same in his position. yet
he gave up his plate and switched a potentially itch-inducing one.
gotta say I really admire his patience.
dad, you’ll never ever read this, but I’ll say it here. I admire you. I respect you.
sis yelled at him yesterday too. ok, not really
yell, but raised her voice in protest of something (I forgot what) dad said she
didn’t do. he just continued trying to explain in his
normal tone of voice, while sis looked as if she was going to continue railing.
sitting there observing, I finally got pissed enough
to say in a low voice (quite patronisingly I must admit)
young lady, that’s no way you should raise your voice at your father who
brought you up.
to her credit, she immediately mellowed down.
I tried explaining to her no matter how
pissed I am with my parents, I never raise my voice at them. I shut up, walk
off if I must. but I guess that’s her character. just hope she’d learn to realise when she grows up. she’s an alright sister I must say though. just hopes she’ll spend more time studying than on 5566. heh.
~~~
on another note, or I mean a few other notes…
a friend broke up with her boyfriend. been
listening to her quite a lot about their problems. and
now it turns out that bastard was kind of cheating on her. glad
she found out, and glad she took the correct way out – ditched him. already wasn’t very happy with the way he was treating her,
but glad things are ok now. she’s happy. previously she was unwilling to ditch him because she still
liked him, but by cheating on her he gave her enough reason to hate him. so that was it.
so I guess that’s a 3.5 on a scale of 1 (sad friend) – 5 (happy friend)
for this friend.
***
went to another friend’s grandma’s wake on saturday
night. ended up talking a lot about old times with the
group of friends there. nice to meet up, but funerals
aren’t exactly the best place to meet up (whenever we do) for a good talk. his grandma lived with him, and I think this must have come
to him as a bit of a shock. he seemed to be coping
well with the loss, but he wasn’t that ok
as I noticed when I chatted with him online yesterday and today. especially on the day of cremation. personal
experience told me it would be very traumatic, and especially since this was
his first close family loss (I think), he would probably be unprepared for the
trauma.
of someone who was living with you just recently, yet now reduced to
ashes. such is the callousness of life and death. but we all have to go someday, and my heart goes out to him.
hope time heals his wounds, just like it has for mine,
over grandpa, however much I miss him now.
that’s a 1 on a scale of 5 for this friend.
***
another friend’s been having some problems. but he’s
not talking yet. but keeps saying he has no friends,
even though he’s hanging out with lots of different people all the time. heh. personally, it sounds
serious to me, but he’s someone who keeps quite a lot of his problems to
himself, I’ve gathered over the years. among all my
friends, I’d dare say he’s one of the closest I am to, yet know the least about
in terms of personal problems. we have almost exactly
identical circles of friends, our families know each other. I dunno if he’d be
reading this, but I’d also just wanna say that I hope
his problems can be solved soon (though I haven’t the slightest idea how
solvable they are). will pray for you. not
that “hommm” kind of praying =p
I’d be there to lend a
ear whenever you need it.
that’s probably a 2.25 on that same scale of 5 for this friend.
***
and then there’s this friend who sounds damn confused by the stuff I read
on her blog. everything’s in
a kind of blur from what I read. it’s kind of
cognitive dissonant to behave in what you’re behaving towards him I guess. but just bear in mind he isn’t exactly the most faithful and
upright guy in the world. you’re worth more than him. really. study hard. you shouldn’t
be doing how you’re doing in school considering your intelligence, but guess I’m
not really in a position to tell you that. get over syf (hope you already have) and get on with school life! can help you out with schoolwork if you need cos I’m on holidays now. just a
call away.
that’s a 3 on the happiness scale.
***
then there’s me.
an ambivalent 2.5 on the scale, cos I dunno how I’m
really feeling nowadays.
wanna learn driving, but won’t have a car and a girlfriend to drive around,
so what’s the point? hehe…
wanna learn to play the cello, but I can produce just about that sound on
another instrument anyway… haha arrogant sia. nah joking. seriously wanna learn cello and
driving, but I need something else.
and that’s dough. need to find a job, that brings
in just enough money for me to survive. another week
without a job and I’ll go to macdonald’s. heh. was
checking out my finances for the previous month.
april: income $276.20
expenditure $605.83
may so far: income $50
expenditure $322.60
that’s a hell lot of overdraft. so the balance now is
$105. to last till august notwithstanding potential
income.
so I’m in a catch-22 situation where I need a job to learn driving, learn
the cello, and sustain my lifestyle (aka survival). but if I get a job, I won’t have the time to do those stuff.
I’ll revise that to a negative 1 on the
scale then.
but waitaminute. it’s
the holidays! and I must say I’ve been enjoying myself going out with different
people, catching up with friends after the exam hiatus (ok not really hiatus.
quarantine would be a better word, especially since everyone knows what it
means now).
so I’ll revise that back to 2.5. shows how
neutral life is now. good.
well, enough of mundane crap for now. dejectium
promises to be back with more social descriptions ala that neighbourhood soccer story. oh,
on another note, that fictional story I began won’t be continued ever again. I just
didn’t like its ending. heh.
goodnight.
dejectium out
19
may 2003
0154
hrs gmt +8