I don't wanna grow up, I'm a Toys 'R' Us Kid

I am gonna be 27 soon and sometimes I'm worried by the fact that I'm not worried that at this point of my life I have nothing to show except for a big debt. In fact the only plan I have for the next couple of years is just to clear that debt off which is admittedly a pretty sad goal. Nah, I lied. I have no such plan. What I have is a wish that I'll be able to clear off my debts in the next couple of years. I have no plans whatsoever. I can't even see beyond October.

Most of my friends are beginning to settle down - some have started to build their own families, paying mortgages, bought nice cars, and to afford all that securities they've got their feet firmly planted on that career ladder or at least they have stable jobs. The single ones who regularly moan about still being single and reflect about the lack of potential eligible partners abound, use the free space and time to fully concentrate on their career, and perhaps making that first real estate purchase or getting a sleek new ride. Or maybe just invest the money in unit trusts and let it grow so that there'll be enough to take care of their cats when they're gone.

In short, my friends are doing grown up stuff. And what the hell am I doing?


I simply refuse to grow up.


I just wanna skip merrily to a foreign land and sample life abroad. And since the last time I check I am not crapping money, hence the only way I can actually afford to do that is to build my career on the sideline. Note that the career is only a means to an end, to get me around the globe, or something like that. In my line of work you most probably have to stay put for a few years to actually get something built from scratch, and since I have the attention span of a dory fish, I may never oversee anything of my design gets built myself. Furthermore, since my interest is of that scale larger than your average building, I might as well forget about staying put to follow the project through unless I'm prepared to sort of be permanently rooted in one particular place for a particularly lengthy span of time. Which is of course contradictory to my original intention. So at this point, to achieve my intention, it looks like I'll spend some good years working at a conceptual level. Which is probably not a bad thing considering I am too tender for the real world.

Or maybe I should switch to something smaller like furniture so that I can produce something in a shorter time span. In that way if you hate my design you can just refrain yourself from buying it or if you really hate it then you can buy it only for the pleasure of destroying it. At least I won't have whole city blocks cursing me which is a probability if I were to stick with urban design.

I also want toys like a Holga, a Vespa, a Brompton, a Macbook, an iPhone, Vertigo comics, Lego Technics, the latest toy from McDonalds Happy Meal, a nice pair of trainers, some nice expensive pairs of jeans, some nice expensive understated t shirts, and a pilot license. Oh, might as well throw in a small plane too. Yes, my friends are having kids and planning their kids' future or investing money for their lucky cats, while I can't see beyond my own shortsighted pleasure. Now that I've mentioned shortsighted, I also want a cool expensive pair of designer glasses. You know the ones, those pairs that can make you look cool without trying while actually you're trying really hard.

I just realized that I wrote that I want trainers and jeans and t shirts. See, I have no intention to dress like an adult too. Which is probably a bad move considering that strangers always assume that I spend my days behind a school desk somewhere, which I probably would still be doing if they still implement that system of having to pass exams in order to progress and finish high school. I am assuming that people assume that I was in high school, because the thought that people think I was in primary doesn't bode well with my self-esteem. At all. Maybe I should stop bouncing up and down when I get excited and that might help.

Sometimes I try to catch a glimpse of the future to see if I would be seated at a table with my partner having dinner with our close friends who are mostly couples too while having a very interesting intellectual conversation (their children and mine are conveniently not in this particular picture. No we haven't chucked them to a boarding school somewhere, they're just mysteriously not present at that moment). In this picture we are all young and beautiful although all that I can see of my partner is a big question mark on his face. I think I would like to have that kind of stability and security somewhere down the line but honestly I don't know when. Not now, that's for sure. But those things take years to build and if I want to taste that life while all my faculties are still intact so that I can participate in that intellectual conversation and not fall asleep over my soup, I probably should consider doing something now to make it happen. Either consider finding a partner or at least stay put in one place. But I've already fallen asleep at a dinner party once despite the engaging company so maybe I'm a goner. So we're back to the the original plan of hopping from one foreign place to another.

