About a son

Tuesday 23-12-09

Dear brother

Mom is coming today to Singapore. For you it would be 5 days without perfect home-cooked food and special attention, for me it'd be 5 days of accompanying 2 women to shopping malls and sales.

I guess Mom does pick the worst time to visit me, as I've been working night shifts for the past 2 days and still is in office now. I cleaned my slump at 3am in the morning, continued after I woke up at 10, and now in office looking like a zombie.

It is also an incredibly difficult time for me to pull off the normal cheerful, all-got-it-together kinda son image that I always try to have around our family. I'm sorry if that image has affected you because sometimes parents do compare. However, as cliche as it sounds, a son's responsibility is to "be" all successful and got it together in front of his Mom, especially when she's with a female friend/cousin with 2 sons.

You see Mom has very few important things in her life. As a smart and rich girl whose life got turned around by war and has been through a lot of hardship, as a (wonderful) wife and mother who has spent most of her time at home taking care of Dad and us, her pride in her two smart, good sons (and her love for saving, shopping, shoes and bags) are the simple things that made her happy. That's why I want to give her that. And as much as you can, within the limit of your life choices and wishes, I encourage you to give her that as well.

I'm not proud to teach you this, but sometimes we do lie to the people we love the most. A little white lies here and there. A little bit of exaggeration of how happy and whole we are with our life, our jobs, and our perfect vision of family and romance. The thing is, when we love someone, we want to give them the best they deserve, and Mom deserves a happy and whole son, the way she raised us to be (Sadly, circumstances denied that). However, with that being said, I want you to be honest with me. I've been there. It's not easy being young and restless. You will make mistakes and it is ok to share it with your brother, the same way I'd do to you once you reach an appropriate age for all this "dark" materials.

Anyhow I need to get back to work. It seems Migration is finally done. I need to get all this shit done before leaving to the airport to fetch her.

Just thought I have a heart to heart talk with you before I put on my pretense this week

With love,