Another Life Gone + Friendship

Been busy with stuff and work, so haven't had time/energy to blog or blog-hop. Just found out that my eldest cousin from mom's side passed away a few days ago at the age of 59 (my mom's the youngest of six and she got married late, thus the big age gap between me and this cousin). He left a wife and three children, the youngest of which had autism. I hope his wife can get all the help that she can to raise three children. Rest in peace, my cousin...and may God help your family! 

I was never close to this particular cousin because he was way older than me and we rarely met and talked to each other, but my mom used to babysit him and during the last few years, she's been close to him and his family. 


I've also heard lots of birth announcements this month in FB, so it's like a full circle of life...death announcements and birth announcements. Just imagine that somewhere in the world is grieving, whereas another one is rejoicing...someone is dying, another one is about to be born...

I went to my friend's husband funeral with another friend. It was a beautiful tribute, a celebration of life. During the car trip my friend and I talked about many different things, including friendship. What makes two people become friends? A common interest or a shared bond/role can help, but if the friendship doesn't develop any further than that, then it won't grow at all. You'll only get stuck at interacting at a certain level only.

This topic reminds me of a remark an emailpal once said to us when he met me and my friends. He said that we were all different, but yet we remained good friends. I think it's possible for different people to be friends as long as they're interested in each other's lives and they're investing (some time) into each other's lives. After all, one of the most beautiful qualities of true friendship is to understand and to be understood (Seneca). 

I must admit that in the past I used to hold my friends (those closest to me) with a tight grip. Baaaddd idea! These days I've learnt to hold them with a gentle grip, cherishing the moment that they've spent with me, but I'm more ready to let them go.


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Letters and Friendships

Writing has been a part of my life since I was young. I remember exchanging letters at fourth grade with my best friend who was moved to the next classroom (we had been in the same classroom since kindergarten). Luckily for me at that time her aunt and my mom picked us up from school, so we could exchanged letters through them. I don't remember how long this letter exchange lasted, though, because I didn't keep the letters.

This habit continued until my uni days. For some weird reason I always found at least one person to exchange letters with. There were two girls in Junior High (one in second grade, another one in third grade). Then the one in third grade kept exchanging letters with me when I went to High School and she went to a vocational school that started right after I finished my classes, so when she came to school and I was going home from school, we had time to exchange the letters. :-D

At uni I also found a friend who exchanged similar letters with me. I think we mostly talked about boys, love life, and also life in general. It was easier to share our innermost desires, thoughts, and feelings through writing sometimes instead of talking face-to-face, especially for tough subjects. These three girls had a habit of folding the letters into an origami form, so I followed suit. :-D I kept the letters until I moved to Finland and then my mom wanted to clear up some space, so she asked me if she could burn them. Gone with the wind, but the memories are in my head. :-D


In High School I also started looking for penpals from abroad because I wanted to practise writing English. One funny thing happened when I wrote a snail mail to one boy, but never received a reply. Years later we found each other through an emailpal club (though I didn't realize it at that time) and he recognized my name and he mentioned receiving my first snail mail, which he replied, but he never received any reply. I told him that I had never received his reply. Yeah, Indonesian postal service can't be fully trusted! Three years ago when we went to Indo for a holiday, we sent at least a dozen postcards for our friends and family here, but they never arrived. Never going to send anymore postcards from Indo! Ah, but I digress...let's go back to the topic, shall we? LOL!!!

Halfway through university, internet started booming in Indonesia (the very slow one that had to connect very loudly to the modem like in the movie "You've Got Mail"), so I started finding emailpals through emailpal clubs (that was also how I found my hubby, though I wasn't exactly searching for one by going to emailpal clubs). 

I had a bunch of emailpals from many different countries, but many of them have stopped writing or communicating with me. I found one of them a few years back and we got in touch through FB. I'm still in touch through FB with the girl from the third grade of Junior High and the one from uni every now and then, though. 

Did you have any snail mail pals (assuming you're old enough to have lived in pre-internet days)?


