Letter to You

I've written something like this before, a letter with no address. To a certain someone dear to me then. Who eventually proved my devotion pointless.

Today, as I reflect on the words of my youth, it is with some nostalgia and much consolation that I pen my thoughts. It is an inexplicable warm, fuzzy feeling to be writing to a special someone once again. But what a far way I've come, and I take heart in the progress I've achieved. Perhaps it is because some things don't change that enabled me to advance. Whatever the case, I am truly grateful.

Back then, I had this to say:
"For a long time I have thought that I should never be the first to reveal my feelings; it would be considered a sign of weakness. I am terribly afraid of rejection...Now, all I want you to know is that I care. It doesn’t matter whether or not you reciprocate my feelings, or if you’d treat it lightly as if it were a joke. Those acts will not depress me again. It is only for those who choose to believe that they can live without love to feel pity for themselves."

These words still hold true. For without my knowing, it was this same conviction that led me to you. So that henceforth I find you to have and to hold, to love and to cherish.

My dearest, thank you for believing in the cause, perhaps even more so than I, and demonstrating exceptional valour throughout our pursuit. You know that the real test of time has only just begun, and things are only going to get tougher; that when hard times befall, I am only going to need you more. Pray be strong, for our happiness.

Inasmuch as I ask of your indulgence, I wish very much to do the same for you. So to you I write a letter with no address. You, who is so very dear to me now...Because I have no confidence that I would not prove your determination pointless.

I promise to try: to add a bit more cheer to your happy days, to chase the grey clouds away; to pamper the little boy that you are, to support the ambition in you; to maintain a household filled with warmth, so you'll always want to come home. Above all, I promise to be here.

Fruitful Life

Like many of my close friends, the transient nature of life has loomed large over our spirits recently. You begin to take the many pursuits you hold dear in perspective.

Sometimes I wonder how very trivial things like work and reputation and status are for us our very lives. Friends fit into the schedule dictated by work and bureaucratic responsibilities; family time revolves around this same center; not to mention personal milestones like marriage and children.

My idea of a fruitful life is primitive. I care not for leaving a legacy, making a difference in my world, having a good amount of followers. I simply think, to have made my friends feel like they've been my friends; to have been placed at a job or task and done my best; to have had children and groomed them well.

I'd say that at least 90% of my friends meet up only when I ask them to. That leaves about 5 people who actually enjoy my company. I'm not sure how good friends could be such if one never knew if the other were sick or well, happy or sad, doing right or wrong. Yet that's my relationship with many, many of my "good friends". Friends with whom you make an appointment many weeks in advance but almost always come up with a last minute reason to leave early; friends whose drastic plans you'd be the last to know about; friends for whom you invest time and effort just so you could hear them say you didn't know them so well after all.

I guess it's the negative connotations of having to turn to someone for help, or even feeling obliged to keep someone informed. We truly have become an individualistic society. So I have learnt to feel uneasy at approaching anyone I know for a favour at all. Or asking them to meet up more often than twice a year. Because following my logic depicted above, the only reason they're constantly trying to make time for me would be because their priority was never me.

Amidst a very broody weekend, God opened my eyes at service: "do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God, and you are not your own?" (1 Corinthians 6:19) Might that be why I've always felt that something was so wrong about the amount of work we willingly get pushed into? Not that I'm absolved from any of the fault, really.

At the end of the day, some things have become truth for me: I have God, a few friends, and sometimes family. And because God is here, that's all I need. Thank God!