Ever since I grew up

Clearing out my desks, I found an old letter from 2011. I had forgotten all about it. And I realised, even with its emotionally charged contents- some stupid, I feel I could talk about it, without worries.

I realised that I'm no longer the rebellious kid anymore. I do not need to escape questions or filter information [considering also how I choose the people I spend time with]. Not because I do not care about the consequences, but because I feel responsible for them. It's a feel-good thought. There were sufficient times as a child that I were this same way too, open because I were guilty if not completely honest. Then those troubled teens happened and elongated for an awfully long time. Sometimes, I'd not say what I felt pretending it were protecting the other person. Often times, I were only just protecting me. Not wanting to explain behaviour or getting irritated with incessant questioning- also because I weren't mentally prepared to handle them. I hadn't thought them through. I feel just enough grown up now to realise actions have consequences, which I control. I never thought I could be convinced into making to-do lists with excels, till one day it just happened.

Following the classical Hofstede's 4+1 model, and being Asian enough to avoid conflict by writing an email was just me. Till two minutes on a Skype call made me feel intrinsically confident to start talking what no written word could have been able to achieve. In fact these days I often feel that the Telephone is a substitute tool too. I feel far better standing in the kitchen, being able to talk in person knowing the exactness of reactions and being able to understand. I thought I had lost this ability to connect on a personal, real level. With all its pros the virtual-ness of the Internet had taken it away from me. I seem to be getting it back now. I try hard to meet conflicts. Till I become a natural. Not aggressive, but someone who can talk directly and fairly, or even emotionally as is warranted, conflict or not.

Surprisingly, it's not draining me out. It's giving me peaceful courage. The kind that comes with being in love, and that idea of owning dogs, together.

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My small attempt at translating my own thoughts (for practice ;-))

Als ein Maedchen hatte ich ein grosse Probleme, ich konnte ehrlich sein oder nix. Weil die Schuld zu gross sein koennte. Als ich bin aufgewachsen, "Troubled teens" haben passiert. Wahrscheinlich glaubte ich, wenn ich irgendwas nicht sage wuerde, dann die andere Person hatte Protektion. Eigentlich schuetzte ich nur mich.

Genau von "Hofstedes 4+1 model" menschen aus Asien (naemlich mich) haben "Konflikt" vermieden. Ich wurde Email schreiben ohne sprechen. Klingt komisch, aber originalgetreu. Gestern war die Verwandlung. Als eine Frau habe ich meine Zustaendigkeit realisiert. Alle Aktionen kam mit Zustaendigkeit. Ich fuehlte "Kontrolle".

Ich habe real-Personal-Kommunikation ohne Internet wieder verstanden. Ich koennte mit den Konflikte treffen. Und das war nicht ueberwaeltigend. Es gab mich den Mut. Wie es kommt mit Liebe und mit der Idee dass wir Hunde zusammen bekommen koennten.

Slow.ly

I don't think about writing much at all these days, especially since writing involves deadlines now. My friend once told me how he has nothing to write because he says it all. It started as an experiment with me. I wanted to stop writing emails to be able to talk better. And be able to express well. I tried sufficiently. [Additionally I cut off all channels of unwieldy communication, my Facebook for instance only has people who don't bother me]. Two things happened. My in-person communication did improve- but that probably was more a natural progression than anything else. I also became a lot more silent.

At 17, I told my then roommate that I found that her silence was corrupt. While she silently saw the truth through my exaggerations. I believed, people who do not talk are being dishonest by not sharing what they feel clearly. At work also. My first meeting with a colleague often meant saying- let me know what you feel I will not assume. I'd often tell others how I don't like quietness which later often meant resentment and piled-up emotions.

I just don't think so cynically about silence now. I hear more. And I enjoy it. Sitting in a white car, zoning out of the music that I don't know. I think of different things. Home, myself, things I enjoy, moving moments. I feel a certain sense of control over my small enjoyable moments. Some that I am so smug and happy with, that sharing them is pointless. They even make me cry and just don't mean anything to anyone else. I look outside the window and see the clouds. I look at photographs which make me feel loved. At postcards on my wall that remind me of strange conversations. I even remember being in some of those. I feel lost in thought and I intently try to make the creases on the forehead smoother. I try to look to remember every detail that I don't have enough camera pixels for. Often, I wait for one sip of sparkling water in the dead of the night while I curl back into sleep, quietly. I internalise my love and nourish my happiness from within. There wasn't anything to talk about. I feel a sense of release.

TheFirstSixMonths: Ein Pariser Inspiration!

Ash was talking one day, and we often talk mit images. The ones that inspire us. Coffee shops, alleys, classic leather bags, Paris, amidst others. One of our long standing plans is to discover new places together. We would often dream travel in office, and enlist these new places.

We do believe that one time, we will get there. Didn't the White Queen say, she likes to believe in 10 (oder 15?) impossible things before breakfast? I'd really like to believe this one doesn't quite fall in the impossibles, just the one that needs to be listed and planned.

Travel moves me intrinsically. It alters relationships, adding this amount of fragility to nervous beginnings, and if you're lucky, a strange calm in mutual moments of the ordinary. These days travel quietens me at times. Just as love does. With its gratefulness and grace.

A Parisian dream

Here's her picture inspiration for the today!


PS: Picture via Facebook's 10 places to see before you die. I'd like to make travel lust-lists like that. What on your together list? :-)

The First Six Months: Rediscovering love

Some people meet quick. Others take long winded paths, as if on purpose. I'm optimistic, even if unrealistically, that they do meet. Like Celine's grandmother fantasizing about the guy she was going to fall in love with, all her life. Who is to say, she wouldn't meet him. Of course it's not practical. But, then there's no practicality in why my heart beats faster when I climb down the stairs from platform 4 onto the other side of the city. Or the number of times I check my mobile to see if it's 17:43 yet. My heart out-thinks my head. Especially where trains are involved. Even if, mother had said it was adolescent-stupidity, she had already lost me to the romance trains generate (with or without Shahrukh Khan).

Some people don't go through half-hearted cruel relationships that make them lose belief. Some do. I'm not qualified to say what the merits of the former are. I'm only aware of the later. It grows like a vine. I expect it to be poisonous. In spite of unrealistic hopes, as a defense mechanism expectations start on a negative. Low expectations generate an aura of mediocrity. Double-guessing, not being able to communicate almost expecting things to start going off. And to be stuck in this rut isn't pretty. At this time, friends from the former lot, writing on how their lives feel inelastic with love and relationships seem distant, as they are. Everyone lives in their own bubbles. Perhaps they have so much of it, or maybe it is the times, that the incredible-ness of sharing real lives is lost on them. Or maybe they really are restricted.

I see the merits of struggles. I may not expect flowers everyday, but I'd value them. A heart with my name engraved, with ecologically sensitive iPad doodle apps, would appeal to me with all its restrictions. Like distinct triangles creatively made of three random squiggles. It makes me walk through the coffee shops in daze. Lost to the outside world. Focused solely on the buzz of this one moment, like the one just before you actually eat honey. I'm not sure what it is called either.

This demand for love, in the long term has become highly elastic. A small effort makes a huge difference. There's no reason why that happens. Just a mild feeling, that, love is, a verb. The more you indulge in, the easier it is to wash off vulnerabilities, the nicer it feels. The dos matter. Especially as you lie in bed, waiting, to turn around.


PS: Long notes for an email Y.