i plead insanity and lack of sleep

I have not slept properly for days. This is worse than anything I've been through before. 3 hours a night for 3 consecutive nights is painful. By the time the 4th night came, I was literally passing out at my desk.

Went back to office every day this weekend, and as I type this, I have one more two-pager company note to finish when I get home. Then its on to preparing myself for the presentation.

I decided not to go back to his place for dinner, perhaps I need some time alone. To stay on the ball, stay focused. I dreamt last night that I had a son together with him. And the kid was so freaking cute. Only thing, it was just me and my kid in the dream, with everyone visiting me. He was noticeably absent.

Woke up and mentioned it to him, and he brushed it off saying "Not ready for it for awhile." and rolled back to sleep.

Well, not that I'm ready for it either. But I know I want a family, and the brushing off felt a bit *dot dot dot*. So yeah. My biological clock tis ticking. I plan to have a family by 30 or 31. No rush, but yeah. No pressure, but yeah. Sometimes it just feels so live in the moment with him. Though honestly when it all first started it really was live in the moment. Now you think twice. You realize you ain't getting any younger. And the hours you work means its impossible to widen your social circle. Gulp. Old maid. Gulp. Haha. I'm having fun freaking myself out.

I need a family to keep me grounded. Sane. My family is insane so the solace you get from them can be a bit insane at times. My mother's solution to my fatigued and stressed nights is to buy me few hundred dollar health supplements which I'm not even sure are FDA-approved or not.

no sheeet

The worst thing in the world to do when you're working via remote access from home at 2am is to surf Kinkybluefairy's website.

That usually will be the point where you start to wonder again why the heck are you putting yourself through all this. We're into the end of 1Q10 and I really wonder where the time has gone to.

I have no time to spend my money as well. That's just about the only good thing that's come out of this.

I suspect by the time all this over, there won't be any shit that I can't take.

you came, you lived, you learnt

Every time I feel like moaning about how I have to work weekends, or 14 hour days or not being able to go and do shopping or run errands as I like, I think of this -

The report looks understandable. Not so much like the blob of gobbledygook it was last week.
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Superhero, if you were 29 and single, I'd be on your case telling you to go.

Because you have a family, I hold back.

Like I was telling the boyfriend a few days back -

"How do you want to be remembered? As someone who was part of just one thing great, or someone who did so many of nothing much at all?"

Okay I know this sounds so dramatic for something like a career change, but to me, it isn't just a job. It's who you are, and it's your choices that define who you are.

I chose to suffer, not because I'm a sado-masochist, but because I believe in waking up knowing you're going to be challenged, knowing that at the end of it, you can look back and say "wow, i can't believe i did that". I wanted to be part of that new team, knowing we have a lot to prove. I am proud to be part of that team whom I know can make it to the top someday. Knowing not all days will be that way, but whatever you go through will be worth it in the end. You came, you lived, you learnt. Period.

will it get better?

I opened my eyes, and just didn't feel like opening them. Days like these come once in awhile - I'm disoriented, and I don't know what I have to show for in this world. It takes a gargantuan effort to focus, to remind myself of just how much I've done. Far cry from those days.

I still manage to keep it together no matter how shitty things get - that has to count for something, no? I keep listing down and repeating what I've done, sometimes I succeed and the feeling goes away, other times I just burrow down in bed, and sleep til the next morning.

This is the 'other time'. It doesn't matter how many items I've ticked off my life list, it doesn't matter how other people would kill to get my life, at times like these, I just feel like saying, "You want it? You can have it.." and then disappear into my favourite dream - the one where I'm living on a farm.

Your twenties can be a really sucky time. One moment you feel on top of the world, the next, you fall into a yawning chasm.

Does it ever get better?

The soul feels weary. Where does a poor weary traveller rest but in his memories? Leaning against an old tree, the traveller takes off his cap and rests it on the ground. He looks up at the foliage above, and remembers. Taking out the memories one by one like little treasures out of a secret chest, he dusts them off, savours them.

His eyes glisten as he remembers the days, smells the scents of yesterday.

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nyc 2006. feeling free.

sometimes i long for the simple things again. autumn leaves, crisp air, blue skies, and a lighter heart.

Rule the world or rule the roost?

My idea of success when I was a slightly overweight kid with mushroom hair and thick knees back in school was of being a denizen of the fast-paced corporate world, always needing to be someplace, power-walking on stilettos from the plane to the waiting chauffeured car, one eye on the PDA in my palm and the other hand smoothening out the imaginary creases on my sharp single-breasted Armani suit.

That idea didn't change when I first got a job in investment banking. Fuelled by books like 'Monkey Business' and 'The Accidental Investment Banker', I knew I was on my way to living that idea. And I'm still on track - having selected a career that promises travel and exposure, the sort of business travel where you spend the whole day in meetings and only spend 6 hours in your 6-star hotel room; the one-city-a-day, see-Paris-from-the-backseat-of-chauffeured-car kind of travel.

But thoughts of a different life surface once in awhile. Blame it on genetics, female DNA, or God's way of ensuring the population continues populating, but I sometimes imagine what it will be like to spend my days playing in the sandbox with the cutest little toddler in a white sailor suit, having butter and honey pancakes for breakfast in the garden with Junior while flipping through magazines for ideas for my latest home decoration project, having ice cream for lunch with my daughter to commemorate 'Just Because' day where we do anything just because we want to.