I am gonna be 27 soon and I'm worried that I'm not worried that I don't want what my friends have. Well I do want a cat but I am sadly allergic to cats. Something is probably wrong somewhere when I'm not worried that I'm on my own and haven't produced a mini-me yet but more concerned with the fact that I can't get a cat.

do. UNDO. redo

I don't speak for anyone or represent any group. I speak for myself.

You are welcome to pass judgment on me, for it is only human nature, but do not expect me to act in a certain way or speak like I'm reading from a well-worn script, for you have not the right. I do not tell you how to live your life and I expect you to treat me with the same courtesy.

I may fit certain stereotypes because of the environment I grew up in, but do not expect me to conform to societal norms for I am becoming increasingly aware of the rules and I am questioning every thing.

Expect nothing from me and you will be spared from the disappointment. I no longer believe in being consistent just for the sake of being consistent as being consistent only means that you are so set in your ways that you do not allow for improvement. Improvement is of course, subjective. Positive and negative are connotations we stick to actions and reactions that we form based on our cultural background, environment, and beliefs. Nothing is absolute.

I am an individual and value me by my thoughts and skills and interests and ethics. And nothing else.

Do not run, yet do not be hasty

It is true that when you throw yourself into something else, the matter that used to render yourself helpless and sad doesn't seem to weigh that much anymore. You can then examine the matter at hand in almost a leisurely manner, you know you must deal with it, and you will, but you also realize that you can. And in these trying times, that realization brings back a degree of control that you desperately need.

But you must be careful not confuse positive occupation with running away from the matter at hand. You have learned that running away doesn't solve anything, as trouble has a habit of clinging on your back, weighting your mind, and after some time, even tricking you into thinking that it has disappear into thin air while what it does is to manifest itself in your future decisions. And not in a good way.

So remember not to run, but also remember not to be hasty.

Although a part of you wish that you can turn back time and live in blissful oblivion, the box has opened, and Pandora is rearing her ugly head. Coming to terms with yourself is never easy, but it must be done.

So do not run, and yet do not be hasty.

Do things that will make the heart soars and remembers the happy times you have had, and throw yourself into it, because you need the high to deal with the low effectively. Later. Accept that there will be moments of melancholic sadness that will make you wish that you can wrench your heart out and numb the senses. But it doesn't have to be all the time. Do not be too hard on yourself. You too, deserve to be happy.

Run not, be hasty not.

Do not do things for the hope of forgetting, for you will never forget, you're only trying to ignore. And what you hope really is not to forget, but to hope that time will numb the pain. So you deliberately ignore and try to keep yourself busy, but at times when time forgets to sedate you, you almost double over from the pain. And you cry and you cry and you cry until your tears have all but dried up and a new sense of jadedness envelopes you. And that is how you continue living. And that is not living. Remember that you must confront your troubles.

Hence do not run, and yet do not be hasty.




But if you do want to run, the world is your oyster.

There is a place where you can bury yourself into practically numbing your senses.

And you know it.

Pensive

There are times in your life when nothing seems to be working, when you can't get what your heart desires and have to settle for second bests, when you know you should be focusing on more important things but your mind unwillingly dwell on one thought, when you suddenly come face to face with the thing you've been reluctant to admit and now can't seem to let go, when you do that one little act that will open the door to other possibilities you've been denying yourself.

Isn't it funny how certain things become real once they are out in the open? Maybe it's true that certain things are better left unsaid, and now that they have been said and your mind can't seem to let go, you wish that you had the foresight to stop it from coming out. And then you can just continue to live in denial. Because living in denial is simpler.

But you thrive on complex situations because they make you feel alive and that is why you feel that you need help, but that is another story.

You wish that things will not change, but at the same time you have to accept that things might. You can try to act like nothing had happened, but at the back of your mind you live with the knowledge. You try to accept the fact that there's nothing you can do about it, and acting normal is the only way to do it. You value too much what you have now, and you can't bear the thought of losing it.

You wonder whether you'll ever be able to do it again without realizing that you're doing it now. And the realization shatters you, because the last time you had done it was the only time you truly felt it. And because the realization confirms what you have suspected of yourself for a long time.

It's too bloody much.