Girlfriends
These days, it seems like all my social invitations (the few there are) are all prefixed with farewell: farewell-party, farewell-dim sum-lunch, farewell-drink-till-you're-completely-plastered-night, etc.
Those who aren't leaving Welly permanently have already left for their winter vacations - Aileen to Sydney and Rathy to Singapore. Jaya's just back from Rotorua. Aileen'll be back in time to give a hand to those who are moving out of Ed House for good. Jaya and Lisa are leaving on the 27th for a two-day trip to Auckland, and then back home, and Carrie's flying off on the 3rd; Jen has to move out by the 25th (but hopefully she's only moving down the block to McKenzies').
My girlfriends are gone. Come summer, I'd be gone too, back home to family and friends. But I'm already missing my girlfriends here.
I don't have many girlfriends back home - my fault, naturally - since I'd spent my most sociable years hanging out with the boys. Boys don't tend to make the effort to keep in touch with a gal pal unless you happen to be 'their' fag-hag or something, something I've always fought against. (I'll be anybody's fag-hag when I'm paid to, but not before.) What few girlfriends I'd made, I tend to let them slip away. It's harder to stay friends when you start having fewer and fewer things in common to talk about.
Back in secondary school, I'd spent my first two years running with a group composed exclusively of boys. When I got separated from my pack in the next two years, and started losing my social skills and getting more warped, I tried to fit myself in with the girls. I like to think I was partially successful even though I'd never felt completely at home.
Everytime I joined in the girls' conversations (gossip about who's seeing whom, that cute bag somebody saw at the mall or magazine, Hong Kong actors, etc.), I felt like such a fraud. It's not that I wasn't all 'girly' like them - I was ... or, at least, I'd tried to be - I just didn't feel like one of them. Ironic, I suppose, since I was in the girls' basketball team, and had spent six years before that in a girls' school.
Then, when I did my diploma, the ratio of males to females in my second and final year classes was around 1:23. I was dead certain I didn't fit in at all. Still I got into a rather temptestuous friendship with a girl, and found a couple more who could tolerate me.
Poor Kai put up with my mood-swings for two years before I mellowed (a little). It's weird that I hated her on sight during orientation week, and by our second year we could finish each other's sentences and know how the other was feeling with just one look. (Of course, that sometimes just made fighting with each other worse.) Andrea was motherly and sweet. My most salient memory of her was the day I had a terrible sore throat, and we had a 'class outing'. I didn't had time to grab lunch, so she shared hers with me. It was a chocolate chip loaf and I told her I couldn't eat it because of the chocolate. So she patiently tore off bits and checking each morsel thoroughly for chocolate chips before handing it to me. Andrea, Kai and I have a little trio going. We meet up for dinner whenever I'm home for the summer. Only difference now is Kai is married (nearly two years now), and Andrea is nearly married to a divorcee with two kids.
I miss SH the most. We had a short and intense phase where we were kinda close and hung out in the same clique. She's the most amazingly funny and witty girl I've ever known. I was always laughing till I cried when I was with her, and I always tried real hard to make her laugh. She was also the only girl who'd ever held my hand since primary school. Up until I met Pat and Sandy (fellow interns at Sears buying office) who were best friends, I'd never once thought straight girls hold each other's hands, and especially not in Orchard Road during the lunch hour. SH and I weren't best friends. I'd like to believe in them, but it's getting really hard to with every passing year. I hadn't had one of those since my 'best friend' switched schools when we were nine; and even then, I'd only known her for a year, and we were best friends only because we told each other, "Let's be best friends."
I haven't seen SH since we graduated. I'd dearly love to though ... maybe when I get back home for good. I've sent her birthday cards (okay, so they were e-cards), but we never did get around to any serious correspondence. Damn, I miss her.
If and when I'm home for good, I'd prolly be meeting Andrea and Kai only occassionally. I'm not sure if there are any other friends I'd meet on a regular basis. It's really hard to try to fit yourself into their lives again. Even my Unholy Trinity. Now that Germ's got someone in his life, I'm sure he'd want to spend more time with his guy; Jason might've gotten lucky and finally found a straight girl he likes.
Then there's my oldest friend in the world whom I've gotten back in touch with in the last couple of years while she was in nearby Oz. Alvina's the best sort of friend you can ever hope for, and the dream partner of anybody who has taste, so I'm kinda protective over her. Kinda strange, since she's always been butchy (but never afraid to show a tear): at seven, indisputably a 'tomboy', at fourteen, a self-proclaimed 'butch'; now, the most chivalrous friend I have, who'd kept me on the inside of the pavement where there's traffic. (Who says chivalry is dead? The propensity for it just passed from the male to the female gender.)
The only other person I'm in contact with on a a semi-regular basis is Kel. She's confident, capable and smart - in other words, everything that I'm not. She's the high-flying sort, and I'm the way-below-the-radars type, so she sometimes intimidates me intellectually. I like talking to her, but I don't see myself having heart-to-hearts with her.
In a nutshell, I really don't have many friends back home. I won't be going home to the sort of camaraderie I've had for the time I've been here. I'll miss our potlucks, I'll miss getting surprised with bear (and group) hugs, getting sandwiched on a cold day, watching and laughing at Hindi movies, getting high without drugs or alcohol, and etc. I think I'll miss Jaya the most.
Fuck, now I'm sad. I don't have as great a problem sleeping now (comparatively; the last couple of months were shit), but I still wish for that bottle of Glenfiddich or Old Parr. I don't like needing help to sleep (and it's not like my liver can afford it anymore; I'm no longer a healthy sixteen year-old), but it's an old friend.
Man, "the bottle's your old friend"? How pathetic is that?
