Dead things everywhere

It's summertime and Gracie cat is out prowling the gardens.

She's still a kitten and often wants someone to play with her. I made her toys, but I think she wants something interactive.

Lately, she sniffs out baby blue tongue lizards from the backyard. On a good sunny day, she can bring in as many as 5 lizards. I know the cues. The house suddenly turns quiet except for the pitter pattering of little feets, the little bell on her collar ringing, she is totally engrossed with something.

Yikes, it is a lizard in various stages of 'still alive-ness'. I will chase kitty away, and then scoop up the baby lizard, hoping it is still alive and intact, and bring it out into the yard again. I know Kitty will bring a new one because the new ones have their tails intact. I found a dead one in my room the other day.

Today, she brought in a butterfly. But as delicate as butterflies go, poor little thing was almost dead. I left it out hoping that it will miraculously recover.

Quite mad with that little murderer now. I know she is a in-born hunter, she's bored, and if only she likes walks instead of hunting. I tried putting her on her leash but the moment she steps out of somewhere unfamiliar, she is so scared it is impossible to walk her.

Really wish to make her a little cat tree so she can climb around and play on her own. I saw the Stolmen cat tree under Ikea Hacks but the other chap here doesn't like to see kitty furniture inside the house.

Blue tongue lizard baby.. this one is thankfully alive

Goodbye little butterfly. Rest in Peace.

Mummy I didn't do it!

Seasonal or Evergreen

I saw an ex boyfriend as I was driving today. There was a girl next to him, and she was laughing, talking to him rather animatedly.

I was amused. For once upon a time, I was that laughing girl. We were walking to all our favourite haunts, and I was the bubbly one chattering along.

What I never really thought of in the past was that before me there were other happy girls standing next to him. One by one we replaced each other, and truth to be told, we were only put there for a season.

There were some friends and people we meet in life that is only there for a season. They are either there to help us, cheer us on, tide us through or simply to teach us a lesson in life. When the purpose is done, you both move on and have nothing more to do with each other.

Yet there are the people who are there for the long and short of your life. I had a high school friend whom I used to hang out before university. He went to NS and I went to uni. Then we both stopped hanging out when he left for overseas studies. Yet he'll call me from the airport before he flies back, and I will pick him at the airport even at the wee hours. I flew over once and we parted with this crazy misunderstanding. When he returned from working in the US, I went to Melbourne. Recently we finally returned to Singapore, and still did the same airport hangout. He'll still sent me to my doorstep, and chat on till late before leaving. All the same routine for over a decade now.

I never thought much about the friendship but now find it quite a gem to be able to keep in touch for so long. These are the sort of friendships you know you can't replace. The joys of growing old is that you finally get to see what time reveals. What goes like the fads of yesteryears, and what stays like an evergreen classic.

When it is not about the distance...

I know most people run long distance as easy as they stir sugar into coffee.

I recently completed a 16.8km run with my friend. It was the longest distance I have ever ran. We vowed to 'train' every weekend, running along the beach and various location. There were some weeks I did not feel like running, but we egged each other on. We moved from running during the cool evenings to trying to beat the full sunrise on weekend mornings.

Mysteriously, I completed the race. The furthest I ran before the race was about 8km, and I asked my friend if I was able to complete it. A two-time sundown marathon runner, she laughed and said 'just walk and run.. you'll get there'.

I worried about the distance. I worried about lagging behind, or even being the last of the crowd. In the end, the distance didn't faze me at all, the heat did. It was a cloudless day, and the sun was beating down on us at 8am. Soon I felt so hot I was drizzling water all over my face and limbs. After uncountable water stations, I arrived at the sight of the big marquee, more happy that there is shade more than anything else.

Many times in life, there is the obvious problem, the bugbear, the thorn in the flesh. We mull over it before it happens, and we do not want to be the 'loser'. I had GPS timings for all my practice runs, I extrapolate distances, I studied the route, but I never anticipate that the thing that will bug me most is the heat and sun. After 10km, I realised the distance no longer bothered me, and if I had a choice to continue to a half marathon, I would be able to do it. I learnt how to improvise along the way, changing my run strategy to 'run when there is no shade, slow down when there is'. Watch me on at the F1 pit stop, I was running like a Ferrari (no, probably a Toyota) along the grandstand where there was no reprieve.

But there were also quite a satisfaction in the end. It did not come with just completing the race and posting that 'achievement' to boast on facebook, but it was the silent comfort to know that somewhere inside me, I harboured the commitment to train for the weekly runs, the discipline to run the distance, weathered the heat without complaining and very privileged  to deepen a friendship along the way.

It's strange how completing 2.4km fitness test during secondary felt so much like a drag. Good things come with age.

Random things I want to do...

I was thinking about my retirement plans and suddenly there were some things I am hoping to do after 60.

