토요일, 2월 28, 2004
20th birthdays are one of the oddest times to be stuck at, firstly because there are no cards that proclaim “happy 20th!” in your face. the card makers seem to think that people jump from being 18 straight to 21, which is a rationale that is really beyond me. no wonder people nowadays say “time flies”. brings with a whole new meaning.

i walked down the aisles of a card shop (name withheld) just the other day trying to find a card for faz’s 20th while still reeling from being bombarded by the myriad colours and various cartoon characters that adorned the shelves (not to mention the cards on the shelves as well). quite frankly i thought that my eyes were playing tricks on me when i found out, to my horror that the good people at hallmark or whatever seem to think that people only go from ages 1 through 10, then straight on to 16, 18, 21 and then 30, 40, 50 and so on. what, do people in between not have birthdays as well? it was a tad annoying, to be quite honest, coming from a person who quite likes birthdays as occasions per se. i suppose you would have thought that in a university town, where most of the uni students are around that age anyway, you would cater for cards that are more abundant in that age range wouldn't you?

but no.

that meant there was lots of hunting, lots of scrounging around, to see whether there was anything better to be had. we (renu and i) did come up with something in the end, but that's another story for another time. moving on then.

being 2 decades old is a special time (despite the fact that there are no cards to commemorate it, but i get carried away). it represents a limbo age, closer to adulthood than 19, which is a time when people still don't take you seriously because your age still has a '-teen' behind it, not that it's funny though. for me, it was a time when i learnt to wise up about many things, but of course it means different things to different people. there is no set formula to go about it, but it all comes to you in time.

don't worry, it is possible to go to sleep and wake up in the morning in roughly the same shape that you were the night before, but somehow the world looks at you in a different way, just as you will learn to look at the world in a different way. fair's fair you know. there are no words to describe it, but the life we lead, or the life we will come to lead, will exemplify it. i thought about that as i walked over the bridge the other day. too many things that were horribly important in the past seem to be, forgive the pun, water under the bridge at the time of going to press. all too easily, life does one of its twists and turns, uncovering a new facet of life that has remained hidden all this while.

so what to do when the big 2-0 rolls round? one thing's for sure -- thank your lucky stars that you've come this far. there is no substitute for youth, of course, but look at it this way: there's youth which involves overalls and pigtails, there's youth which involves make-up and experimentation, and there's youth which involves brightness and exuberance. just like how money can't buy happiness, love and a whole truckload of other things, youth is something that can't be bought, and comes to one slowly as slowly gets. there is no speeding up that formula, and, if you think about it, now’s the time when the experience of living is at its prime.

the threshold of teenager to young adult may be a treacherous time, although not in any way different from being a teenager (seeing that the world has progressed in such ways as we do not know nowadays), there is more legroom for improvisation and interpretation, and more chances for one to trudge out into the great unchartered territory that is the world we will come to live, nurture and maybe even grow to love. wasteland or utopia, it will become what we choose to make of it. i could push the envelope a bit and say that i'm speaking from experience, but experience comes, not with age, but with realisation, and in many aspects, the realisation is just hitting me.

so on your birthday faz, take time out to ponder the significance of your existence here on earth, and see how many lives you have touched with you just being yourself. happy birthday, and thank you for being a friend in every possible way. you will surely acheive great things, so long as you put your mind to it, and you have friends who are just as willing to be behind you all the way.