A mother's love

 

 

 

 

Of all the epic moments in the latest episode of my favorite drama, this scene moved me to tears not only once but almost every single time I watch it. Maybe  because it makes me miss my Mom so badly...

Watching the reunion of mother and daughter, I can feel how much grief and pain Ji Wan's mom has put on her beats. No matter how harsh her words may sound, it's true that she still loves Ji Wan as a mother and the suddenly appearing of her daughter after almost 10 years with no connection utterly overwhelms her. In the end, she's a mother and Ji Wan must always be among the most precious treasures in her life.

The other day, a close friend of mine left a short note on her Facebook telling that her mom refused to pick her up at the airport at 11pm 'cos she said it was too late for her to go out, and my friend had to nag that she'd got too much luggage to manage all alone so that her mom would agree to go to the airport. My close friend, she used to be a target for my jealousy 'cos of her wealthy family as well as her freedom to go to almost everywhere she wants, but after reading her note, I realized that in some way, I may be the one who's got more. My Mom, she's just simply the one who never goes to bed before I get home and even if she's got sick, she'd rather let me sleep some more than wake me up to do something for her illness. And for that alone, I know how much I've been blessed for being her child.

Me and friends

1. Close friends

I've got very very few of them. I call them "close" which means: they are people who can see through me, calling out both the good and evil sides of me,

My very first close friend was a beautiful, charming (and rich, like an ideal chaebol girl in K-drama) girl from junior high school. She's one of the most mature, cleverest with such insightful thoughts I've ever met of my age. No wonder she is the first and also the only one who can understand me the most to date. Our personalities are almost completely different, so it kinda amazes me thinking over how we could tolerate each other through all those years, especially when we all knew that both of us belonged to the super stubborn and pig-headed kind of girls. Since she went abroad for her study (to succeed her family's business), we haven't been in touch regularly. You may say it's me who avoids her rather than it's geographical distance to blame. Don't ask me the reason, it may sounds stupid to some but to those who know what kind of person I am, they will not wonder so much about this. However, no matter what happens and however much we may change in course of time, I know that forever she's a friend that I never can forget for my entire life.

The second one I wanna mention here is another girl from high school. She's also pretty and very smart (in many ways, except for the matter of foreign languages). If the first one mentioned above is the one who can understand me best, this second is someone who had to tolerate me the most, over last eight years, I suppose. Maybe it's just my super luck to find her, an extremely out-going personality so that she could easily forgive and forget all of my madness from time to time. She's the one who taught me lots about life, I mean "normal life" - literally. I don't know if it's due to the fact that I was born in autumn, people tend to look at me (and I also get it myself) as a girl-with-her-mind-in-the-clouds. That's why to some ordinary matters of life, I appear to be an strangely ignorant person, much that she had no choice other than holding back her laughter and teaching me how to deal with such things.

The third one, a girl again. But actually she's much younger than me. She not as pretty as the other two but charming and has her charisma. I bet many must feel jealous at her attractiveness. If you wanna find someone who can be crazier, more impulsive, moodier than me, it's her. But she's got an admirable talent for language and imagination. At the age of fifteen, she already had a short story which was spread over hundreds of local online forums and personal blogs. But above all of that, to me she's like a guardian angel. A true angel in its beautiful meaning. She always appeared in time when I was at my lowest stage or in the very worst circumstances of my early life. She gave me her hands, raising me up, comforting me then disappeared again, back to her non-stop journeys (she travels a lot). But as  told you earlier, because she's not less crazy than me, we fought a lot over many tiny things. However, we both know where to stop before things get out of hands and in our heart, we see each other as someone who cannot be traded for just nonsensical stuff, thus, we know what it is to reconcile and treasure one another after all.

The forth, and also the final for today, is a boy. The only boy who can accept me as who I am, an ugly, weird, hot-tempered, arrogant, straight-forward girl, and a cold-minded friend who can throw hash words at him any time if she's mad or when he acts foolishly over something. The best guy I've ever met (even a thousand times better than my ex) but also the guy I never can LOVE as a girl does a boy. Yes, it's kind of a mysterious question for which I can't find an appropriate answer yet. He's just someone who leaves me messages of comfort everytime I'm in bad mood, knowing that I never answer them. He listens to my petty stories hour after hour until my phone account is out of balance. He drives me along the dark, flooded streets in the heavy rain of a summer night to make sure I'm home safe and sound. He collects pictures of my Mom, who is also his teacher, in their field trip to send me via Y!M because he knows that I would love to see them. He's someone about whom another close friend of mine once said: "Whatever may come, I know he'll never leave you alone."

