Friends we don't see enough...

Now Playing: For Good - Wicked Soundtrack

Days been pretty jammed recently… sometimes I wonder if I’m pushing myself too much… Dad commented that I’m out till late almost every night and he doesn’t know how I get the energy to get up every morning at six… (although I admit that the morning hour of 6am is the lowest point of my life every weekday).

Work is piling up, more often than not as my papers have come in and the annual holistic report is due… I’m really lucky in the sense that as I’m teaching translation, I only teach two hcl classes and therefore has a smaller marking load than other teachers. My co-form is a dear and takes half of the holistic report workload off me too…but the papers remain piled and don’t seem to lessen… Also been informed that I’m down for O level markings… which extends my marking season till end of Nov… already anticipating the brain-dead-ness…

Recently met an old friend by accident while going for my jazz class at Capital Towers… didn’t know that she actually works at Capital Towers and already has for two years… Managed to squeeze in an hour on Friday for a chat over coffee… Somehow this reminds me of how I’m not meeting up with my old friends… I do see Lin every now and then (more then than now) and I see Xuan for dance every week… but otherwise… all my dear friends, JX, Shimei, Zai, Jia and more… Friends that watched me grow and whom I grew up with… friends that have seen me at my best and my worst and know me inside out… I haven’t seen them for ages and when I do it’s usually once a year. It used to be because they were overseas and I was overseas (or as in Zai’s case, she’s still overseas)… but now we are all on this small little island and we still see each other about once a year… even if Jia stays 10 minutes away!

What is it about human beings that we take such things for granted?

During the chat with Xiao Gua on Fri… I discovered that she’s actually leaving for China next year… and that made me resolve to see her more often. We met last year for her birthday and it’s been almost a year since. Somehow it made me question myself, does it have to take the fact that she’s leaving to wake me up? If she isn’t leaving, when will I take the initiative to meet her again?

I used to pride myself on keeping in touch with my friends. Somehow, the ability slipped away as I started work and various other commitments like salsa and gym. And because all of us is so busy and it takes ages to plan a meet (it took JX and me a month to find a time to meet up for a birthday), sometimes I don’t even bother to make calls when I want to watch plays… I usually just go with my mom or myself. Only to find out that my friends usually do want to watch too… (Yea, Gab, this means you. I’m confessing here).

Time… everything boils down to time… With dance lessons 4 nights a week and gym at least 3 times a week and usually a play or a seminar or some other commitment on the other night and catching up on my work on Sundays… I’m usually rushing here and there with barely enough time for a meal in between sometimes…

But is it worth it? I know I’m doing what I want to do…and I really do enjoy everything I’m doing… I’m making friends through salsa and dance… but is it really worth it?

Nothing will ever replace my friends… people that really know me and still accept me for who I am… and somehow that never changes… when I talked to xiao gua on Friday… it was like the year in between with no contact never happened… we knew what each other was talking about and we could talk about everything, from life plans and worries to yoga classes… we could pick up the unvoiced nuances in what each other said... that kind of comfort only comes from shared history and friendship… and I wouldn’t want to give that up for anything…

But I do fear that I take it for granted… I know my friends wouldn’t change… oh, we will grow and mature… but who we are inside, that wouldn’t change…and our friendship wouldn’t change… but circumstances do… and I’m just not seeing my friends enough…

And I don’t ever want my friends to think that I do not appreciate them because I do… we have shared so much together over the years and nothing would ever take it away and its priceless… and I want to see them more often… not just the once a year for birthdays and before either of us go overseas… but regularly as we used to back in uni and school… I want to be able to talk about our troubles and to share our happiness and to know what’s going on in their lives…I want that closeness that we used to share on a daily basis…these people are more than friends to me…

But will it happen? Will be meeting up with Jia for her birthday and Fen in October… been making plans to meet up with Gab for Happy (a date that has yet to materialize)…but its all not enough….somehow…