Today, during our CNY visit at our Second Grand-uncle’s place, I had a long chat with my cousin Richard about jobs and then his relationship and then Tinder and then Coffee Meets Bagel.
Another cousin, Kang Zhen, was there. In my memories, he was a boisterous kid with crooked teeth and a bubbly laugh. I remember hitting him and tripping him on purpose, a couple of CNYs ago, because he was being a little squirt.
I don’t know exactly how he was a little squirt, but the idea that he asked for it was a small enough padlock to compartmentalize that memory. I wondered if he remembered how much of an ass I was, because I don’t remember that he deserved my violence.
He wandered over, now a gangly teen with a sharp jaw, and I asked him if he was Sec 2, when which he replied quizzically that he had just finished his O’s. He gave me a grin, one that seemed to say “I remember you played with me when I was younger.”
I lost my mind over the whole relationship thing, going on a little ramble about how I was 24 already, and that 24 was two zodiac cycles too much to not have had a girlfriend. I wanted to fuck up properly before I hit an age before I was reasonably expected to be mature. I wanted to fuck up while the dating pool’s warm, inviting and not the dregs of people who couldn’t find dates because their baggage is just over the limit, mine included.
I ended up feeling more depressed than I’d ever felt in months, which I’m sure isn’t entirely true, but I’m not there holding a gauge to my sadness, am I?
It’s not my fault they’re all lesbian.
Rae once called me an empath, a word used to describe people who have extrasensory attachments to other people’s feelings.
Being both a staunch disbeliever of astrology but a sucker for being special, this term gave me an odd bipolarised case of dismissive pride, which only seemed to be exacerbated when she rejected my advances during Valentine’s 2017.
I feel responsible for people’s feelings. I’m crushed in an impasse if they’re 127-hours-ed into a rock and a hard place. Sometimes they pick up smoking, sometimes they cut themselves, sometimes they just want to die, and all of that manifests as an odd trickle of mercury through the heart.
I understand that the metaphor is lost on every human alive, so here’s the tell and not show: the sense of impending doom. The very same one that exists to remind your monkey brain to run for the hills upon hearing a branch snap in the topsoil. Coupled with empathy, the thing that makes you yawn when others do – don’t quote me on that – I feel like shit every fucking morning. Anxiety. And depression when you can’t help.
It’s the worst tin-can-with-string ever. Don’t get me wrong. I love you all. Friends who are going through the worst of shit. I’m so tired of seeing you all in pain. I have no reason to be upset, myself. But here I am, eyes a metre away from a lit phone screen, typing dryly and inconsistently.
It’s the same harpoon to the heart I get when people dismiss my Spotify playlist or call me out, and the same pleasure I get when people laugh at my improv and say thank you for talking to me.
Validation is the topsoil of the desperation, and my next goddamn therapy session is 2 weeks away.
They’re not your cuts. You can just be there. That’s enough. Do what you can and just stop the knife when you see it. Listen to your own advice; it’s always gonna be okay, they love you, they’re gonna let you know. You don’t need a resolution right now.
Good night.
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