Saturday, September 20, 2008
Dissection of a Reflection.
“You know, you’re actually quite pretty. if you lost some weight, you’d be model material.”
Three years on, and those words still sting, still feel like a fresh wound, still smart like a new bruise. Not because I care particularly about modelling, but it because reminds me of what an… obliging person I used to be.
Flashback! 2004, 2005, I forget which. I was working, I met a guy at my workplace who was all show and swagger. Being an impressionable sixteen year old, I did what I thought was the best move. I fell head over heels in love with him. And he, being a typical 24 year old, did what he thought was best. He took advantage of it. I bought food for him, ran errands, helped him design stuff, MADE him a Valentine’s day card cos, y’know, the Hallmark ones are waaaay too cliché and my baby only deserved the BEST. I almost got into trouble with our supervisor because she caught me clocking in for him even though he wasn’t in the office yet. Since we’re paid by the hour, and he was gonna be late, I might as well help him save a few bucks right? It was the least I could do. And what did I get in return? Nothing. Nada. Zip. Zilch.
I was wholly and utterly ignored for most part. We rarely went out on dates and he hardly replied to my txts and calls…. well, except when he wanted something. Then he was all sugar and compliments. He didn’t even want anything physical from me. I was perplexed. We didn’t talk much outside of work, and it’s not like he was trying to get laid, so what the hell did he want from me? One day, after a month of watching him toy with me, an older co-worker who had a soft spot for me pulled me aside.
“I think you really should end things with Tej.” he said.
“What! Why?” I had no clue where this was coming from.
“Trust me, hon. You don’t want to be with him. He’s not good for you. I can’t tell you any more because it’s not in my position to do so, but please, stop seeing him. You’ll regret it.”
I didn’t listen. He was the love of my life and no interfering co-worker was going to tell me what to do. I didn’t even think about asking him about our odd relationship. That’s how much I adored him; I trusted him 100% even when all evidence pointed otherwise. Until, of course, I found out about his fiancée.
My world crumbled.
My next relationship was with a guy who thought a little bit too much about himself. Jalen wasn’t typically handsome, but he had a body to die for and was charismatic enough to get any girl eating out of his hand. Sadly, I was one them. I was constantly in awe of him; I felt like a little girl in the presence of a mini-rockstar… with his confident strut, vast connections and random people on the streets stopping to talk to him. I kept trying to impress him, and he didn’t ignore me. He did something much worse.
He scorned me.
Nothing I ever did for him was ever good enough. I wasn’t pretty enough, wasn’t smart enough, wasn’t vivacious enough, wasn’t rich enough, wasn’t accommodating enough. And it was him who said that magical statement.
“You know, you’re actually quite pretty. if you lost some weight, you’d be model material.”
That one sentence became what I based our relationship on. I truly and honestly thought that if I lost weight and looked prettier, he might love me a teensy weensy bit more. I changed so much for him, that now I look back and wonder HOW I could’ve been so stupid. I dressed the way he wanted me to, did what he wanted me to, hung out with the bunch of people HE wanted to hang out with, and I’d better enjoy myself, because he threw the most phenomenal temper tantrums. I became his living, breathing Stepford Wife who did everything with a blissful smile on her face. Why? I don’t know. Maybe I was starved for attention. I wasn’t getting it anywhere else.
He dumped me months later because he was convinced that I was cheating on him.
“You’re the worst girlfriend I’ve ever had. I don’t even know what I’m doing with you, I don’t even know why I bothered.”
Words that cut through me like a hot knife through butter.
I ricocheted from one destructive relationship to another, kept assuring myself that “this one’ll be better than the last even though he doesn’t have a job, his family is FUBAR and he has a jail record, everything will be okay in the end because I BUREEEEEEEVE THAT RERRRF WILL FIND A WAAAAAAAY.” Reality check, daaahhhling. That only happens in an ideal world, and this one definitely ISN’T one. I had my heart broken, had my heart shattered into millions of pieces; I was sure I hadn’t gathered all the tiny shards up yet, that there were gaping holes where some parts of my heart must be that were now gone or irreversibly damaged.
And then I met someone special. He treated me like an absolute PRINCESS. I was convinced he was going to be the one I married. He did so much for me without me even asking. He was, in every sense of the word, perfect. Until, of course, I screwed up in some way and he would unleash all his pent up emotional angst on me and recount every last favour he’d done for me while exclaiming hysterically, “You see all the things I do for you! But you never ever appreciate me! All I ask you is for one thing! ONE! And you can’t even give me that!”. I would then be obliged to give in to him because, well, you seeeeeeee all the things he’s done for me?!
