The After Effects, Part I
Assalamualaikum
Well…it’s been one year or so.
And I felt really weird…so awkward…so unusual…
I could not do what I somewhat often do before…
I mean, it felt like it was a totally different ‘dimension’…between then and now…
But that’s what I have to be accustomed to…familiarize with it…
Or at least, tried to get used to it somehow..
And may have to continue this for the rest of my life…
What the heck am I talking about?
Hmm…
The scenario is something like this…
1) you happened to know someone for a very, very long time (read:girl), and
2) you kinda like that particular person (read:love)
so, a normally sane person would surely like to know the happenings, the situation, the going-ons that revolve around that person, as well as we tell our parts too.
So how would you do it? Of course, there’s a lot of mode of communications. These include meeting face to face, phone conversations, text messages, e-mails and postages, online conferencing (chatting), updates on social networking site, and adding one for me, writing blogs.
For us, those modes of communications happened somewhat persistent. And I’d say, between 2003 until 2007 were the ‘peak’ periods. (We did communicate before, of course, but not that prominent. And don’t forget the snail-mail era during secondary school!). I’d say, somewhat, because, it wasn’t always like we do it everyday (something that I actually wished to do), but we weren’t too remote that we took an awful lot of time to get in touch again…
I like to elaborate on the second part. After a nice, successful communication session, I (kinda regrettably) took about a 3-4 weeks to engage another session. This was not normal. If I was truly cared, I could do it once a week or even more often. But the more frequent I do, the more variety of ideas and new topics needed to be thought of, or it might ended up to a quite generic “dah makan ke blom? Makan ape hari ni? Pagi tadi mandi pukul brape?” or something like this. This was something I kinda failed and often blanked out. That’s why I took for quite some time, collecting some of the topics to be conversed, until I believed that I’m ‘ready’.
Here’s the thing. I’m a shy guy. You all know this. Even at my ‘ready’ time, I have a very hard time to initiate a conversation, especially to girls. It is like, “How should I start? What words should I use?” and always think real hard of how to make a perfect opening of a communication, when a simple “Assalamualaikum, apa khabar?” is more than sufficient. Why it is so hard on me? These things dragged me for another couple of days and weeks. Until, more often than not, it was the other person who made the first move and contacted me. When that happened, I would surely felt like an *ss, ashamed of myself.
It was like; the other person cares about you more than you cared about the person.
After these particular conversation ends, I kinda thought that, “If I let this always happens, then at one point, she would be bored with my lack of concern and lack of care, so why would she bothered anymore?”
Did you?
Hmmm…
That was a very long time ago. Things happened. It has to happen. Our Lord works in mysterious ways, so we have to believe in Him that the path He laid for us is the best, and should I keep myself from going astray from this path, then I will be fine.
Actually, I wasn’t going to talk about that as I’ve written it before. What I am going to write is the one I opened this entry up there, the weird-like feeling that I felt throughout last year and the need to get used to it.
I am fully aware that once people move to the next stage of their life and have certain responsibilities to take care of, some certain kind of limitation and restriction are imposed and immediately effective. I cannot simply knock on someone’s door and hoping they could open it and let me in, at least, not that easy. I do not intend to ‘menjaga tepi kain orang’, let alone to be accused of ‘mengganggu perihal rumahtangga orang’.
In fact, I think that my mind had built for me an ‘invisible wall’, impassable and unclimbable. It is a mental block, and I think this is far too excessive. There’s no need for this kind of wall to exist but then again, it does. I do not have any problems whatsoever with my other girl-friends’ (I mean, friends consist of girls larr) marriage. Of course, I didn’t disturb them either, because I have no reason to do so. But I don’t have any reason to disturb her as well! So this weird feeling shouldn’t exist in the first place!
I'm not sure why it is happening to me…hmmmm…actually, I do know why it is happening to me, just that I don’t know why it should be happening to me…I know she is well taken care of, be it from her husband, families and relatives, close friends, fellow staffmates and pupils, all covered. So for me to join in, it is just a little, speck of percentage which doesn’t add up anything significantly and possibly negligible, so it doesn’t matter anyway.
In the end, I think that the only realistic mode of communication left for me is this blog. Although it is only one-sided intercourse, and available openly for public, this is the only way I usually can freely write from the heart, and hoping the intended target will feel it the same as I do. I suck at heart-to-heart talk (because I’m shy, I stuttered sometimes and so the message sent isn’t really effective), but surely I have to get to that level somehow.
So here, I would like to wish a prosperous happy birthday to you, dear :). May God bless you with happiness and live cheerfully with those who loved you and those you loved.
Since I think I might not be able to write something like this every year, considered the above wish stays valid for next year, the year after that and many years to come, haha. So always watch this space.
PS - Sometimes, rereading those chat logs, e-mails and message archives would give me some pleasure and made me always think that these good moments will always be cherished for generations to come. I appreciate it much and glad that it happened. Quoting from an episode 12 of CSI: Miami, Season 5 “Internal Affairs”, during at the end when Natalia, while packing up her deceased husband stuffs and pictures, tells Horatio how her husband made her life like a ‘living hell’, Horatio, taking a picture frame from Natalia, tells her:
No, I’m not comparing the situations, it’s not the same. I’m merely showing the last line Mr. H tells Natalia that to keep appreciate those good memories forever, which is quite applicable here.
PS2 – This entry is supposed to be even longer. But since my aim is to increase my entry per month ratio, I divided into two parts. The other half is a different kind of story with contains only a bit reference of this entry. I’ll publish the other part sometime in coming weeks after a bit more touch up.
Well…it’s been one year or so.