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Do You Get Tired? Part Two

I've had a jumble of messy thoughts after writing my post yesterday. I feel that I was too generic in writing that post yesterday and let me try to untangle some of my thoughts, which would be too long to write in the comment section (though I did try to write some of them already).

OK, first of all I think blogging is a different platform altogether. I write for myself and my audience in my blogs (depending on the topic, sometimes it's more for the audience, sometimes it's more for me, sometimes it's 50-50) and because I don't allow anonymous commenters anymore, I find that those who do comment mostly do want to say something to me about my post or they want to build a connection or they feel that they can relate to my post or something like that.

Facebook is a different platform altogether. What I find to be tiring about Facebook is also because of my fault, I suppose. I have a jumble of different people in my Facebook friends' list, but I don't want to bother separating them 'coz then I'll have more accounts to take care of. Back in the beginning before I was active at all in Facebook, I didn't really know "that world". Now I have semi strangers in my blog as well as close friends and relatives and ex school friends, blogging friends and those in between (friends of friends).



 


Here are some things that I find tiring about Facebook in a nutshell (let me try to remember my thoughts from last night):

1. Facebook resembles so much like the real world in a twisted way.

So much like the real world, because unlike blogging where some people use pseudonyms, they mostly use their real names. And the interaction happens in a much faster speed. Twisted because you can be half a world apart from the other person, yet you can still feel things just like the feeling you may get from a face-to-face conversation.

An easy example: I once commented on someone's photo, and the person's response struck the wrong chord in myself. While reading the response, I got so angry and upset that I just wanted to lash out at that person. My initial reaction was to "slap back" (for lack of a better phrase). Thankfully I managed to calm myself down before typing down and publishing something I'd regret, withdrew myself from my computer, and did other things to calm myself down. Only after I did that then I replied to that person in a more civilised manner. That, I suppose, is a good thing about an online platform compared to the real world - it's easier to just withdraw and take a step back before reacting (in the real world this may be more tricky to do).

I've also felt a few times when someone comments on my posts, "Oh no...not again!" because the person is the kind that pushes my button, but once that person comments on any of my posts, it's "rude" if I don't respond back (especially if then I do respond to other commenters after and before that one).

I know that whatever I write can be subjected to any interpretation by anyone and that anyone is free to speak up their minds, but still it does resemble real life in a way. Sometimes you just want to get away from all of those feelings and people. But the problem with deactivating a platform like Facebook is that I feel that I'll "be left behind" because there are people in the site whose lives matter to me, whose photos I want to see, who I really want to connect regularly, whose interests match mine, etc. etc. etc. 

2. And because so many people are active in that platform, I feel that it's getting harder and harder to just disconnect there. And that's also one source of the fatigue. 

The feeling of not wanting to miss important things, but then again I do need to disconnect completely sometimes...but disconnecting completely means that when I get back online again there'll be so much to sift through in order to find out which is more important and which is not...

3. Due to the nature of a platform like Facebook, I feel that the temptation to show off is much greater than in blogging for example. Because I blog also for myself, I don't necessarily feel the need to show off because I mostly want to write down a kind of journal for myself - which I hope will entertain people or will help people connect with me or will help people learn from my mistakes, etc. 

However, in Facebook, many times when I want to post something, I have to think twice, "Am I posting this to share or to show off?" This is especially true for holiday pictures, but this doesn't cover all of the issues that may make me feel this way. For holiday pictures, I've resorted to sharing them with only a certain group of people.

4. Another part of the problem I experience with this kind of platform I've written down in the other post (and in the comment section): about wondering whether or not to comment, about the feeling of voyeurism (funnily enough I don't really feel this way with blogging - maybe because in Facebook there is a bigger opportunity to really check out those people whom I may know by name already in real life and that takes it to a whole different level), about whether my silence is better than saying anything (because a silence can also be deadly), etc.