But then, there was the last straw. When he was helping me with my spring-cleaning and he couldn’t figure out how to fix the nozzle on my vacuum cleaner. I kept asking him to pass it to me so I could fix it on properly, but sheer male bravado made him keep insisting that he could do it even though he was fumbling like hell. I heard him let out a triumphant exclamation that was followed by a loud crack and a crash as the nozzle fell to the floor. Exasperated, I picked it up to fix it myself. And that’s when I found out what was the loud crack that caused the nozzle to fall off. The clasp holding the nozzle to the main body of the vacuum cleaner had cracked cleanly in half. I knew it was only a matter of time before it broke right off and rendered my vacuum cleaner completely useless.
“You broke it!” I yelled.
“It’s no big deal, it’s just a small crack.”
“Yeah, but now there’s a higher chance of it breaking off altogether. And that thing cost me fifty bucks!”
“Well,” he said without skipping a beat, “fifty dollars is nothing compared to how much I’ve spent on you.”
All I could do was stare at him in disbelief. YOU volunteer to help ME, YOU break something that belongs to ME, and then YOU tell ME to cool it, because what I paid for the vacuum cleaner is an insignificant sum compared to what YOU’VE spent on ME?
And that’s when I told myself enough was enough was enough. I refuse to do something I dislike out of sheer obligation. I refuse to be cowed into doing something because someone digs up an old favour yet to be repaid. I refuse to bend over-backwards to cater to someone’s whims. I refuse to act the way someone wants me to, to look the way someone wants me to, to behave the way someone wants me to, simply to make SOMEONE happy. I refuse to let someone else take charge of my life. I’d rather fall myself than let someone drag me on down.
So right now, I don’t know where I am, and I don’t know what I want. I don’t know what I’m going to be doing tomorrow, or the day after that, or the day after that. But I do know who I am. And I’m happy.
:)
Three years on, and those words still sting, still feel like a fresh wound, still smart like a new bruise. Not because I care particularly about modelling, but it because reminds me of what an… obliging person I used to be.
Flashback! 2004, 2005, I forget which. I was working, I met a guy at my workplace who was all show and swagger. Being an impressionable sixteen year old, I did what I thought was the best move. I fell head over heels in love with him. And he, being a typical 24 year old, did what he thought was best. He took advantage of it. I bought food for him, ran errands, helped him design stuff, MADE him a Valentine’s day card cos, y’know, the Hallmark ones are waaaay too cliché and my baby only deserved the BEST. I almost got into trouble with our supervisor because she caught me clocking in for him even though he wasn’t in the office yet. Since we’re paid by the hour, and he was gonna be late, I might as well help him save a few bucks right? It was the least I could do. And what did I get in return? Nothing. Nada. Zip. Zilch.
I was wholly and utterly ignored for most part. We rarely went out on dates and he hardly replied to my txts and calls…. well, except when he wanted something. Then he was all sugar and compliments. He didn’t even want anything physical from me. I was perplexed. We didn’t talk much outside of work, and it’s not like he was trying to get laid, so what the hell did he want from me? One day, after a month of watching him toy with me, an older co-worker who had a soft spot for me pulled me aside.
“I think you really should end things with Tej.” he said.
“What! Why?” I had no clue where this was coming from.
“Trust me, hon. You don’t want to be with him. He’s not good for you. I can’t tell you any more because it’s not in my position to do so, but please, stop seeing him. You’ll regret it.”
I didn’t listen. He was the love of my life and no interfering co-worker was going to tell me what to do. I didn’t even think about asking him about our odd relationship. That’s how much I adored him; I trusted him 100% even when all evidence pointed otherwise. Until, of course, I found out about his fiancée.
My world crumbled.
My next relationship was with a guy who thought a little bit too much about himself. Jalen wasn’t typically handsome, but he had a body to die for and was charismatic enough to get any girl eating out of his hand. Sadly, I was one them. I was constantly in awe of him; I felt like a little girl in the presence of a mini-rockstar… with his confident strut, vast connections and random people on the streets stopping to talk to him. I kept trying to impress him, and he didn’t ignore me. He did something much worse.
He scorned me.
Nothing I ever did for him was ever good enough. I wasn’t pretty enough, wasn’t smart enough, wasn’t vivacious enough, wasn’t rich enough, wasn’t accommodating enough. And it was him who said that magical statement.
“You know, you’re actually quite pretty. if you lost some weight, you’d be model material.”