And I felt really weird…so awkward…so unusual…
I could not do what I somewhat often do before…
I mean, it felt like it was a totally different ‘dimension’…between then and now…
But that’s what I have to be accustomed to…familiarize with it…
Or at least, tried to get used to it somehow..
And may have to continue this for the rest of my life…
What the heck am I talking about?
Hmm…
The scenario is something like this…
1) you happened to know someone for a very, very long time (read:girl), and
2) you kinda like that particular person (read:love)
so, a normally sane person would surely like to know the happenings, the situation, the going-ons that revolve around that person, as well as we tell our parts too.
So how would you do it? Of course, there’s a lot of mode of communications. These include meeting face to face, phone conversations, text messages, e-mails and postages, online conferencing (chatting), updates on social networking site, and adding one for me, writing blogs.
For us, those modes of communications happened somewhat persistent. And I’d say, between 2003 until 2007 were the ‘peak’ periods. (We did communicate before, of course, but not that prominent. And don’t forget the snail-mail era during secondary school!). I’d say, somewhat, because, it wasn’t always like we do it everyday (something that I actually wished to do), but we weren’t too remote that we took an awful lot of time to get in touch again…
I like to elaborate on the second part. After a nice, successful communication session, I (kinda regrettably) took about a 3-4 weeks to engage another session. This was not normal. If I was truly cared, I could do it once a week or even more often. But the more frequent I do, the more variety of ideas and new topics needed to be thought of, or it might ended up to a quite generic “dah makan ke blom? Makan ape hari ni? Pagi tadi mandi pukul brape?” or something like this. This was something I kinda failed and often blanked out. That’s why I took for quite some time, collecting some of the topics to be conversed, until I believed that I’m ‘ready’.
Here’s the thing. I’m a shy guy. You all know this. Even at my ‘ready’ time, I have a very hard time to initiate a conversation, especially to girls. It is like, “How should I start? What words should I use?” and always think real hard of how to make a perfect opening of a communication, when a simple “Assalamualaikum, apa khabar?” is more than sufficient. Why it is so hard on me? These things dragged me for another couple of days and weeks. Until, more often than not, it was the other person who made the first move and contacted me. When that happened, I would surely felt like an *ss, ashamed of myself.
It was like; the other person cares about you more than you cared about the person.
After these particular conversation ends, I kinda thought that, “If I let this always happens, then at one point, she would be bored with my lack of concern and lack of care, so why would she bothered anymore?”
Did you?
Hmmm…
That was a very long time ago. Things happened. It has to happen. Our Lord works in mysterious ways, so we have to believe in Him that the path He laid for us is the best, and should I keep myself from going astray from this path, then I will be fine.
Actually, I wasn’t going to talk about that as I’ve written it before. What I am going to write is the one I opened this entry up there, the weird-like feeling that I felt throughout last year and the need to get used to it.
I am fully aware that once people move to the next stage of their life and have certain responsibilities to take care of, some certain kind of limitation and restriction are imposed and immediately effective. I cannot simply knock on someone’s door and hoping they could open it and let me in, at least, not that easy. I do not intend to ‘menjaga tepi kain orang’, let alone to be accused of ‘mengganggu perihal rumahtangga orang’.
In fact, I think that my mind had built for me an ‘invisible wall’, impassable and unclimbable. It is a mental block, and I think this is far too excessive. There’s no need for this kind of wall to exist but then again, it does. I do not have any problems whatsoever with my other girl-friends’ (I mean, friends consist of girls larr) marriage. Of course, I didn’t disturb them either, because I have no reason to do so. But I don’t have any reason to disturb her as well! So this weird feeling shouldn’t exist in the first place!
I'm not sure why it is happening to me…hmmmm…actually, I do know why it is happening to me, just that I don’t know why it should be happening to me…I know she is well taken care of, be it from her husband, families and relatives, close friends, fellow staffmates and pupils, all covered. So for me to join in, it is just a little, speck of percentage which doesn’t add up anything significantly and possibly negligible, so it doesn’t matter anyway.
In the end, I think that the only realistic mode of communication left for me is this blog. Although it is only one-sided intercourse, and available openly for public, this is the only way I usually can freely write from the heart, and hoping the intended target will feel it the same as I do. I suck at heart-to-heart talk (because I’m shy, I stuttered sometimes and so the message sent isn’t really effective), but surely I have to get to that level somehow.
So here, I would like to wish a prosperous happy birthday to you, dear :). May God bless you with happiness and live cheerfully with those who loved you and those you loved.
Since I think I might not be able to write something like this every year, considered the above wish stays valid for next year, the year after that and many years to come, haha. So always watch this space.
PS - Sometimes, rereading those chat logs, e-mails and message archives would give me some pleasure and made me always think that these good moments will always be cherished for generations to come. I appreciate it much and glad that it happened. Quoting from an episode 12 of CSI: Miami, Season 5 “Internal Affairs”, during at the end when Natalia, while packing up her deceased husband stuffs and pictures, tells Horatio how her husband made her life like a ‘living hell’, Horatio, taking a picture frame from Natalia, tells her:
Take a look at that, Natalia-- some of it was good. Some of it was really incredible. So here's what we do. Let's hang on to that. Okay?
No, I’m not comparing the situations, it’s not the same. I’m merely showing the last line Mr. H tells Natalia that to keep appreciate those good memories forever, which is quite applicable here.
PS2 – This entry is supposed to be even longer. But since my aim is to increase my entry per month ratio, I divided into two parts. The other half is a different kind of story with contains only a bit reference of this entry. I’ll publish the other part sometime in coming weeks after a bit more touch up.
