Patchworks: Let’s go back to the start
My grandmother called me on the phone every single day when I was a child, just to chat. But I was always impatient to get back to my computer game, and pressed the hang up button on the phone. When I released the button, she was still on the line, oblivious that I was not listening anymore.
Listening to her voice was a privilege that is taken away by time. The daily phone calls dwindled to just once every few days as she increasingly weakened with age. When she passed away, the calls stopped altogether. I could not get used to her lack of presence, so I pretended that she was still there in her Bukit Batok flat, except for the physical impossibility of meeting up.
This lack of appreciation on my part was a reminder that my grandmother, like all elderly people, was a human time capsule. Their unique experiences from tumultuous times in history made them knowledgeable, and also enriched them emotionally. What elderly people can tell us, in my opinion, are stories far more meaningful and memorable than the superficiality in this current age.
When I interviewed Mr Soh Yong Kee, a 73-year-old former secret society member, he too had anecdotes to share, stories that survived layers of memories piled through the decades.
His bare back bore scars of knife wounds sustained from past gang fights, and his right leg had also suffered from traumatic injuries due to the clashes. However, in his old age Mr Soh said he has since mellowed from the violent days of his youth.
He said: “The doctor at Tan Tock Seng told me that elderly people cannot get too upset. We must enjoy the little things in life and go with the flow. But I asked him, why can’t we choose to be miserable? He said, what has passed is already in the past. Thinking about it will only harm the brain and worsen my glaucoma.”
While listening to him, I had this thought. This man had experienced his own happiness, tribulations, triumphs and loss to arrive at a point in his life where he is finally at peace with himself. It was also a little lesson in itself, that no matter how unsatisfied or aimless we are with our lives, there is always the perennial hope that one day we will have our own self-actualizing moment.
Yip Jieying
Cross-posted from Yesterday.sg on 28th June 2009.
http://yesterday.sg/2009/06/lets-go-back-to-the-start/
Listening to her voice was a privilege that is taken away by time. The daily phone calls dwindled to just once every few days as she increasingly weakened with age. When she passed away, the calls stopped altogether. I could not get used to her lack of presence, so I pretended that she was still there in her Bukit Batok flat, except for the physical impossibility of meeting up.
This lack of appreciation on my part was a reminder that my grandmother, like all elderly people, was a human time capsule. Their unique experiences from tumultuous times in history made them knowledgeable, and also enriched them emotionally. What elderly people can tell us, in my opinion, are stories far more meaningful and memorable than the superficiality in this current age.
When I interviewed Mr Soh Yong Kee, a 73-year-old former secret society member, he too had anecdotes to share, stories that survived layers of memories piled through the decades.
His bare back bore scars of knife wounds sustained from past gang fights, and his right leg had also suffered from traumatic injuries due to the clashes. However, in his old age Mr Soh said he has since mellowed from the violent days of his youth.
He said: “The doctor at Tan Tock Seng told me that elderly people cannot get too upset. We must enjoy the little things in life and go with the flow. But I asked him, why can’t we choose to be miserable? He said, what has passed is already in the past. Thinking about it will only harm the brain and worsen my glaucoma.”
While listening to him, I had this thought. This man had experienced his own happiness, tribulations, triumphs and loss to arrive at a point in his life where he is finally at peace with himself. It was also a little lesson in itself, that no matter how unsatisfied or aimless we are with our lives, there is always the perennial hope that one day we will have our own self-actualizing moment.
Yip Jieying
Cross-posted from Yesterday.sg on 28th June 2009.
http://yesterday.sg/2009/06/lets-go-back-to-the-start/