That one sentence became what I based our relationship on. I truly and honestly thought that if I lost weight and looked prettier, he might love me a teensy weensy bit more. I changed so much for him, that now I look back and wonder HOW I could’ve been so stupid. I dressed the way he wanted me to, did what he wanted me to, hung out with the bunch of people HE wanted to hang out with, and I’d better enjoy myself, because he threw the most phenomenal temper tantrums. I became his living, breathing Stepford Wife who did everything with a blissful smile on her face. Why? I don’t know. Maybe I was starved for attention. I wasn’t getting it anywhere else.
He dumped me months later because he was convinced that I was cheating on him.
“You’re the worst girlfriend I’ve ever had. I don’t even know what I’m doing with you, I don’t even know why I bothered.”
Words that cut through me like a hot knife through butter.
I ricocheted from one destructive relationship to another, kept assuring myself that “this one’ll be better than the last even though he doesn’t have a job, his family is FUBAR and he has a jail record, everything will be okay in the end because I BUREEEEEEEVE THAT RERRRF WILL FIND A WAAAAAAAY.” Reality check, daaahhhling. That only happens in an ideal world, and this one definitely ISN’T one. I had my heart broken, had my heart shattered into millions of pieces; I was sure I hadn’t gathered all the tiny shards up yet, that there were gaping holes where some parts of my heart must be that were now gone or irreversibly damaged.
And then I met someone special. He treated me like an absolute PRINCESS. I was convinced he was going to be the one I married. He did so much for me without me even asking. He was, in every sense of the word, perfect. Until, of course, I screwed up in some way and he would unleash all his pent up emotional angst on me and recount every last favour he’d done for me while exclaiming hysterically, “You see all the things I do for you! But you never ever appreciate me! All I ask you is for one thing! ONE! And you can’t even give me that!”. I would then be obliged to give in to him because, well, you seeeeeeee all the things he’s done for me?!
But then, there was the last straw. When he was helping me with my spring-cleaning and he couldn’t figure out how to fix the nozzle on my vacuum cleaner. I kept asking him to pass it to me so I could fix it on properly, but sheer male bravado made him keep insisting that he could do it even though he was fumbling like hell. I heard him let out a triumphant exclamation that was followed by a loud crack and a crash as the nozzle fell to the floor. Exasperated, I picked it up to fix it myself. And that’s when I found out what was the loud crack that caused the nozzle to fall off. The clasp holding the nozzle to the main body of the vacuum cleaner had cracked cleanly in half. I knew it was only a matter of time before it broke right off and rendered my vacuum cleaner completely useless.
“You broke it!” I yelled.
“It’s no big deal, it’s just a small crack.”
“Yeah, but now there’s a higher chance of it breaking off altogether. And that thing cost me fifty bucks!”
“Well,” he said without skipping a beat, “fifty dollars is nothing compared to how much I’ve spent on you.”
All I could do was stare at him in disbelief. YOU volunteer to help ME, YOU break something that belongs to ME, and then YOU tell ME to cool it, because what I paid for the vacuum cleaner is an insignificant sum compared to what YOU’VE spent on ME?
And that’s when I told myself enough was enough was enough. I refuse to do something I dislike out of sheer obligation. I refuse to be cowed into doing something because someone digs up an old favour yet to be repaid. I refuse to bend over-backwards to cater to someone’s whims. I refuse to act the way someone wants me to, to look the way someone wants me to, to behave the way someone wants me to, simply to make SOMEONE happy. I refuse to let someone else take charge of my life. I’d rather fall myself than let someone drag me on down.
So right now, I don’t know where I am, and I don’t know what I want. I don’t know what I’m going to be doing tomorrow, or the day after that, or the day after that. But I do know who I am. And I’m happy.
:)
Thursday, August 14, 2008
New Ink
Tuesday, May 27, 2008
I tried. I really did.
Wanna know what that is?
Do you have any idea how hard it is to blog when you have a half-kilo parrot sleeping on your shoulder, growling softly everytime you move too much?
It's impossible, i tell you.
Friday, May 16, 2008
Updates Updates!
I'd decided to take a month’s hiatus away from blogging (says a lot about the absence, dunnit!) to give myself some “ME” time to sort through various issues… but now I’m back and raring to go! Now for the updates of the more.. INTERESTING things that have been happening in my life. Not that you care to know, but I’m gonna tell you anyway!
1. I AM DONE AT NGEE ANN POLYTECHNIC! Hallebloodylujah baby! My three years at NP have been bittersweet. I’ve won some battles, lost more, but most importantly, I LEARNED. I almost didn’t make it through my final semester, but thanks to a rather odd twist of fate (more about that later) I managed to pass… by default. Ah well. A pass is a pass is a pass. My input at NP is over. Time to move on.