1) Enrol in a Christian counselling course and take up counselling after retirement. If I can afford three square meals by then, I will help give free counselling in church.
2) Illustrate a children's book, preferably with a cat character in it. I was looking at Alice in Wonderland but some of the pictures looked a little scary.
3) Learn how to draw those really pretty botanical drawings or flowers, leaves and birds.
4) Open a cattery. Decided I can't do animal rescue because I am too soft to put down kitty cats.
5) Plant my own veggie patch- that will be my form of exercise

To listen, to draw, to nurture...

One man's actions, another's pain

What happens if a drunken person drives and knock a cyclist down, and the cyclist got seriously injured and as a result, fell into depression, lost his job, his friends and his income? The drunken man is slapped with a fine and gets a jail term of 6 months. After 6 months, one man has paid for his consequences and one man is still reeling.

What if a husband with a highly paid job divorces his wife and takes the children and house along with him after paying his wife her rightful share. She does not have the ability to feed the kids as a single mom and so relinquishes her children. What if the wife has devoted the last 10 years of her life to the family and had no large savings nor career to speak of? The man later remarries someone else.

What I want to know is, how do the cyclist and the divorced wife live the first 3 months in their new state?

Do they get mad at the perpetrator, even if he had made the necessary compensation? Is compensation enough?

Do they blame themselves for not being 'careful', 'smart', and to see it coming?

Do they just 'get over it' because what's past is past, so let's get the party started!

Do they ask God 'why me????'

Do they just decide that life is not fair and get bitter?

Do they look outside their 5th floor window one quiet night and with their tear streaked face, wondered if life is really that worth living after this.

I really don't know how to offer answers to life changes as a direct or indirect consequence of someone's actions. These scenarios are a little different from sad stories involving sickness and poverty. I know of real people in the two situations above and they are doing well now. What I do wonder is, what were the initial months like? How do they get over the pain that someone's decision can plunge them into such darkness, even if the harm wasn't deliberate. Did people tell them to get over it, or forget the past?

Elijah goes into the cave

You are not in the position to evaluate your own effectiveness.

Let God render the final verdict.

That still small voice

Were there days where all you wanted was to hide inside a cave, shut the world out, and tell God 'I had enough!'... I did, and before I felt too ashamed of myself, Elijah did too.

I'm very touched to read that while Elijah was in the cave feeling so depressed, God did not tell him to 'toughen up', 'grow up', or get his act together. He simply cajoled him to go out of the cave and watch what happens. Then just when he thought God will appear in an earthquake or strong winds, there was nothing.

Yes.. nothing after one last desperate hopeless prayer. Nothing after you curl up and die. Nothing even when you finally convinced yourself to feed on some food and watch some tv, and nothing when the thoughts in your brain start to churn. Then one day, it comes in that still small voice to tell you what to do.

There are some spirits which must go through a discipline analogous to that sustained by Elijah. The storm-struggle must precede the still small voice. There are minds which must be convulsed with doubt before they can repose in faith. There are hearts which must be broken with disappointment before they can rise into hope. There are dispositions which, like Job, must have all things taken from them before they can find all things again in God. Blessed is the man who, when the tempest has spent its fury, recognizes his Father’s voice in its under-tone, and bares his head and bows his knee, as Elijah did. (F. W. Robertson)

Be afraid...

Be not afraid of challenges that seem unending
Or groundhog days
Be not afraid of steep faced hills
Or blizzards swirling around you

Be not afraid when your vision blurs
Or when you have made a wrong move
That you wasted time, efforts and hope
Or people deriding you

But be afraid that you
Quit when things are mending
Fail to see goodness in things
Lose faith in what you believe
Run, flee and never use your courage

Will God leave you in the cold?
Is God good?
Does He disappoints?
Can He be trusted?
Will He test you beyond what you can bear?

The next time you feel afraid, be even more afraid of forgetting who He is.

We need the eggs...

Just finished watching Annie Hall. Alvy Singer (Woody Allen) said this wistfully as he parted with his ex- girlfriend Diane Keaton- the ditzy girl meets neurotic with their craziest silly moments. Yet there are relationships that do not survive even if there is love, unreplicable memories and wistful reunions.

“It reminds me of that old joke- you know, a guy walks into a psychiatrist's office and says, hey doc, my brother's crazy! He thinks he's a chicken. Then the doc says, why don't you turn him in? Then the guy says, I would but I need the eggs. I guess that's how I feel about relationships. They're totally crazy, irrational, and absurd, but we keep going through it because we need the eggs.”

Those Durian and Tau Huey People

I am learning how to be thoughtful like a lot of people around me.

On Thursday, I got a message asking if I was home. I was out celebrating a friend's birthday. I said "No, what's up?".. and it was my friend asking if I wanted a bowl of tau huey that I was craving for some nights back.