Additional reason (added on Jan 17, 2013): I also feel that it's hard to control what you see in Facebook. Even though you can limit what you see in your Newsfeed, if your friend posts something that you don't really want to see, you're bound to glimpse through it and when it's something disturbing, then I feel disturbed and it doesn't really help me calm my inner world. 





Another part of the fatigue is due to a different platform. I've written about Whatsapp application before in this post: Whaddup. Anyway, that kind of platform allows you to chat with anyone in your guestbook (or phonebook) constantly if you're both online 24/7 with your mobile phone or iphone or smartphone. A few close friends have started using WhatsApp application to chat with one another and I did try it using the free version for PC during its trial period.

What made me tired was the thought of more and more people interacting this way - through that kind of platform and that, again, makes me feel left behind. I don't care about people I don't know, but I do feel left behind when it comes to my close friends, because you don't exactly "chat" that way via emails. When people use WhatsApp application, they can chat with one another during their breaks or when they're on the way to a place or when they're waiting for an appointment or whenever. In emails, you formulate your ideas in a more controlled manner, but when you're chatting with people live, you can talk about ANYTHING at all that comes in your mind. And it's hard to transfer that kind of chat file to an email-based world. And when you're not connected to them in that way, it feels as though they've gone for a quick coffee break to have fun without you.

Connecting through that kind of platform is VERY tiring because of time difference among other things. I go to sleep and when I wake up, I can see that some of them have left hundreds of messages already and I need to sift through the messages to find out if there's anything I need to respond to - but still even if I do respond to some of the (already old) messages, I feel that the conversation has moved on already. This is something new that feels weird for me and I don't necessarily like the feeling.

When you're on a holiday for a few weeks and you don't check your mailbox for a while and realize that your close friends have written dozens of emails, you feel overwhelmed in a way, but at least with emails it's (for me personally) still easier to catch up on because it's more structured so to speak. When it comes to following old chat messages (even if it's just a few hours old), it just feels so random, fragmented, confusing, and daunting.

So all of the above contribute to my feeling tired about this online world because I have to set my boundaries, but in a way I also don't want to "lose the connection" (especially with those I care about) by setting too tight boundaries/limits, but it gets harder to sift through the mess. OK, I think I've said what I really want to say, so enough about this for now.

Bad Influence?

In my lifetime, I know at least two mothers who have ever deemed me as a bad influence for their daughters. Of course they didn't tell me directly, but I found out anyway. The first time I found out from another friend. This particular mother was angry at her daughter for keeping secrets from her, but she blamed me instead. She told a mutual friend of ours that my parents must've brought me up badly 'coz I became such a bad influence to her daughter.

I was shocked, but I just laughed it off. Although I have influenced her daughter in some ways, but I know why she was keeping secrets from her mother. Is it 100% my fault then that she did it 'coz she wanted to have her privacy intact? 'Coz she didn't want her mother to interfere or yap at her? The mother probably thought that the daughter told me everything, but it wasn't true. I was also rather disappointed at that time that she kept some things from me, but it was her right. If she wasn't ready to tell me, then I couldn't do anything about it.

At that time she was working in another city and she came back to her hometown and spent some days at her friend's house without telling her mother (and she didn't tell me, either). Unfortunately a distant relative met her in a public place and told her mother and the mother even called me to ask if I knew about it (she was raging with fury when she called me). The mother probably thought that I had conspired with my friend to keep it a secret, though I only found out about it after she had called me.

I guess it was "logical" why her mother was upset (though the reason why she had said that my parents must've brought me up badly was due to a different reason), but in a way I couldn't help thinking that if the mother was easier to talk to and to be open to, my friend probably wouldn't have done what she had done.

The second time it happened, another friend of mine was in a long-distance relationship with a guy and the mother wanted to break it off. She stated a reason why. She said, "How can you know for sure that he's not fooling around with some other girl in his city? Is there any guarantee that the relationship will work out? Do you even know any long-distance relationship that works out?" And my friend told me that my long-distance relationship with R2 did work out. And because of that, the mother thought I was a bad influence, especially 'coz she had been telling me everything about their long-distance relationship and I had been supporting it.