Sliding down into the warm waters of the Ritz's bathtub at 3am, leaning back and looking out of the huge window by the tub overlooking the bay, thinking about ruling the world. You wonder if it will come a time when you realize it's just a bunch of BS and that all you want to do is teach your toddler to fingerpaint or decorate the home.

Amber and I have been having not-so-serious conversations about domesticated life.

Amber - Fuck this shit. I wanna be a house wife.

Me - Ya, I can come over to your house after dropping my kid off in school. We can sit around having coffee before picking them up for their swim class or piano class.

Amber - Yeah... I don't mind that. Never thought I'd be having this conversation with you so soon.

But apparently, in this era of enlightened female empowerment, you're supposed to want more for yourself than making babies.

Playboy - Hows the job?

Me - Really good, learning alot, but I don't think I'll be doing this forever.

Playboy - That's just what you say.

I guess I pull off the corporate bitch look quite well. :)

I still remember the two dreams I had - the one where I was pregnant and protectively shielding my stomach everywhere I walked, and the other one where I was on my knees scrubbing the floor of the new condo waiting for my husband to come home to show him what I did that day. Only thing I don't know who my husband will be because when I heard his keys open the front door, I woke bloody up.

But I think I'll work for awhile after I get married. Basically pursuing our careers while being married, sounds very very nice to me. You can work til 3am knowing that there'll be somebody at home warming the sheets. Lol.

Jeez, I really don't know where these thoughts are coming from. Blame it on the last person who recently announced she's getting married. At least I still have Amber and gang to remind me that not everyone's getting hitched yet.

Happy Chinese New Year. Tomorrow's another day of hints from my mom and assorted family members, which I've learnt to deflect rather well by stuffing my mouth full of food and going "pffmph!!" when they ask unanswerable questions.

Definitely.. Maybe

Reading Superhero's post on how people desire some form of rhythm to their lives brought about thoughts about the opposite - how random meetings, chance encounters and one-off experiences leave us with a multitude of possibilities, many forking of paths. For some, it's not so much actually pursuing every possibility that they want, but the freedom of knowing that they could do it anytime.

Knowing you have a choice helps you do the right thing at the right time, even if it isn't something you want to do at the moment. I used to think I was losing out if I didn't go chasing after every dream - I think I'd be in a mental institution by now if I wanted to be everything, do everything.

I'm pretty clear about the path I'm on, where I want to go. Though I'd be lying if I said I didn't think of what's out there. But somehow, knowing that I can have it / do it whenever I choose to, suddenly renders me indifferent to whether I take that path or not.

That's the litmus test of how important a thing / person is to you. If you know you're going to be able to do it / have it tomorrow, would you still want it as bad? If yes, then pursue it, hold on to it, never let it go.

Things I Definitely Maybe Want To Do.. But Have Shelved For the Moment In Pursuit of What's More Important

1) Teach English in the middle of nowhere, like Kazakhstan, for a year.

2) Be a fruit-picker / assistant in a rural farmhouse in a small village in France / Italy for 6 months

3) Work in Melbourne and make weekend trips in my sports convertible to Mornington Peninsula and surrounds

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying give up on your dreams. Just know what's important for the moment and do it. No need to worry about when you're going to do the other things on your list, because they will happen if they're important enough. I'm hardly spiritual, so I won't say trust that God will do what's best. But this is based on some basic cosmic belief in a higher power that all things eventual.. will eventuate.

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On a lighter note, I've crossed over international borders for my job, in the first month of work. It was just Singapore, for a corporate event on a yacht (hello linen pants, bare feet and nautical striped tote) but that's faster than the comparable period in my first job.

I've met new people, seen what I can do, what I will be doing. I know I'll do some over the next few months, others I might never do (like understand what it is that derivatives traders do). So am I open to the possibility that anything can happen?

Definitely.. maybe.

Macam Made It Tak?

Never in my 25+ years did I think I'd manage to own a place with a KLCC view. Yeah yeah, its a speck in the distant horizon, but if you squint hard enough you can see the spires of Twin Towers and KL Tower.

I know it's going to be a headache with the renovations and contractors, but just let me savour this feeling of accomplishment for a bit. Because it rarely comes often - the way I heap the pressure, expectations and self-criticism on myself.

I wanted to lie down on the bedroom floor and do a 360 degree wiggle and roll on the floor, but the boyfriend would have looked at me funny. As it is, I already did a 360 degree hoppy jig in the master bedroom squealing "My room can see KLCC!! My room can see KLCC!!"

No offence, but I'm not sure he'd fathom the magnitude of my elation - him living in a nice house, not having to pay rent or a car loan. And me, having lived in a terrace house with a back room whose window overlooked a graveyard (you don't even need a binoculars to see the grave markers even), then on the 2nd level room of a rented house that was used as a classroom in the day time and subsequently a condo with a room whose window opened out into an airwell. I never complained, because it was the best we could afford at that time and as kids you never think about things like class and money and prestige, but it sure does feel damn. bloody. good to be able to buy an apartment myself now.

I think of the Mastercard ad -

"Buying a condo, RM390k. Building your own home, priceless."