When the month of June rolls in, the fleeting of time never fails to dawn on me. Just recently, my two kids became a year older and we celebrated another year of marriage.
Time just keeps on marching on.
This is actually the first time my son celebrated his birthday away from us. Good thing there's Uber Eats. My daughter, on the other hand, still likes hanging out with her friends so they ice-skated while the parents hovered and chatted nearby.
At times it's a confusing mix of feelings.
I think I'm a naturally melancholy guy. I celebrate these milestones in our lives but at the back of my head a certain loneliness lingers. I guess, when you find yourself uncontrollably sleepy some afternoons and struggle to bend to tie your shoes, or even rise from a particularly low sofa, then you know time is racing against you too.
I've always tried to brush this feeling off and try to focus on the happy bits. But this month I realised that I may be doing it wrong. I think I need to accept both the 'bad' and the 'good' in me if I am ever to find inner peace.
Hang on.... this actually sounds like a mashup of King Fu Panda and Inside Out.
The month of May had not been a merry one for me. I contracted COVID so I had to isolate for a week. A couple of weeks later, I'm still feeling the effects: dizzy spells and drowsiness especially in the afternoons. I get disorientated with the most simple of tasks; I misplace my keys, wallet, ID. That's really annoying. More annoying than when I first had my first bout of COVID when I lost my sense of taste. At least that didn't affect my appetite. But this one hits different.
When I was in isolation I lost the energy to do anything. I totally missed blogging about the 4th of May (Star Wars Day) and Mother's Day. I even had an idea on what to write about for those days weeks before! But I couldn't muster the energy to think and write it down.
And a couple of weeks after that. I still feel lethargic.
So May came and went, and now we're in June. Winter has officially started. There's been a lot of sickness going around - flu and COVID mostly - and I'm sure it's due to the colder-than-usual winter.
On a positive note, we have a couple of birthdays coming up so that should brong some much needed cheer 😊
My son had gone back home for term break and his three-week 'holiday' ends today. He will take an Uber with his mum to the airport early this morning, as I am not with them today. I'm in Auckland for a weekend conference, and my wife is flying this morning to join us.
The weeks past have been a whirlwind of activities. I can't recall most of them now, so I do feel a twinge of regret that I haven't had time to blog about it.
One highlight would be my daughter winning silver in kata and bronze in kumite! She's always striving to better herself and she is aiming for the gold on the next tournament. I'm do proud of her and I'm thankful she did not inherit my introvertness.
Yesterday was a milestone of sorts. It was my first time to go up Auckland by land. Thank goodness I'm not driving though as I don't think I'll survive such a long journey. Overall we travelled eleven hours. It normally would have been nine hours but we took meal breaks inbetween, which makes a lot of sense.
As a matter of fact, I do enjoy being a passenger more than being the driver. I get to observe the scenery and take it all in.
We left Wellington at 6.30am and the sun greeted us on the road. We were greeted by the Auckland traffic at around 5.30pm.
Along the way we swapped insightful stories with my good friend. We had a picnic-style lunch with other friends under a huge tree whose leaves have started changing to a reddish colour to welcome Autumn. They brought lots of food - chicken adobo, laing, fried chicken, noodles... I bought fried rice from a nearby Chinese takeaway because rice is life.
In that journey I felt so fortunate to be surrounded with such good people.
This morning I think about my son who's going back to Christchurch. While he was at home he was mostly back to his usual self. He slept til late, but instead of waking up by lunchtime or even mid-afternoon, he would be up by mid-morning. We still didn't see much of him, but not because he would lock up in his room but because he would be out and about. But the one thing that made us realise he was really home was when the cooked rice that normally lasted us for days was gone in 48 hours.
It was awesome.
These past few weeks have taught me to open my eyes and appreciate life as it unfolds. I've been wallowing in my own thoughts for too long that life is passing me by; attitude is not doing me any favours. I have so much to be thankful for.