She did tell me about the relationship 'coz she wanted to know how R2 and I managed to work it out. But the mother disapproved of it and finally forced her to break it off. She was even forced to burn out all the pictures of them together. And during that time when she had the relationship, whenever I called, the mother or the other family members would be listening close by for fear that I'd be giving her more bad influence. At that time I decided not to call her anymore so that she wouldn't be more oppressed.

(Side note: Don't worry about this second friend. She did have a hard time breaking up with that guy, but she's OK now. She's over it.)

Has anyone of you ever been accused of being a bad influence behind your back? Just curious he he...

3BT: Random Days

1. How I've found wonderful human beings through the internet and the blogosphere to share my ups and downs, to support and encourage and understand me. I would never have made it without all of you people.

2. When I've been whiny and annoying (even in my own ears/mind), yet hubby still tells me, "I love you anyway, honey." That is one of the most beautiful things I've ever heard in my life.

3. Watching autumn colours, especially the red colour (my fave autumn colour) surrounding me...and noticing a squirrel running about cautiously in our yard.



4. Hubby let me eat the last cup of chocolate pudding. (FYI: I bought 4 cups and ate 2 cups, but when the last cup was still in the fridge, I asked hubby if he wanted it or not and he said, "Nah, you can have it 'coz you like it so much.")

5. Getting a permanent part-time job contract means that I had some spare money to buy some things for my in-laws - I bought FIL a warm jacket (with fleece lining inside) and a pair of warm socks for MIL when I visited them the other day and they were happy to get them. ;-D

6. Meeting new foreigners in this small village on my Finnish course and laughing with them when we talked about different topics. In a small village where foreigners are rare, it's always a PLEASURE to meet fellow "comrades-in-arms".

7. Looking back over the past and realizing that God's closed doors led me to this job. If there hadn't been those closed doors, I wouldn't have ended up here. THANK GOD for His closed doors, even though at that time I felt sad and dejected (esp. when I couldn't continue at the daycare) and I didn't understand why they were there.


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8. Having a hubby who knows how to do coining (scraping my back with a coin and some balm). It's VERY VERY beneficial for me 'coz I do need his help sometimes in this area.

9. Living in a small village where there's no traffic jam, less noise, no long queues at the supermarkets/stores, where I can be close to nature.

10. Meeting friendly, warm, patient customers. They're the highlight of my day at work.

Boundaries

A friend of mine told me about her current problem in life. She met this woman at her son's school, but this woman clings to her like a magnet. She calls my friend over 15 times A DAY and sends her plenty of messages. She wants to be with my friend as much as possible, though she herself has a husband and a child. My friend becomes a bit spooked by this, so she tries to avoid her as much as she can BUT she can't help feeling that she's such a cruel person.

I told her that the woman had overstepped my friend's boundaries. I then asked if this woman's messages were important or urgent and my friend said no. I then said this, "If she's not in dire need for help and the message isn't all that important or urgent, then it's fine to ignore it or just reply later." After all, it costs money to reply to SMSes and if she sends my friend so many SMSes a day, then it's just crazy. Plus a housewife like my friend who also needs to take care of her parents' store as well as help take care of her sick father doesn't have time to answer every time that woman calls her.

In the beginning she did answer every one of her calls, though after a while she realized that it just wouldn't do, so she began to ignore her calls. It's kinda hard to make someone like this woman to understand that there are certain boundaries that she should know. Maybe she doesn't have any other friends and that's sad, but that doesn't mean she can bombard my friend like that. She even wants to spend a night at my friend's house, can you believe it? I mean, she's got her own house, her own husband, and her own child!!! And it's not as though my friend ASKED her to spend a night at her place...that woman just said to my friend that she wanted to do so!



Anyway...have you ever encountered someone like that - someone who oversteps your boundaries? What did you tell him/her then? Or did you just try to avoid that person as much as you can 'coz telling that person the truth would sound too cruel?

