Epitaph

It was just a small obituary which I had chanced upon, and would have forgotten the next instance - if not for the uncommon surname which stirred fragments of a vague memory.

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September 1996.

In the strange calmness of my numbed senses (after being slipped a tablet and told to sign something by a frazzled medical officer who conducted all these with an air of secrecy behind a hastily drawn screen around the bed), lying on my back and wondering why there was so much white all around me, his smiling face appeared above mine and a voice that seemed almost too loud cheerfully told me to take a deep breath, and another, and another, and... and then, there was nothing...

A few days later and a short trip to the dentist's chair, the attempt to start on a liquid diet ended up with me throwing up the chocolate milk, which the nurse found amusing: "Eh, Dr Ling, it's coming out from her nose! Hehehe!" (It was a strange experience - I almost felt like I had twin beer taps on my face, except I was dispensing milk.)

The slight furrow in his brows and momentary displeasure when I asked for an early discharge, going into my fifth miserable day in a ward full of really old and really sick people.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

The surgery was just a small procedure, hardly life-saving, though one could say it was life-changing, in a sense. There was little contact - I do not have an impression of him as a person, and only know him as the surgeon who took a tiny piece of bone from my face. Still, it seemed important that I should mark his passing - albeit belated.

When he was of the living, I really would not have cared to know or find out more. (Same goes for other acquaintances.) Now that he is gone, I wished I had gotten to know him a little more as a person. Because, the dead do not cease to exist. They live on, in the memories of the living. And I wish that I had a more complete picture of him in my head, than just fragments of encounters.

Afterthought:
Some friends who saw me after the surgery could not quite figure out what was different - but they knew something was no longer the same. For all the grief that piece of bone (to think all it took was just a few millimetres!) once caused me through my early years and young adulthood, I (and a few friends) wonder why I had never thought to ask to keep it. I guess I was just eager to be rid of it and the reminders.

Rose-tinted

She has always seen the good in people (even when it was not there). She still does - it is part of who she is.

When the veil was pulled from her eyes, she saw the world around her for what it was, including the bad and the ugly - in others, and herself. And in this new light, she became what she would never see; she became the things that she had always feared.

She started hate campaigns against the new meat - TWO of them, one after another, encouraging the tentative voices of discontent. Understandably, they were not particularly likeable people from the start. (Though, interestingly, the others warmed up to the first one eventually. The verdict is still out on the second.) I wonder if anyone realises that this is also the same person who, otherwise, has been spending a lot of time generating positive feelings and building team spirit - around herself.

I understand now, why the rose-tinted glasses should not be taken from some people - for their own sanity and that of other people around them. The ones who do not have the capacity to understand the truth are just as dangerous.

Cracking up

Suddenly, people around me are having emotional breakdowns and ranting to me about their lives. And somewhere in between, a couple of colleagues have been unloading their stressful moments on me. (As if I am in a much better state than they are.) Have been dispensing words of comfort, but mostly, am just standing apart from all this "madness" and wondering why everything feels so surreal.

Bloody hell, what was all that about?


Witnessed by

Just received "warning" that E (she who can see certain things in the future) intends to reveal to me the date of a mutual friend's wedding (but not to the bride-to-be, which means I cannot tell her either), so that I can be witness when the day swings around.

Curious as I am, the impending knowledge scares me a little.

The Wonder Years

There was a tinge of sadness and resignation in her musings of the lucky ones who were "untouched by corruption" and could still look upon the world with childlike wonder, while she had "seen too much" to ever do that.

Notwithstanding the proverbial truth in ignorance being bliss, I do not believe that people who have had more hard knocks in life, or who can see things for what they are, can never look upon the world with wonder - albeit a different kind - again. It is about looking at the world through older and wiser eyes. Of course, some people might find it easier than others, because God has "blessed" their lives with sugar and spice. Or, there is just something in them that reaches out more readily for the light, in spite of everything. Sometimes, it is about wanting and choosing to see and do things differently, and to find joy in living each new day, encounter and experience.

Even the jaded ones, no matter how much they whinge, just want to be able to look forward to another day, and to life.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

He was not what I expected of a litigator. And he seemed so young, unmarked skin and all. (Actually he was - late 20s, going by pieces of information gathered.) There was, literally, an openness in his wide (and rather pretty) eyes. When he laughed, he would turn to share his laughter, so easily, so freely. There was something so appealing about his youthfulness, his whole person. Here was not an Innocent, "untouched". He had allowed life to touch him, but in a different way.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

The two little girls came by and announced they wanted to sit with SF on the Viking ride. It must have dismayed her date who had not expected two little lightbulbs to get in the way, especially after six streetlights went to great depths (and then heights - No Fly Time exceeded by two hours) to stay out of the way. Heh. Heh. Heh.

"Children are just drawn to me."

I guess children recognise their own kind, no?

(Afterthought: Do people have children so they can vicariously experience wonder again in a blood kin?)


Questions

"We were talking yesterday when he asked about you being so quiet..."

Shrug. I dunno why. And I'm getting so tired of being told that.

Meanwhile, I hear that headhunters have taken to reading blogs for potential employees because it gives them a good assessment of the person's strengths and work attitudes. Maybe someone would offer me a job as a mime, eh.

Unexplained

(Sometime earlier this year.)

I stood up from my workstation and turned to greet my visitor. In that instant of our first meeting in person, he took an involuntary step backwards as a faint look of shock (and almost distaste?) flickered across his face. He was wary during the brief exchange.

I sometimes wonder if he just "did not like my face" (though he was pleasant and friendly enough in subsequent email exchanges). Or, knowing what I already did back then, did I remind him of someone from a long time ago?

Just one of life's little mysteries that comes to mind once in a while, and would most probably remain so.