On friendship
I've been spending lots of time with my housemates lately, which is why things have been kinda quiet here. As Dean is fond of saying, "Real life trumps blogging!"
Relationships are important to me. In high school, I didn't relate to my classmates very well, so I had pen-pals instead...
I wrote to them about myself and my life; diary-like letters which consumed reams of paper. A real diary was not for me; what was the point of writing things which no one else would ever see?
Mom said I wrote "novels" to my friends, pages and pages of words. No one I knew had the same passion for writing, which meant that in many cases I'd "chase" my friends for replies. On average, I'd send out two letters and receive one reply (because the second letter would remind the person that they hadn't replied, and they'd guiltily reply immediately! *wicked laugh*). At one point, I had thirty pen-pals. Yup, you read right: THIRTY!!!
We did develop real relationships, some of us. With them - complete strangers whom I'd never met before - I shared all my hopes, dreams, and fears. We'd talk about God, about our families, about studies... nothing was too trivial, really. And I considered one of my pen-pals my "best friend": a girl named Joanna Chaw Yane-Yin.
I still remember writing her a 100-page letter during the SPM examinations (a major government exam at the end of high school). Just for the fun of it, I wanted to be able to say I'd written a hundred pages, so I wrote throughout the exams, a little a day - beginning on the day of our first paper, and signing off on the day we completed the last paper. She scolded me for it, saying I made her re-live the entire exam through my letter!
When I went to college, I became more open and learnt to relate better to "real life" people. But eventually, I realised that I wanted more than surface relationships; I wanted to know and be known. I wanted the same kind of in-depth sharing of self that I'd had with my pen-pals, with Joanna.
And I ran into a brick wall.
People don't give of themselves so easily. It frustrated me, because I was willing, even hungry, to give. But no one seemed to want what I had to offer.
After a while, I decided that if no one wanted to know the real me, then I would only show them what they wanted to see. I could feel the walls going up around my heart, but I refused to be vulnerable any longer.
Looking back, I know I was hungry for love. Not the romantic kind of love, but just to be loved as a person - to be loved for being me, to be loved as I am. Growing up, it was something I never felt I had; always pushed to change and to do more, be more. Bleargh.
Anyway... so the walls went up around my heart, and I became a quietly solitary person again. Yes, I mixed with colleagues and classmates, but no one got too close. It was surface interaction. The loneliness and isolation was exacerbated by my living arrangements: I'd rent a room in a house full of strangers, and whenever I got home I'd go straight upstairs and sit in my room, alone.
Now I share a house with a bunch of crazy housemates who have become my friends. I'm coming out of my shell again. I'm learning to care, learning to trust, and learning to give again.
It is good.