2. Buddies

I call them buddies because they're friends who I can share some moments but not those who can be by my side at critical times. I've got quite a lot of them since my enrollment to the university and through my jobs as well. They're all nice, they left me something to remember, but I know when time passes by, I may fade away in their memories and vice versa.

3. Online friends

Well, it's kinda strange that some of my best friends come from the Internet world, where people find it hard to build up any long-term relationships. I got my first online friends in high school time and now they're still my special friends. It's been almost eight years, I think. Later I also made some more online buddies but don't know why they couldn't become as close as the first ones did to me. Perhaps it was because of me. I changed, indeed. I closed down my world and was afraid to deal with anyone/anything wholeheartedly. I didn't proactively approach anyone for years like I used to, and consequently, my inner world became smaller and smaller until one day it was too narrow to accept anything new.

These days, suddenly I felt an urge to reach out to the world again. It's like how Kang Suk felt when he could resume his love with Dan Ah (in Family's Honour), that "I feel like can breath again, can live properly again". This morning, when an older sister, who I first met in a forum and we felt in loves as sisters, asked me if it's fun to be a "fangirl", I answered without any second of hesitation "It is. I feel like I'm living again." She said if we had a chance to meet again, she would hug me ten times for what I said today which many others have longed to hear from me for so long.

4. Disconnected relationships

I'm not talking about those I hate because I would never mind giving any room in my mind and any minute of my time thinking about them. Instead, I'm gonna write about why I dropped some should-have-been-good relationships.

To me, people in such relationships are all good, at least they're as fine as ordinary buddies to whom I wanna give some of my thought. But for some reasons, I felt unable to bring myself to handle all of them. Our connections were like loose strings on which I had to spend time and effort to keep them... as loose as ever. That made me tired, my mind tired and my body also tired. I totally understand they all were nice and nothing wrong if they wanted to deliver me some sweet words, "bubble care" but like I said, maybe I'm a crazy, weird and greedy creature who doesn't know what it is to be content, I just felt like needing some gentle touches, some radiant smiles, some vivid voices, some body warmth, some more actions of care so that I know they were real, our relationships were real. Then, once things went off my limits, I ran away. And that's how I gave up, cowardly and irresponsibly. From time to time, I do wonder: is there anything wrong with me?

Me and family

1. Brother
2. Mom
3. Dad
4. Grandfather (dad's side)
5. How I was raised

(edit later)

Me and dreams

1. What I dreamed of

When I had to make a choice of which university I should enroll, I chose my current one 'cos I dreamed of being an expert of Japanese so that I could go (back) to Japan someday. I loved Japanese comics, some of which were so brilliant that they did effect my view of life back then.

I wanted to become a successful business woman so that I could earn lots of money as well as fame. I wanted to be recognized, to be honored. It was just a dream, I told you.

I wanted to built a gorgeous house for my family, and in order to do that, I knew I must study hard to earn enough money. It wasn't just a dream, I was a promise which I don't know if I can keep.

2. What I'm dreaming of

I don't know if it still can be called a dream once you can see a clear way to achieve it. So, I'm just gonna count what I've still got no idea how and what to do as "dreams".

I'm dreaming of the day when there's someone who can wake my heart up from death. I don't hate people for what I've got through, just simply I don't and can't feel anything after which.  There were some trying to act cool to me, but all I could do was... running away from them, and now I still am. Is this bad, I mean my present condition?

I still want to make the dream of that gorgeous house come true but it seems so hard for me at the moment, especially as I haven't got much vision of where life will lead me in several years to come.

I want to become an excellent translator. It's far more difficult than people think it is. Being good at a foreign language doesn't mean you can be a good translator. It takes you tons of study and years of life experience. I wish for a day when my translation of a foreign literary work appears on the bookshelves of local bookstores, and my name can be found under the book title as its main translator. I don't know why I love this job so much though it doesn't earn me much. No translator can be rich without another job.

3. What I did to my dreams

To some, I abandoned completely. The business woman, for instance.  After all I've got through in my fucking university (which is considered as one of the best domestic schools), I'm now pretty determined to become a professor like my Mom, by which I can help reduce the increasing number of crappy, heartless and irresponsible teachers in this country. One more reason for the abandonment is that after more than a year working in that famous company, I realized business environment is not where I can fit myself in. I worked hard and earned some recognition but all the time I felt like an actor on stage, putting on just fake appearance. I got almost no friends there and every work day left me exhausted.

