Saturday, January 9, 2010

A One Third Life Crisis In a Pear Tree.

Blooooody hell. Last night I had the biggest urge to blog and rant while I was high but NO! Cannot! Blog had to be down. Must be a sign from Allah. Oops. I mean. God.

Happy new year all! :D

It feels weird being able to BE at home for such a long period of time. These past 3 week marks the longest stay I've had in Malaysia over the past year. When I was away for work it was mostly me, the four walls, cable tv, booze and the laptop. It was fun at first since it has been quite awhile since I have lived "alone". Not having to layan anyone but myself. Do whatever I want, whenever I want to. But the novelty and the sense of adventure wore off after 6 months and routine kicked in. Most of the time, there was so much work to do that I end up leaving the office late, only to continue with work at home with beer in hand - because there was just nothing else to do and nowhere else to go, without having to go through the trouble of wrestling my way out of a sea of people who have nothing else to do and nowhere else to go. The only things that kept my sanity in check were my friends, and well, would you like the guess the other thing? No prizes.

Last year will also be remembered as the year I drank the most beer in my entire life. *looks at belly*

Getting flabby now. Should start hitting the gym already. Not to lose weight, but just to get back that sense of fitness. Not getting younger. Even my mum's muscles are more toned than mine and she can carry more weights than me. A bit shameful lah, that's all I'm saying.

Okay. So now I'm back for good, I'm like a lost puppy.

WHAT THE HELL DO I DO?

I am so out of touch with everything it's not funny. Apperantly too many things have happened over the year. I'm out of touch with this community, my local friends, technology, hell I'm even out of touch with myself.

One really weird thing now is that I find it out that all my friends from this community are SO hooked up that every time they say/do/go/taste/smell/laugh/touch/see they update it on twitter first before anything else. -_- This phenomenon is really going to take a lot of getting used to.

So, I guess this year will the year where I jump start my own life. Get ME sorted out. Get up to speed with everything and as fast as possible.

Which brings me to something very dear to my heart.

One Third Life Crisis.

Look, it's not fair that 20 year olds and 40/50 year olds with a life/identity crisis get to have an official name for what they are going through. Sure, One Third is not as catchy as Quarter or Half, and will probably never catch on, but hey, 30 year olds with a life/identity crisis have rights just like any 20/40/50 with a life/identity crisis do and it therefore deserves a real name damnit.

I'm turning 30 this year. Oh my god (which just in case you didnt know when translated to BM means: Ya allah tuhanku).

The big Three! Oh!

The funny thing is that whenever someone I know frets about the number I'm always telling them that it's ONLY a number. But now when it has infected me I'm all - It's NOT JUST A FUCKING NUMBER. I'm sweating now Not because I have the urgency to get married tmrw and operate a baby making factory immediately.

I'm sweating now because I still have naught a major achievement to be proud of in the past decade of my life. Or perhaps my memory is so damn short now that I probably had quite a few but forgotten them all because too many brain cells drowned in booze. But I digress. The point is, if I don't remember, it didn't fucking happen. Haha.

Someone I look up to once asked me "you don't have really high ambitions do you?"

I'm not sure if I was supposed to feel insulted, but I wasn't. Because this person is right. By high ambitions, he probably meant that I didn't have that desire to climb the corporate ladder like an aggressive fire breathing dragon lady on crystal meth and having the desire to eventually take over the company and destroy a small country.. or something along those lines. Anyway, he was right. I don't. But that does not mean that I didn't have ambitions. It's just that my priorities in life were different.

Then he asked - what do I want?

I want to be happy.

Then he asked again - Yeah but what will make you happy?

I couldn't answer. Which then got me thinking - WHAT makes me happy? What were my priorities?

After nearly a year, I think I now have a vague idea. In no particular order:

1. My family. I want to spend more time with my nieces. My oh so damn cute can die got com nieces I can't get enough of. I want to be there with them every second they grow up. Make them laugh. Scold them when they are naughty. Buy them nice, pretty things. Watch them beat me at computer games. Take them out for their first beer when they are 18. Dispense auntie-ly advise to them whenever they seek it.

I want to be able take my family out for a holiday. Buy my parents a car. My little sister a car. Dispense big sisterly advise to my sis and brother whenever they seek it. Help out with brother's twins. Hang out with the sis-in-law. Treat the family to makans or a movie sometimes. Buy my sister nice things when I feel that she deserves it.

2. My friends. I want to have hang out with my friends more and get into all sorts of fun, stupid shit with them. Have tonnes more warm and fuzzy memories with them. Have stories about them to tell my grandchildren or at least, my nieces when they grow up. And even when we are all old and grey, still be able to have a beer at the pub, exchanging pictures stories of our grandchildren. When on my deathbed, I want to be able to reflect upon my life and say that I had been a good friend (even though forgetful and scatter brained), and was constantly surrounded with good friends and good times.

3. Myself. Start exercising again. Organise my bloody mess around the house. Start a working filing/action/scheduling system. Own a landed property with MY name on it. Get a bigger car. Go on that crazy backpack round the world trip. Start another blog which focuses on that one hobby and actually commit time and effort to come up with proper content. Update THIS blog a little more regularly because I still do ENJOY IT. Pick up a new hobby. Go for hip hop, belly dancing and pole dancing. GO dancing. Get married one day with someone who's better than me at life and madly in love with me. Have a couple of kids. Adopt a beagle. And if I don't get married, fine. I'll still have my nieces. And TWO dogs. And my own place.

Funny thing about my list is that work was nowhere in it. Yet somehow I'm spending MORE time on it then I pursue the things on my list. Plus I KNOW I don't want to eventually take over the company or anything like that. I just want to do something I enjoy doing, contribute my fair share, and work well with like-minded and awesome colleagues/employers who I actually like enough to want to have a drink with. Only a naive idiot don't know that work IS important. Because without work = no money = no means to hang out with friends or family or do things that make me happy. Also, because of my stupid sense of responsibility I would feel nothing short of guilty if I didn't make it a point to do a good job at my job. Besides, I enjoy it most times. It's not perfect, but I think I can safely say that I liked it much more than my previous jobs who close friends are aware how.... strongly I feel about those.

I want to do too many things, with too little time, and with not enough moolah to go around. That whole work hard play hard saying is easier said than put to practice.

I need to find a balance that works for me. But How. How? HOW? HOW???!?!?!?!

I haven't found the answer to that yet. Which is why I don't feel like I've achieved anything, I suppose. Hence, my one third life crisis.

Perhaps time will tell. I hope it doesn't take too long though. Because for some reason, I keep thinking that time's running out too quickly... and the answers are still nowhere in sight.

Meanwhile, I'll continue bumbling around, trying my best to make things work.

Well, it IS the new year. New decade. New ambition, perhaps. And hopefully new motivation.

So friends & family, please be patient.
This life is still under construction to serve you better.