Boxing Day 2005

"I screwed up. I wanted it so much that I screwed it up. I met the one person who although I do not know everything about, I knew enough to know that this was someone who I could spend the rest of my life with. Who I wanted to spend the rest of my life with. And now he is gone. And as much as I mourn his loss, what I mourn more is the future. The fact that it will be exceedingly difficult to reach the new bar that has been raised. And I well up at the thought of that. And I ache from the fact that I can’t make things right again. I wanted him to get to know me the way I instinctively feel I know him. I am impatient and that drove him away. I just miss him so much. And I am too afraid to admit it to him for fear that it will drive him away further. I meet new people and I find them interesting, then I sit back and look at how they match with my ideals and it’s not enough. If I cant judge someone by who they are then there is no hope for my heart to find someone new to love. Am I in love with an idea? Perhaps and it's likely that I will live with this loss for a while to come. "

Now when I look back at what I wrote a mere 4 months ago - Such despair, such pain, longing, seeking solace and comfort. How twisted this world can be when we try to make ourselves happy. Some people take a lifetime to fall in love, and others take mere moments. I have always been the type to give each relationship every drop of effort I can muster. I try not to let the hurt, and betrayal of previous encounters to stop me from giving it all I’ve got. Otherwise I would live to regret all the what if's. But even then it seems to have failed. Even when I give without asking, or ask when I am not receiving, it doesn't seem to be enough. Or perhaps it is just too much.

My parents want me to get into an arranged marriage. Marry one of our kind according to our prehistoric traditions of meeting them with their parents and deciding after 2 hours if you want to see them chaperoned again and then deciding after two weeks of such chaperoned visits if we would like to spend the rest of our lives with each other. Preposterous I say, yet it has worked for many. There is one reason for this; they are a lot more adaptable to the situation.

So I’m demanding - big deal. I know I want to be with someone who is in love with me and who I'm in love with. I want to marry someone I can be great friends with and with whom, 40 years down the line when I have lost all sexual appeal, still wants to wake up next to me each morning and can’t wait to spend time together.

Ironically I thought I had found him. Not only was he the same caste and religion, he had a job that inspired me to be a better person. He had an outlook that motivated me and made me look at myself and feel wonderful. He would look into my eyes and tell me I was beautiful even though I was in my frumpiest clothes. I had fallen in love with the idea of him.

we spent a glorious week doing everything we both loved, food, sunshine, driving, sleeping, watching movies, massaging, arguing and plain sitting about doing absolutely nothing. I came back home longing for when I could see him next. I hadn’t been so happy in such a long time. This happiness came with a sense of freedom, knowing he would be accepted by my parents, and that I wouldn't need to hide it like every other relationship I have had.

I didn't see the dark storm looming ahead. I was too caught up in how happy I was to see the devastation that was due in my direction.

The horoscopes didn’t match. It said he would always have other women whilst he was with me and that he would leave me in 2010 for another woman. I was devastated. Not by the results of some goddamned soothsayer! But devastated that my parents turned around and used this ridiculous piece of rubbish as a reason to say I could not continue with this courtship. Couldn’t continue to see if this was the person I wanted to spend the rest of my life with!

I turned to him for comfort but he must have been equally bothered in his own way and I turned emotionally destructive. I do not know how but he felt like he was slipping away and there was nothing I could do about it. And soon enough he was gone. I had to let go, I couldn’t make someone stay when they clearly didn’t want to.

It hurt, hurt because I didn’t think I would find someone who I could care about from my own community. It shook me to find someone I could consider a soul mate and it became increasingly difficult to see things in a different light. Colours dimmed and happiness fled. Elusive to my grasp. I spent a great deal of time alone, trying to heal. Wanting to see him and wanting more. But he had moved on and I was struggling to do so.

I didn’t tell him. I didn’t tell him cos I didn’t want him to think he meant that much to me. So why is it that now I am able to share what I had so preciously locked away? I grew tired of showing I cared. I grew tired of giving and not even getting an inkling of appreciation in return. I was tired of being the Giver.

It was such a simple thing that made me break. I had left my laptop on just by my bed and at 1 a.m. the annoying thing made a racket. I got up only to find an email from him saying he had been ill. I still liked him, but either way I cared. So I got up got the phone and called him. He didn’t answer. I emailed him back asking him to pick up the phone. He replied saying he had left it at the hospital and it was probably for the best given that he needed to be productive having been ill all this while.

I was furious. I was just trying to be nice. I had woken up on a weekday night and wanted to just see if he was ok and to give some form of comfort. I had it thrown back in my face and made to feel like I was time consuming and unappreciated. I was calling from a different country, an overseas call. It may not be expensive but it takes effort. I made the effort. And for what? Nothing.

