Me, Myself & I...

PART I

There are may things in my lifetime that I do not truly understand. My initial thought regarding alot of things was that, as I move through time, I'd mature and soon those mysteries would unravel. Besides, isn't that what people say all the time? "Someday you'll understand." Which, is to suggest that, in time, I will come across a similar situation, and because I'm dealing with it, I would be able to comprehend it. "It" being a relative term. Hence, my dilemma.

The thing is, over time, I would probably be better equipped in dealing with 'It", simply because of experience. Not by my own person but by way of observation and literature. Having knowledge about "It" allows me to deal with it, with uncanny precision even. Yet, it doesn't mean I understood. Or why "It" should be dealt with as such.

Let's leave "It" for a moment as you, the reader, may not be able to make out the point I;m making at the moment. But, you will.

For those who knows me, a few or maybe a lot of things that is about to be mentioned may sound ludicrous or strange/far-fetched. Well, if that happens, relax. Nobody's perfect, especially me.

I was frowned upon when I was a kid growing up. Why? Simply because I did a series of odd things in my time. And I don't play well with others. Not that I was a pitbull or anything, it's just that I wasn't interested in mixing it up with other kids. On times that I actually do play with other kids; I was forced to. Got no choice when you're up against stern Sisters at the convent pre school. Of times I was mixing it up out of freewill, it's because I needed numbers to achieve my objective. I didn't actually do that to make friends or make merry. In a way, I just used them. After all that, I would go about my own business in a corner somewhere.

Reading came naturally to me. I remembered being able to read as early as 3 years old. I know that nowadays whats with the pre-school programmes and such, kids are able to read simple vocabs. Nothing special about it. Except, I wasn't reading picture cards. It was the Straits Times. Though, I have always attributed this to my late father's habit of deep reading. He used to read with me on his lap thus, he may have imparted some reading skills albeit undeliberate. Then I would have weird fascination with certain words. Not due to its meanings but rather how it sounded. Sometimes, it would be phrases. "Of course" was one them. Don't ask me why. I was fascinated with the word "Phoenix" for a long, long time, even to the point of obsessing about it. As a result, kindergarten was pretty boring for me, the only thing I was really learning was Chinese. I got a lot of grief as to how I wouldn't listen to teachers and stuff, because I'd go on about my own business most of the time. Oh, and I like to snatch things from other kids. They're usually crayons. I simply wanted to use 'em. I got whacked by my mom for that. I didn't know what I did wrong except I was never to snatch things from other kids. On top of that, teachers wrote that I was "dreaming in class" in my report card.

I supposedly 'dreamt' in class all the way to secondary school. No kidding. Teachers were probably annoyed and wrote it my report book. It became a norm to my parents whenever I did badly in assessments or exams, to attribute it to my "dreaming in class", and that I wasn't paying attention to what was delivered during lessons. I can't argue about that. Frankly, school was hell for me. All the attention and focus I had to give was driving me nuts. But everybody else was doing it, so I struggled. I totally have a problem about spacing out. I space out constantly. The only thing I do to stop it is by looking at people's eyes when they speak. This is a problem for me because I feel very agitated staring into people's eyes. Through the years, I had trained myself to appear normal when conversing with other people because they often look at me funny when I don't. I didn't realize it was rude not to look at them when they are talking. In the early years, when people talk to me, I would look at something else. The trunk of their body for example. Or feet. The worst will be me fixating at other things. My parents would often 'correct' me on this. It was for the best, I thought because I would space out if I don't force myself. I've come across many people who are annoyed at me for ignoring them, or at least it's what they thought. There were many times when my friends saw me down the street and call my name out only to find me unresponsive, even after waving wildly at me. Sometimes, they were even standing beside me and talking to me and I wouldn't have a clue. It was embarrassing to say the least. To make it up, I would apologize and suggested that they should give me a little nudge in the future, if it happens again. More often than not, I would give the excuse of having my attention on some hot chick passing by to cover up. I constantly had to make up excuses or lied. I became real good at lying to cover up whatever I was doing because I didn't want to appear as being retarded and laughed along with my friends, passing it as something silly. If only they all knew it's because I couldn't help it. This trait is the foundation of what people would describe me as being: aloof, distant, dreamer....etc.

Over the years, I managed to somewhat control myself from spacing out too far. Though I'll admit it's such a chore. When I was young, spacing out could prove to be dangerous. There were times that I could've gotten seriously hurt because I wasn't aware of things around me.