I’m still trying to
figure out, and the answer is probably simpler than I think it is. Perhaps they
just aren’t afraid of judgment. They’d treat you well just because you’re fine
and that’s that.
The problem with so
many problems in life is that there isn’t a fixed answer. It makes it hard, but
it makes it easier because if you can convince yourself it’s the right answer,
you can be at peace with yourself no matter how wrong the answer seems to
others.
Whereas this battle
here with math I am facing is a battle because math has right and wrong
answers. People who are good at math claim math is easy because there are fixed
answers, “either you know it or you don’t”, but doesn’t that mean then that
there ARE people who “don’t know it”? Finding that fixed answer is difficult
when the path to it is a winding maze. Sometimes you don’t even know where the
starting point is, where the ending point is, and which way to take. Sometimes
you just take one slight wrong turn and it leads you to the other end of the
labyrinth. Of course, when you show me the way, I can follow you through the
maze. If you put road signs at each turn, I could find my way to the end. But
if you throw me in the middle of a maze, I’m just a lost rat who can’t find its
cheese.
People always talk
about the ‘joys of learning’ and yadayadayada but this… Is it even learning
anymore? Yes, I want to learn. I want to learn how to play all the lovely songs
on the piano, cello, pick up the guitar. Heck, I want to learn the harp and all
sorts of percussion and beatboxing and singing. I want to learn how to make
clothes and bags and be a rock star and direct my own movie and breakdance and
write books. I want to learn how to learn and learn how to love and be patient
and be joyful. What we are doing now is cramming our pea brains with an
over-sized luggage, not motivated by curiosity but by what the society thinks
we’d need to know in order to help society advance when we become the ones in
charge.
It just makes me
confused because it’s like a privilege and an honour but it feels like a chore
and it feels like torture sometimes but I’m here because everyone says it’s a
good thing and just to be safe let’s listen to ‘everyone’.
On a brighter note,
some small things really can make my day and drive these threatening thoughts
away. A little Bible verse from you at random times really reminds me to pray
and not rely on my own limited self. A little snack thrust into my hands in between
lessons when I bump into you can make me feel more energized knowing I have
food (lol). The bus driver who greets us ‘Morning’ every morning (provided I don’t
miss my bus…) can give me lighter steps to my seat. Having a mere acquaintance say
‘hi’ to you randomly on the way home (I’m touched you remember my name. Aow See
barely remembers my name after 2 years.) can make me feel less drained.
Random encounter that
somehow made me laugh (out loud): I met my neighbor in the lift while going
home yesterday evening. He had pressed the nth
floor button, thinking I lived on that floor, and he asked to confirm. But I don’t
so I told him the right floor and he pressed it. The lift door closed and he
said ‘Ah, never mind, I’ll walk down then.’ Not quite comprehending, I didn’t
really react. When the lift door opened at the nth floor I
said ‘goodbye’ while he headed out carrying his 5kg box of soap powder and
walked down one floor to his home. I was thinking ‘what a weird man’ but when it
sank in, I started to laugh to myself. It turns out, he didn’t even press the button for the floor he was heading to, yet he pressed 2 floors (of which one was wrong) for me…If he had pressed the button for himself
too, I’d have had to take the lift stopping at 4 consecutive floors, and he so
kindly avoided that and rather walk down carrying such a load.
There is hope yet for
this world.