And so the painful reality that I meant absolutely nothing anymore hit home. Hard. And I so I let go. Of all emotions of wanting anything more with someone who does not care. And yet on top of my dresser sits his birthday gift, that I lovingly hunted for for days until I found the perfect one.

Will he ever turn up to collect it? Will I want him to have it? Who knows...? I’ll leave the future for the future to unfold, and not it in the hands of a soothsayer...

It's better to have loved and lost than to have never loved at all

I had a crush on this guy four years ago. I used to try and spend time with him, and get insanely jealous when he gave other girls attention and showed a tendency to like them. It was silly really. He had no clue I liked him. Well he thought I was cheeky and funny. Am sure he must have had some inclination. I was 22, and I was such a kid. I left chocolate and a cheesy handmade card outside his door, knocked on it and ran away! He knew it was me and teases me mercilessly about it till today.

I got a bit bolder and gave him a box of mint chocolates for Christmas. A gesture that he returned in kind after the holidays :) And for some reason I decided he wasn't responding to me and backed away. We remained friends, had meals in halls often and hung out, but I kept my emotions aside.

Last week I went to visit him along with another mutual friend. I was my same cheeky self with the same crush, if not bigger. And I learned he hated mint chocolates! Oh dear :) Well all teasing was taken in jest and he was lucky that we got him a box of assorted chocolates instead.

The gorgeous woman he is in love with for three years wants different things in life, leaving him single. I felt such a connection to him this time it scared me. I was afraid to get to know him better. Afraid that if I did so, my crush would turn into something deeper that would sweep me away. And so I balanced at the edge of falling.

I flirted with him shamelessly and he took it all with such good grace and never once made me feel like the idiot I am. He is the sweetest person I know and how I wish I could have stayed and shared my life with him.

On the final night of our stay we spoke about taking chances and opportunities and risks. He told me I should take the chances. Take them as they come so that I find the right person. I didn't know if this was an invitation or not. I wish I had had the privacy to get into a deeper conversation.

And so I gathered my courage, 4 hours before I was due to leave I sent him a text message: I'm going to be cheeky and ask you this; will you meet me on the balcony for a goodnight kiss? if yes, text back, if not, at least I took a chance :)

He texted back.

It was slight windy on the unlit balcony. I stepped out into the crisp air and waited for the adjoining door to slide open. I could hear my heart beating and feel my pulse in my ears! The door slid open and his tall slim figure slid out silently, he shut the door, never taking his eyes off me. As he walked towards me he said, you really are a cheeky girl.

I put my arms around his neck, and drew myself up towards him. Yes I am I said and I felt his lips on mine. I could sense his hands soothing my back, and can only remember how familiar it all seemed. Like meeting and old lover and reliving a long burning romance.

When the kiss ended and I headed back to my room, I felt complete. I felt the closure of the crush and the longing to let myself free-fall over that edge. Instead I got on that plane, and flew home, leaving this love for another time...another life....

I used to try and keep a journal. It didn't last very long. I was too afraid someone would read it. When things are written down they are held against you. A rather simplistic thought one would say but there's a lot more to it.

Right now I am just trying to avoid writing my report its due tomorrow and I should get on with it. I should stop being afraid that it wont be good enough and stop worrying about it. I need to get up and deal with it. But before I do that I need to make a difference with my life. How is blogging going to help? Well perhaps the fact that no one actually knows who I am here will help. I can just write my random thoughts down and have a place for them to exist.

There have been so many times where I thought, my life so far would make a great book. But then there's the problem that involves writing it. I can think it out aloud in my head but rarely ever make the effort to put it down on paper.

So what's so horrible about my life that I feel so miserable? I just feel disconnected and aimless. I sometimes just want to hide here and do absolutely nothing but then he bills wouldn't get paid. My job used to make me want to go to work each day. Now its a hassle a chore and maybe I should just get married and quit working the way my parents want me to. My problem is the fact that I am lazy and cannot be bothered.

I'm not particularly old but in the community I was brought up in, I am pretty much a spinster right now. Younger cousins are married and have kids and I cant even keep a boyfriend. I am so emotionally scarred by the pressures of my society that I look for a long term relationship but tend to overwhelm anyone who likes me even a bit. I get the same you are a great pretty girl but I don't see a future for us being together I just want your company and some fun.

I feel so tired. tired of having to go through each day and see people happy together and wonder why it is that when I want to give and share there isn't someone who wants that as well.

My biological clock is going tick tick tick yet its not children that I want its not a family that I yearn for. Its the warmth of that other person when you snuggle up and watch crappy TV, and that warm comforting feeling as you wake up next to them each morning.

Right that's enough procrastinating, time to get back to that report and finish writing it.....