the abnormal quilt
Since I don’t discuss the idiosyncrasies of my family as openly and as frequently as I used to, not many know the truth. This is the truth: we’re a weird family. Extremely weird. We embody love-hate relationships and on the surface, we don’t look, sound, or act anything like each other. Me and my brother joke (not occasionally, but quite frequently), about how we were all (the fours of us) excess members from families which had their quotas filled. And since God doesn’t like to waste (as he has proven and teaches us time and time again), he put the last remaining bits together and made a new family that he could send out into the world. On a surface it’s seemed like a good idea to Him: 2 people get to spend the rest of their lives together and their 2 kids will grow up in a healthy home environment, provided for and watched over. All in all, we were supposed to function just like any other family in a milk powder advert (minus the cows, we don’t have one. That was the generation before).
Sound enough plan? Not necessarily so. As I said earlier, on the surface, we’re all on 4 different ends of the same spectrum (yes, it is possible. We do it everyday). There’re various reasons why when things are supposedly normal (no one individual member has pressing problems, no child is facing major exams or puberty) we still fight like kids. There’s probably an explanation as to why we’re extremely nice to each other during times of adversity. I’m fully aware of the fact that it’s probably the other way round it other families because when adversities come a knocking, tensions rise and tempers clash.
Weird as it is, the total opposite occurs. When tragedy strikes, the stitches between the four of us somehow tighten and everyone carries their own weight. We don’t usually impose ourselves on each other (except occasionally, when the quilt is being pulled in two or more directions) and we come off as a pretty united front.
The current circumstances have us acting very differently from our normal (*pauses to laugh*) selves and I for one, have been apprehensive as to how we’ll be able to adapt with my dad’s condition being a part of us now. Will we still act like we used to? Will there be extra considerations when we use humour around each other (in those rare events that we do)? And the one question underlying all of this, the one question which brings about the most sadness and confusion: will things ever be the same again?
The paper I sat for yesterday was surprisingly manageable, not as tough as I expected it to be, and for that I’m thankful. I will admit that it was a close shave, and when I visited my parents yesterday, my mum was more than willing to shove it in my face. And blame the close shave on HER (I wish I was referring to Keira, but I’m not, I’m referring to Debate). Needless to say, we had ourselves a pretty little argument in a hospital room. I shouldn’t be too pleased about it but that’s the point of this whole post and the point I’m getting across now. I am pleased about it because in that heated exchange, I realized that things won’t necessarily be the same again, but some things will never change. Our arguing only occurs in time of normalcy, and it’s always done with the reassurance that we’ll always be there for each other, regardless of how much we want to throttle each other (dark humour, it’s really not that bad la.)
We’re learning to cope. We’ll make it through this.
Sound enough plan? Not necessarily so. As I said earlier, on the surface, we’re all on 4 different ends of the same spectrum (yes, it is possible. We do it everyday). There’re various reasons why when things are supposedly normal (no one individual member has pressing problems, no child is facing major exams or puberty) we still fight like kids. There’s probably an explanation as to why we’re extremely nice to each other during times of adversity. I’m fully aware of the fact that it’s probably the other way round it other families because when adversities come a knocking, tensions rise and tempers clash.
Weird as it is, the total opposite occurs. When tragedy strikes, the stitches between the four of us somehow tighten and everyone carries their own weight. We don’t usually impose ourselves on each other (except occasionally, when the quilt is being pulled in two or more directions) and we come off as a pretty united front.
The current circumstances have us acting very differently from our normal (*pauses to laugh*) selves and I for one, have been apprehensive as to how we’ll be able to adapt with my dad’s condition being a part of us now. Will we still act like we used to? Will there be extra considerations when we use humour around each other (in those rare events that we do)? And the one question underlying all of this, the one question which brings about the most sadness and confusion: will things ever be the same again?
The paper I sat for yesterday was surprisingly manageable, not as tough as I expected it to be, and for that I’m thankful. I will admit that it was a close shave, and when I visited my parents yesterday, my mum was more than willing to shove it in my face. And blame the close shave on HER (I wish I was referring to Keira, but I’m not, I’m referring to Debate). Needless to say, we had ourselves a pretty little argument in a hospital room. I shouldn’t be too pleased about it but that’s the point of this whole post and the point I’m getting across now. I am pleased about it because in that heated exchange, I realized that things won’t necessarily be the same again, but some things will never change. Our arguing only occurs in time of normalcy, and it’s always done with the reassurance that we’ll always be there for each other, regardless of how much we want to throttle each other (dark humour, it’s really not that bad la.)
We’re learning to cope. We’ll make it through this.
posted by pwasad at 7:21 PM
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