To some, I hardly manage to carry on. Going to Japan is among them. To tell the truth, I'm really sick of the language but an inner voice tells me not to give up since I've been going this far. Mom is going to to find me a school in Japan next year and she's hoping that I can be accepted to her old school, a prestigious one. Do I owe you for any huge debts in my past life, Japanese?

4. What I'm doing to realize my dreams

I'm still struggling with my resistance to Japanese. If it's not for the sake of my further study and the dream of becoming a professor, I would kill anyone who dares to spill a single Japanese word in front of me. I like my Japanese name, which means "a beautiful flower" and sounds similar to my real name, I like Japanese manga and anime, I like Japanese arts but they're not enough to serve as a motivation in this situation, where I find myself totally lack the so-called "passion".

I'm going to study hard for the final graduation exams so that I can make up a little for the poor academic result at school over 4 years. I will follow anything my parents tell me to do and let them show me a way. I've been really really tired during the nightmare so I think moving on on a good path is somehow a good way to rest.

I'm gonna be a good child again from now on.

Me and life

1. Who I am

I was born in fall which is said to be the season of poetry. I really like this season and thus, am very proud of my month of birth. But it's kinda strange that no matter how I favor September as well as its yellow-turns-red leaves and cool breezes, summer appears to be the most lucky season of the year for me. I don't hate winter, the time that teaches me the meaning of warmth and hugs. It also allows me to show off my huge collection of winter coats which helps change my colors every single day. "You look like a colorful ice-cream" - said a classmate when I was in junior high school. However, winter, with its cold and rough weather, plays as the toughest  time of a year for me. The worst things I've encountered in my life so far all happened on winter background. If a friend is close enough, he/she never cares to leave me any greetings on Christmas 'cos they know it's the time I hate the most of the year. 10 years in a row, this year included, Christmas was such a nightmare to me, as if I'd been cast under a cruel spell against the season. Since the death of my grandfather (dad's side), spring is no long special to me. I even want it to pass faster so that I can go back to my daily routine in summer. This is how I enjoy a year.

Parents, close friends and strangers, they all tend to use one word to describe me: WEIRD. They find it hard to understand what's going on in my mind, and sometimes frustration is the only thing they can get as my reactions go against all of their predictions. But also, there's one thing on which they all agree and thanks to which I'm not abandoned despite my weirdness, that is: I always am the one in front of whom they can put their hearts on their sleeves without being afraid of any hurt.

2. How I lived

For the first 19 years of my life, I was a good child to my family. I made them so proud that they could boast about their daughter anytime, anywhere. I was all new to the outer world, and hence, to me it was beautiful and fantastic. I could easily trust people and believed that my kindness would be repaid with kindness. My heart was wide open (although my behaviors appeared to be not) and I did everything with 100% enthusiasm. My friend said I was so innocent back then, yet most beautiful.

For the next 3 years, after I first experienced what it was to be heart-broken and betrayed, I began my long journey to see this world more clearly. Let alone I let my study drop off shamefully, I was a true rebel against my family. I got a job in a famous company which is a dream place for many people. I worked like a professional and never in my life, I'd had to smile that much. Yah, I say "had to" because it wasn't what I "wanted to". My friend, again, said "You seem to smile a lot more and easy-going towards people, but your heart is closed". It was the darkest time in my life so far, the worst and longest nightmare I've ever had.

3. How I want to live

Now, as the nightmare is gone, I wanna be back to my true self. It may not be so good and professional-look, but it's simply who I am.

To me, a day would be perfect if I wake up after a sound sleep, do some house chores, read books, listen to music, cook delicious meals, write several words about something I like, learn foreign languages, meet a nice friend and on that day, there shouldn't be so much sound.

I don't have many friends and I don't want to, either. I can't handle so many relationships at the same time even though I tried hard. However, on the other hand, I want to open my heart again, to let people in and let them decide to stay with me or not. It feels better than to live like a moving creature with a dead heart, I think.

4. How I'm gonna live

The idea "how I'm going to live" is not always the same as "how I want to live", but for once, I'm wanting them to be one.

I'm going back home soon, to start all over again. Maybe in one year, I'll be leaving it again but I believe it'll be different this time. Because it's the journey that everyone earnestly wants me to take so that they can see a bright me back.