I remember when I first moved to Indo, I also overstepped my friends' boundaries by clinging onto them too much. At that time I didn't have friends here yet, so I bombarded my friends with emails - LONG, frequent emails and one of them had enough guts to tell me about it ('coz in a way it also made her feel guilty for not being able to reply to my many emails). It hurt me at that time, but it was the right thing to do and I TOTALLY appreciate her openness to me 'coz it made me realize I couldn't "put my eggs in one basket" so to speak. I needed to widen my sphere of friendship and blogging has helped me A LOT in that department. Without you all my blogging friends, I wouldn't have made it. So, CHEERS for you all, my beloved blogging friends! ;-D


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Here's to Friendship!

Today I got an SMS from Mom, saying that two of my best friends had just visited my parents. One of them is a doctor (click the link to read her blog) and her husband is also a doctor. All three of them came to visit my parents 'coz they knew my Dad had just had that little accident. My friend's husband told my parents that if something happened, they could call him to get some advice or help.

I can't describe how touched I am having such great, thoughtful, caring friends (the kind of friends I trust with my life). There were never any back stabbing among us...though of course sometimes a misunderstanding happens, but still we've been sharing all the good and bad times together for years and years...I don't know what I'll become without them.

So today, in honour of my wonderful friends, I'd love to say CHEERS TO FRIENDSHIP!!! :-D :-D :-D

I've also met so many thoughtful, supportive, positive blogger friends who have been there for me through my good and bad times. Life is much more beautiful when you're surrounded by friends, especially those you can trust.

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Here's a classic friendship song that I'm sure everybody knows...

Interesting Input

Remember my post entitled "He Listens"? Shan made an interesting input in the comment section. It made me wonder about men in general, but most especially about my own husband's view about it. I hope you don't mind about this, Shan. If you do, I can always delete this post later on ha ha ha...

Let me quote it here:

You know, I really hate to be the one that stands out from the crowd...

But the first thing that came to my mind after reading your post was something bad...

Maybe it's just me but they say the higher you are, the greater your fall is...

Men are a shallow species, believe me I know. Your treatment of your husband makes me feel that he is almost a God to you. That in many ways is very good because you will boost his ego and allow him to feel strong and secure.

Yet on another hand, it would be wise to perhaps stop what you are doing as we men get bored when there are no intrigue in our life. They say, women gives themselves up after marriage and that contributes to the break up of many happy marriages...

So, I feel that you should pull back a bit and perhaps give him a bit of intrigue and tickly his curiosity a bit. Don't give everything away.

Otherwise, I am delighted to join in the throngs of people in congratulating you!

Well, right after Arttu came back home from work just now, I asked him to read the comment and he said that it wasn't true for him. It may be true for some men (wanting a little bit of intrigue), but it isn't true for him. Well, I'm GLAD to hear him say that.

Another thing that crossed my mind when I read Shan's comment is that it's pretty difficult for me to keep something inside me, anyway. The reasons are these:

1. I've told him EVERYTHING about me. He's the only person in the world who knows EVERYTHING about me (including all the skeletons in my closet), so I don't think it'll do me any good to keep anything 'coz there's really nothing to keep. Even my other closest friends don't know THAT much about me.

2. When it comes to praising him, I don't want to keep anything since life is short. I don't wanna keep praises about him to myself and then for example the next second he has an accident and dies right on spot (GOD FORBID!!!) and I regret not saying whatever I feel about him for the rest of my life. I wanna live knowing that I've said everything good that I can towards anybody so that if I die the next minute or hour or day or that person dies soon, I have no regrets at all.

3. We never really started our relationship based on intrigue. We started our relationship based on friendship. Then the first time we started falling in love with each other, I demanded him to show me his true colours 'coz I was also committed in showing him my true colours. It's not good to base a relationship on masks. Intrigue may be interesting and fun in the beginning of a relationship (for me), but I can't live with intrigue.

