Why Do You Have to Grow Up So Fast, Baby Girl?

She has been watching me drive for the past 2 weeks. Been asking how to switch between the gears, even asked what she has to do with her feet at the pedals.

When I asked her why, she said she will drive me around instead when she's big enough.

Tight thugs at my heart hearing that. So much love and responsibility coming from a small body.
What did I do to deserve this much love?

Yesterday, she asked again.

But this time, it's how to stop the car. She asked if I used my right leg to step on the pedal to put on the brakes. Such observation. I nodded, felt the hard thug again, looked into the big brown eyes and smiled. My baby girl has such a big heart, and I feel so undeserving to even take up a small part in it. She smiled back, and turned her head to look at the road as if feeling very proud of herself for getting it right.

Why do you have to grow up so fast, baby girl?

I was holding you in my arms some near 5 years ago and now all you're thinking is driving me around in return.

It was like yesterday that you learnt your first word. It was like yesterday you crawled to get to me. It was like yesterday that you grew your very first tooth.

And when I woke up this morning, you can sing almost every latest song on the radio. You walk, you run, you dance shamelessly in public, enjoying life as how we adults fail to.

And one day I know, oh I so know, baby girl, I will wake up on your wedding day, wishing that you are still the baby girl I hold so tight when my heart hurts.

And I know that on that day, I could hear your sweet little voice singing soft lullabies to your bears. I'd see your wicked smile, looking all charming to get something of your wants. I'd feel your small hands grabbing me by the arms, hugging me from the back, holding my hand just because.

And I know, baby girl, I will miss your fluttering kisses you'd give me at the school gate and the hidden waves you throw when I drive off.

Why do you have to grow up so fast, baby girl? Mama can't catch up with you.

Do You Have a Shadow Following You?

Do you have a shadow?

One that follows you around, putting you all in guilt all the time?

Because you know that you shouldn't have done it, but you did anyway?

Like whispering a bestfriend's secret to someone who shouldn't know about it, or like badmouthing a colleague yet pretending to be a buddy?

*GRIN*

Yeah, I know you do.

Doesn't it make you sick worrying if the person you whispered the hot gossip to actually confront and tell that person that it was you who spilled the bean? Doesn't it haunt you to death that actually your exact words would come to the ears of the one you badmouthed so badly? Doesn't it make you wonder how tomorrow will be like when you have to face that person you gossipped?

Well, enough with the worrying already!

If you are afraid of being confronted with your own words, then quit gossipping. Or if you still want to be the Daily 10, then face up to the fact that you may be used against your own words.

Eliminate hypocrisy in your dictionary. If you don't like anything about a person, tell it straight. Why must you make yourself look good and spread the wildfire? Why must you create a shadow that may follow you around and make you restless all the time?

And the worse thing is, with the shadow hanging by your toes, it makes you think that others are doing the same to you!

So do me a favor, quit it already, ok? Don't make me feel like I'm on top of the world laughing at you.

Though it does feel nice knowing that I am a better person than you are.

:)

No Idea...

The big word for tonight is 'responsibility'.

A friend wrote on his Facebook status that he was on half day leave to care for his wife who was feeling unwell. Regardless of praises by his female friends, he just said that it's his responsibility. But women don't see it that way. It's not a responsibility; it's what you'd want to do for someone you love. It's what you want to sacrifice, knowing that your presence is very much appreciated in times of uncontrollable shivers and splitting headache. It's not responsibility, it's love.

Responsibility is something you have to do, you are obliged to do, in the capacity that you can do.

Responsibility is something that you have to do, no matter the degree of you liking it or hating it.

And responsibility is the one word abundance in my life.

Less one - towards myself.

I never tended to my soul, I never cared for my skin, I never cared if my beautiful eyes have dark bags hanging from them.

I fail to be responsible for myself, when I very much try so hard to fulfill responsibilities put upon me.

My responsibilities are like the IN tray, with none ever making it out. They seem to keep piling one upon another. They add weight to the shoulders; they draw more lines to the face.

With no one even bothered to understand, let alone offer a helping hand or two, things seem to be too heavy to carry on this fragile frame.

And after all these years of carrying responsibilities on my own, I can't help but feel deeply hurt that I am accused of slacking my responsibilities, just because I'm fulfilling responsibilities to my own body and soul.

Is it not enough that I sacrificed? That I tried my best to run the show all by myself?

That I have left my soul to wilt so that I can have other souls to green?

That I let those beautiful smiles I once had slowly turn into forced grin?

Am I not responsible to turn myself back to who I was before?

So, let me be.

It's not that I neglect my IN tray. It's not that I slack my routine.

I just want to be the one responsible for me.

Oh, Malunyerrr...

"I turn my head to the east, I don't see nobody by my side,
I turn my head to the west, still nobody in sight,
So I turn my head to the north, swallow that pill that they call pride,
That old me's dead and gone, but the new me'll be alright.."

My favorite part of my favorite song during every 4.5.

Every time this part comes, I'll be singing it out loud, as if to release all burdens from my shoulders.

I always make sure that no one is behind me, in front of me, or that I'm walking past a house with its owner out gardening.

But one day, I kantoi...

I was belching the words out, relieving all of the day's tensions, putting much passion into every word of the chorus when... a makcik holding orange plastic bags stood staring at me on her front porch. She had the look of curiosity on her face, no impending smile, more like disbelief. It was as if I was yelling for help or something.

As I drew an apologetic smile, her daughter emerged out of nowhere with the look of dismay. Oh goodness! Was I THAT loud?

I kept the apologetic smile (more like a smirk, I'd say) on my face for a while, shut my eyes as I passed both irritated mother and daughter and increased my speed.

Tebal giler rasa kulit muka... felt like burying my head in the sand like ostriches do.

But will I quit singing out loud during my 4.5? Naaaaah.... Try hover around Taman Melawati weekday evenings - you'd probably catch me doing Jai-Ho on an empty Jalan Melawati 2!!

:D

P/S: Jokes aside, ostriches don't actually hide their heads in the sand... I checked Wikipedia on that already. :P

A True Altruism

I passed a fellow jogger who slowed down his pace as he was approaching one of the roundabout's turning. He waited for a car to pass by. He seemed as if he wanted to cross the road. After a few steps, I took a swift turn of my head to see what he was doing. He was picking up a significantly-lengthed narrow piece of wood that was lying on the road, took it to the roadside, and left it on the grass. I managed to throw him a big grin, a sign that actually meant "Bravo" more than anything else.

Altruism. A word I hardly grasp the first time I learnt it in PPP.

Until now, I can only imagine altruism in masses - people helping someone in need, say, like helping accident victims.

But today I realized that that fellow jogger was committing altruism - an act of unselfish regard for or devotion to the welfare of others - without actually needing anyone to know what he did.

He had picked up the piece of wood from the road so that no motorist could run over it or get hurt by it. He picked it up because he knew it would cause danger to people who are strangers to him. But these strangers need not know that he had actually saved them. He needn't have the whole Melawati population know that he has done a good deed. He couldn't care if I didn't write about him.

Such noble thing. A true altruism indeed.

:)