Those who aren't leaving Welly permanently have already left for their winter vacations - Aileen to Sydney and Rathy to Singapore. Jaya's just back from Rotorua. Aileen'll be back in time to give a hand to those who are moving out of Ed House for good. Jaya and Lisa are leaving on the 27th for a two-day trip to Auckland, and then back home, and Carrie's flying off on the 3rd; Jen has to move out by the 25th (but hopefully she's only moving down the block to McKenzies').
My girlfriends are gone. Come summer, I'd be gone too, back home to family and friends. But I'm already missing my girlfriends here.
I don't have many girlfriends back home - my fault, naturally - since I'd spent my most sociable years hanging out with the boys. Boys don't tend to make the effort to keep in touch with a gal pal unless you happen to be 'their' fag-hag or something, something I've always fought against. (I'll be anybody's fag-hag when I'm paid to, but not before.) What few girlfriends I'd made, I tend to let them slip away. It's harder to stay friends when you start having fewer and fewer things in common to talk about.
Back in secondary school, I'd spent my first two years running with a group composed exclusively of boys. When I got separated from my pack in the next two years, and started losing my social skills and getting more warped, I tried to fit myself in with the girls. I like to think I was partially successful even though I'd never felt completely at home.
Everytime I joined in the girls' conversations (gossip about who's seeing whom, that cute bag somebody saw at the mall or magazine, Hong Kong actors, etc.), I felt like such a fraud. It's not that I wasn't all 'girly' like them - I was ... or, at least, I'd tried to be - I just didn't feel like one of them. Ironic, I suppose, since I was in the girls' basketball team, and had spent six years before that in a girls' school.
Then, when I did my diploma, the ratio of males to females in my second and final year classes was around 1:23. I was dead certain I didn't fit in at all. Still I got into a rather temptestuous friendship with a girl, and found a couple more who could tolerate me.
Poor Kai put up with my mood-swings for two years before I mellowed (a little). It's weird that I hated her on sight during orientation week, and by our second year we could finish each other's sentences and know how the other was feeling with just one look. (Of course, that sometimes just made fighting with each other worse.) Andrea was motherly and sweet. My most salient memory of her was the day I had a terrible sore throat, and we had a 'class outing'. I didn't had time to grab lunch, so she shared hers with me. It was a chocolate chip loaf and I told her I couldn't eat it because of the chocolate. So she patiently tore off bits and checking each morsel thoroughly for chocolate chips before handing it to me. Andrea, Kai and I have a little trio going. We meet up for dinner whenever I'm home for the summer. Only difference now is Kai is married (nearly two years now), and Andrea is nearly married to a divorcee with two kids.
I miss SH the most. We had a short and intense phase where we were kinda close and hung out in the same clique. She's the most amazingly funny and witty girl I've ever known. I was always laughing till I cried when I was with her, and I always tried real hard to make her laugh. She was also the only girl who'd ever held my hand since primary school. Up until I met Pat and Sandy (fellow interns at Sears buying office) who were best friends, I'd never once thought straight girls hold each other's hands, and especially not in Orchard Road during the lunch hour. SH and I weren't best friends. I'd like to believe in them, but it's getting really hard to with every passing year. I hadn't had one of those since my 'best friend' switched schools when we were nine; and even then, I'd only known her for a year, and we were best friends only because we told each other, "Let's be best friends."
I haven't seen SH since we graduated. I'd dearly love to though ... maybe when I get back home for good. I've sent her birthday cards (okay, so they were e-cards), but we never did get around to any serious correspondence. Damn, I miss her.
If and when I'm home for good, I'd prolly be meeting Andrea and Kai only occassionally. I'm not sure if there are any other friends I'd meet on a regular basis. It's really hard to try to fit yourself into their lives again. Even my Unholy Trinity. Now that Germ's got someone in his life, I'm sure he'd want to spend more time with his guy; Jason might've gotten lucky and finally found a straight girl he likes.
Then there's my oldest friend in the world whom I've gotten back in touch with in the last couple of years while she was in nearby Oz. Alvina's the best sort of friend you can ever hope for, and the dream partner of anybody who has taste, so I'm kinda protective over her. Kinda strange, since she's always been butchy (but never afraid to show a tear): at seven, indisputably a 'tomboy', at fourteen, a self-proclaimed 'butch'; now, the most chivalrous friend I have, who'd kept me on the inside of the pavement where there's traffic. (Who says chivalry is dead? The propensity for it just passed from the male to the female gender.)
The only other person I'm in contact with on a a semi-regular basis is Kel. She's confident, capable and smart - in other words, everything that I'm not. She's the high-flying sort, and I'm the way-below-the-radars type, so she sometimes intimidates me intellectually. I like talking to her, but I don't see myself having heart-to-hearts with her.
In a nutshell, I really don't have many friends back home. I won't be going home to the sort of camaraderie I've had for the time I've been here. I'll miss our potlucks, I'll miss getting surprised with bear (and group) hugs, getting sandwiched on a cold day, watching and laughing at Hindi movies, getting high without drugs or alcohol, and etc. I think I'll miss Jaya the most.
Fuck, now I'm sad. I don't have as great a problem sleeping now (comparatively; the last couple of months were shit), but I still wish for that bottle of Glenfiddich or Old Parr. I don't like needing help to sleep (and it's not like my liver can afford it anymore; I'm no longer a healthy sixteen year-old), but it's an old friend.
Man, "the bottle's your old friend"? How pathetic is that?
posted by s at 15:56
1 Comments:
I'm flattered. *blush*
*grin*
anyway, having read yours, I feel like posting my version of girlfriends on my blog. *wink*
will do so once i get inspiration. :P
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