I want my husband to be my best friend for as long as we shall live, even though we're going to undergo some changes in our lives due to circumstances or anything else, I still want him to share everything with me as I'll share everything with him 'coz that'll keep us close together.

4. It's TOUGH not to show your love when you're really feeling it...or for that matter, to show your disappointment or anger when you live 24/7 with somebody he he he...

Anyway, I also wanna state that my husband is imperfect, but so am I (so is everybody)...and the reason why I write down all the good things about him is that I wanna truly cherish them all. And I also wanna remember them better (human's memory isn't too reliable), so that IF for example I get mad at him, I can reread those posts about his positive sides and be reminded about those and hopefully I'll not be angry anymore. :-)))))

That said, I'm DYING to read different points of view here, especially from men HE HE HE HE HE HE HE HE...So, c'mon my male readers, don't be ashamed in sharing your views, puhhhhleeeezzzzzzzz...

P.S. Shan, THANKS for making me think and for making me question Arttu hi hi hi hi...It's always good to know more about men's POV in general and about Arttu's POV he he he...;-D I REALLY enjoy writing this post HE HE HE HE HE...

P.P.S. I don't believe that men are shallow beings, by the way. I still believe that are VERY GOOD DEEP men out there. Besides, there are shallow women out there, as well he he he...

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Trinity's True Blue Award

Trinity has created an award and shared it with me. I'm HONOURED to get this one as I've only known her for a short time, yet it feels as though we've known each other MUCH longer than that. I guess one reason is also 'coz she's my senior in High School and university and we both come from the same city he he he he...

This is what she said:

Dolphins are blue, so true blue, calm in the storm, they never sleep, so ever-present, they're friendly, so amicable, accountable, dependable, and protective. This award is presented for bloggers who always stand by you!

I'd love to share this award with these four people who've been with me every since the start of my blogging days:

Michelle
Max
Shan
Crystal

Joke of the Day

When I was MyLotting, I found this funny joke image. Source: unknown (if somebody's seen this pic somewhere, pls tell me so I can write down the source here). Click on the pic to see a bigger version!

What Would You Do?

As another follow-up to the "incident" with my close-knit group of friends that I mentioned in a previous post, I'm now confused to the bones.

I truly want to continue our friendship, but I know I need time to heal first. We've been sharing our innermost feelings to one another and I've found out some disturbing facts. As I'm an intense person and I'm a bit of a loner, I've "chosen" them to be my my "special people". Therefore, I've always leaned on them and I've always enjoyed if it they lean on me. Naturally it's MUCH easier for me to give myself to them and to focus on them as I have less people in my life.

However, now I've found out the other edge of my choice. In choosing them as my "special people", I've burdened them with my expectations. Now they're busier than ever before, so they just can't keep up with my emails anymore. They don't even have too much time writing about their lives anymore! What started as a fun and intimate exchange became a burden.

So, my question is: how can I continue my friendship with them when I know that what I've done has been a burden to them? Besides, I know I've hurt them in some points, too. How can I go back to them, knowing that I'd hurt them in the process? What kind of person am I if I do that? On the other hand, I TRULY love them and our friendship. I don't know yet if I can reduce my intensity to them without keeping them at arm's length (read: erasing them from my "special people" list).

It's been a rollercoaster ride so far. I ENJOY my new life here, but I have this bad feeling that I will not be able to be myself if I keep on this friendship. I HOPE I CAN do it, though. I just don't know. It feels as though my friendship world is broken into pieces now. I don't want to keep potential friends or old friends at arm's length, but knowing my intensity (and the fact that I have MUCH more time in the world than regular people), I'm afraid I'll only end up breaking hearts and burdening people.

That's one reason I like blogging. I can't expect anyone to read my posts, but I also get the relief after writing down my thoughts and feelings candidly. If someone does comment on my posts, it makes me even happier because I know the person is really interested in reading my posts. I think without this "outlet", I'd go mad in no time. ;-)