2. I GOT INTO NANYANG TECHNOLOGICAL UNIVERSITY! Believe me, I’m more shocked than you’d ever be. Having a measly 2.6 GPA, I thought I’d have to, y’know, do a couple of dodgy “favours” to get in, but NO! Apparently I must’ve done really well in the aptitude test they made all of the applicants sit for, because I’m the first and (so far) ONLY person from my diploma course that has managed to get in NTU. I must’ve won them over with my sheer talent and creativity! I kid, I kid. Seriously though, as one of my lecturers put it, “There must be something very, very wrong with what we’re teaching, if someone with a GPA of 2.6 managed to get into a course that someone with a GPA of 3.4 couldn’t.”
3. I am still own by a very, very active African Grey by the name of Wheeler, who might have a little friend to keep him company in August. And that little friend is a Sun Conure. If you don’t know what that is, go google them. They’re bloody adorable.
4. I’ve decided to keep my personal life out of my blogs, but the people who matter definitely know what’s going on, yes?
5. I am making plans for my new tattoo. More about that later.
6. I have made major changes in my life. Shifted priorities, perspectives, and all that nice stuff. I’ve learnt that planning too far ahead just leads to major disappointments, so now I’m just rolling with the punches, surfing the waves of fate, riding the train of destiny, driving the rickshaw of opportunity, and all those other very posh-sounding descriptions.
I’m living for the moment, because there won’t be another moment that’s like this one.
I shall stop here. My head’s about to self-combust. More updates coming soon!
Wednesday, May 14, 2008
Quote of the Day.
Now, I don't know what's worse; the fact that:
1. Sy is a buff thirty-something who goes to the gym religiously and has a body to rival Vin Diesel;
2. He said it in the most matter-of-fact voice possible;
OR
3. I was the only girl at the table, but I wasn't the only person he was addressing.
OR maybe it was:
4. We weren't even talking about dildos in the first place.
Monday, March 24, 2008
Farewell.
and naked I will depart.
The LORD gave and the LORD has taken away;
may the name of the LORD be praised."
Job 1:21
Sunday, February 03, 2008
SO Obiang!
I spotted him in the crowded train station and we both waded through the mass of people. Just then, we saw each other and stopped dead in our tracks. We stared at each other’s t-shirts for a good five seconds.
threadless.com
“OH MY GOD!!!!” We yelled in unison. People turned round to see what the commotion was. We were wearing the EXACT same tshirt! We buy quite a number of our tshirts online, and both of us loved this particular design. We decided that we would try and call each other beforehand to make sure we weren’t going to wear the same tshirt like one of those sickly sweet/demonstrative couples who love to coordinate their clothes. It’s just disgusting. We both clutched our shirts and tried to cover the design and hoped that no one would notice. And this isn’t exactly a design that is easily overlooked.
“What should we do?! Should I buy a new top or something?” I said panicking.
“We could just pretend like we wanted to do this.” Nantha said, hunching over.
“This looks SO stupid.” I groaned.
“There isn’t much we can do.”
Suddenly, I had a brainwave. “You could turn your tshirt back to front!”
“What?!” Nantha looked at me like as though I’d just insulted his mother.
“You know, Turn your tshirt around! Your bag’ll cover the design!”
“But the cutting will be off! Tshirts are made to be more roomy in the front.” he eyed me suspiciously. “Why dyou want ME to do it anyway? Why don’t YOU flip your tshirt around?”
“Because if there’s really less space if I wear it back to front, my boobs’ll be squashed.”
“Good point. Okay… okay.. I’ll do it. Yeesh.” He sighed as he disappeared into the toilet.
He re-emerged a few minutes later, walking as though he had a finger in his butt. “This is SO uncomfortable. My tshirt feels way too tight and it feels so weird.” He grumbled.
“But it doesn’t look obvious at all!”
“Really?”
“Yes, sweetheart. Now, just try and act natural.”
“Remind me to never do this again. I don’t know why we’re going through all this trouble just to hide the fact that our tshirts are the same. It’s not THAT bad!”
After surviving the ordeal, I went home and told my mother about our coordinated tshirts. Her reaction was priceless.
“Aiyoh!” she winced. “SO obiang!"
Seriously, who wears coordinated tshirts nowadays anyway?
The Bum.
Beer is God's Gift to mankind.
So am I.
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Dissection of a Reflection.
New Ink
I tried. I really did.
Updates Updates!
Quote of the Day.
Farewell.
SO Obiang!
M. I(slamic). L. F.
Wheeleriffic!
A Brief Update
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