On Saturday, I received a phone call while I was grocery shopping. There was an excited voice on the other line. "Hey, I was at Cold Storage and they were selling durians. I bought a few and do you want to have some with me?"

There are some truly nice people around. Some time ago, I thought one of the nicest thing is to make someone feel significant about themselves, because God made them significant in His eyes. I bounced around the concept of how to add value into other people's life?

I guess "Hey, it was just an ordinary day, and I was doing something really banal, and even though so, I thought about you" is pretty nice for a start.

Thoughts like these really motivate me. Try it! 

About measuring love...

As one reflects on love, do they wonder about its quantity?

Is it measured by an average of the amounts of love over a lifetime? Consistently average is the same as highs and lows.

Is it measured by how it starts? Falling in love, butterflies in the stomach, that wonderful first impression?

Is it measured by how it ends? A breakup, an affair, a divorce nullifies everything good before that?

Is it measured by how much one can appreciate? Do I think you love me more because you speak my love language? 

I thought about how much God loves me. 

Yet the biggest element of love is still that "God sent his only son to die for us, while we were still sinners'

Take something you value a lot, sacrifice it all for an unworthy person, possibly someone who annoys you, irritates you, and waste your precious time. Do it even before knowing if the love can be reciprocated, or if he takes you for granted. Do it even if it risk looking foolish in the eyes of the world, that you might cross your fingers that no one tags 'omg' on your facebook.

Do it so that love is not about some inconsistent expression fed by a spur of a moment. Do it so that a lover has no excuse to say he loved enough. Do it so that love is a challenge than a hindrance. Do it so that we can love in disappointment, in tears, in anger, in pain, in disdain, in courage and in humility. 

Do it so that for some crazy reason, there are people with godly decency to talk about for centuries to come. For you cannot erase a love like this.

That is a pretty good measure of love. Past, present, future.

Night Festival

Went to the Night Festival last weekend. We went to the National Museum at 11pm, and who could have predicted that we walked out at 2am?!

It's been a few years since I went the the National Museum, and there was not too much of a change. There was a light display on the facade of the building, very much like the Singapore Art Museum that we visited earlier.

I was initially reluctant to walk into the final exhibition room of Singapore History Gallery, thinking it might be too much of a propaganda. It turned out to be quite entertaining since they provide you with an audio guide, and that was the room I did not visit the last time. A little wordy in the information part, but good if you like to listen to stories.

By 3am we were having a round of supper at the airport. I have to enjoy the craziness before it ends!

When I find the right person...

Had been watching Andy Stanley quite a bit lately. I really love his sermons!

In the series on "The New Rules for Love, Sex and Dating", he talked about a very common myth of 'Finding the right person'- that some people believe that when they find the right person, there will be little effort needed to be patient, kind, to not envy... and conversely, when we find ourselves in marriages and relationships that are not kind, nor patient, it is because he/she 'is not the right person!'.

I once went out with a person who loves to fill up survey forms when we dined in restaurants. I was far from patient in those days, but I blamed it on his simple-mindedness, that 'it looked so silly' that I felt irritated. If only he was a little more like this or that and I'll be admiring him. Fast forward years later, I think what Andy said was right. I was more likely irritated because I was full of pride more than he was the 'wrong person'. Being a prideful person was probably more detrimental to a marriage than a person who fills out survey forms! Will meeting a less simple minded person help because I will like him better and hence it will take less effort to be kind? Possibly so in the short run, but we all know that the definition of a 'right person' changes throughout one's life. Soon enough, we are left with the 'wrong person' again. Worse still, we meet a more 'right person' and we realised our spouse cannot be any more wrong. One point I found humorously true, was that Andy pointed out that while we can naturally and effortlessly feel passionate and 'in love', we do not naturally and effortlessly become more patient and kind (chuckles with guilt).

So it is more important not to buy the myth of 'the right person' than to make sure that we become the right person ourselves. More importantly, Andy mentioned if we are becoming the kind of person who we are looking for, is looking for? Take it simply, am I that kind of person my future husband/wife is looking for? I thought that was very inspiring to start practising patience, kindness, showing my 'wow' for the other person, tame my tongue, say sorry, and the whole 1 Cor 13 list.

He also talked about determining the 'stories' we want to tell others. What we do in the present will become our past, which will eventually surface in the future with your future partner. While it is not about spewing details like who-did-what, you still cannot get away with the behavior and decisions you made. It's interesting that Andy said that even if you choose not to tell your story, you might not even like your own story, and you can't run away from that. So choose your actions well today, it'll become your story of tomorrow.

The sermon can be found here.

La-la-la...

 

My toys were pretty excited. All because it was like them, pint-sized, had a cute little personalised drawing on it, and we all had a sing-a-long session.

Random teenage blurb

Seeing how a good friend's daughter has grown into a teenager brings back memories.

I asked an old friend what was the first cassette he bought, he thought, and went "Paula Abdul's Forever your Girl". I chuckled. That was my first cassette too.

Managed to rack my brains to think a bit of my teenage years, and came with these interesting snapshots.

1) Buying the same Esprit bag as my partner in Sec 3, and bringing home the wrong bags one day. There was no mobile phone in those days and we had no choice but to bring them home first.

2) Sitting in the square in Takashimaya during short day Wednesdays in JC days. Orientation groups, classmates, ex-classmates. There was few suburban malls, no exciting places other than Orchard then.

3) Swapping letters with a good friend every day during common lectures. We wrote pages and pages. We still email now.

4) "Staying back for Projects" was always a great excuse to use for a social gathering of classmates.

5) At 13, I still do not know what possessed me to conduct a science experiment with my partner on 'which brand of chocolate melts the fastest'. In room temperature in tropical Singpore, pretty much none did.

6) Listening and recording songs played in radio- easiest time to do it is during 'Song Dedication' timeslots. I sent a dedication to my class, and also my first crush.

There is no forever after, but happy moments still remain in retrospect.

Flip flap...

When one door closes, another opens.

True and honourable relationships stand the test of time.

Try a little faith...

How do you feel about trading your wisdom for faith?

I tried a little last week. The fact is, your wisdom, still works to certain extents when it comes to the outcome. You can, like me, pour through annual reports, SEC fillings, headache-inducing 138 pages of guidance between GAAP and IFRS in anticipation of the latest interview. But I did something different this week. I asked God to take over, to not land an offer because I did the above, to then take full credit for being 'so prepared'. Of late, I was wary of wanting to orchestrate situations and its outcomes solely by putting faith in my wisdom. I decided to exercise a rather irrational card- faith. I prayed that God gives me the right things to say, that I honour him in my answers. 

I used to think someone will laugh at me for being simplistic if I just trump situations with the 'have faith' card. I thought it might even sounded mindless. Not that I do not prepare for interviews anymore, but I learn not depend on wisdom, but on God's goodness and sovereignty. 

I must say the outcomes have been supernatural too. Such outcomes certainly feed my soul better than a proud pat on my back that my own wisdom has brought me across the circumstantial gamble. 

I found a quote by Tozer that I noted in my journal a few years back.


“To believe actively that our Heavenly Father constantly spreads around us providential circumstances that work for our present good and our everlasting well-being brings to the soul a veritable benediction. Most of us go through life praying a little, planning a little, jockeying for position, hoping but never being quite certain of anything, and always secretly afraid that we will miss the way. This is a tragic waste of truth and never gives rest to the heart.

There is a better way. It is to repudiate our own wisdom and take instead the infinite wisdom of God. Our insistence upon seeing ahead is natural enough, but it is a real hindrance to our spiritual progress. God has charged Himself with full responsibility for our eternal happiness and stands ready to take over the management of our lives the moment we turn in faith to Him.” - Tozer

Importance

It takes 4 weeks to gain attachment, 4 months to grow affinity, 4 years to root importance.


It takes 4 weeks to dull attachments, 4 months to change preferences, 4 years to root importance.

What is important to you today? Will it be the same in 4 years time?

Faith

Faith - how to get there

First dig yourself a fairly large hole
Next jump into it
Try your utmost might to get out of it
Realised you have not got a chance to get out
Fret, get angry, frustrated
Cry for help, contemplate giving up
Wait, don't lose hope
Know that someone heard you
Know even if you don't know how
Know even if you don't know when
Know that you will somehow be saved

Or blame yourself for digging the hole
For jumping into it
For not bringing a ladder down
For losing your cool
For acting weak by crying for help
For wasting time to hope
For having no comfort
For uncertainties
For you know that you might never be saved

The things you can be sure of, are death and your own created consequences. God has unseen plans which you need the key of faith to unlock.

I am unlocking a few things.. and it has been exciting so far... unbelievable some days...

When I was 18...

I was just browsing through some classified ads online and came across this particular ad:

i have currently just turned 18 and i wanted to start my own family by starting off with a kitten , if anyoneeeee has one that they will give to me or ill pay a bit before , please contact me , i really want to save and give a good kitty a home

When I was 18, the most independent thing I had done by then was to take an overseas trip out with some friends. I was impressed by this boy because he related turning 18 with the maturity one needs to take care of something else. He posted an ad, and he's willing to even pay a small price (listed in ad as $100) for this experience. He's got a goal in wanting to save a cat.

I kept wondering what my own kid will want at 18. Would he be asking for more responsibility? Would he start relishing in standing on his own two feet?

I am pretty impressed by his maturity.