Improve

I woke up this morning, sat at my desk and thought how nice it was that I could finally sit down and have a cup of tea.  Maybe finally get cracking on those 1,982 emails in my inbox.  Perhaps even do laundry.

About 1/5 of the way through my cup of tea, the phone started ringing, yet more emails began pouring in, and the day began.

By the end of the day, or, technically, the beginning of the next morning, life is already different again.  As it had been every day for more days than I care to count.

Ideally, I like to write about the lessons I learn in life here on this blog.  But lately, I have been learning them too quickly to be able to actually document them.  Suffice it to say that, as painful as it is to actually put this in words, my parents have been right about some things all along.

When you have Chinese parents who grew up in the midst of the cultural revolution, the first words you hear when coming out of the womb is: "Never rely on anything but your own two hands."  And then those words are repeated to you every hour on the hour.  If I ever had a motto in life, other than to eat as much as I can when I can because who knows when food might appear again, this is pretty much it.

Unfortunately, I have really bad memory.  Sometimes I have lapses in judgment and sanity lasting varying lengths of time.  Compounding these problems is the fact that my own two hands are bruised, cut, bleeding, swollen, incompetent, confused, and basically useless almost all of the time.  So, sometimes I get weak and accept offers of help from other people.  And there has never been a single time this has happened that I haven't regretted it almost immediately thereafter.

I'm not saying it's a bad thing.  But it's not my thing.  And it's not about pride.  It's about the fact that when you are determined to live out your life being chained to nothing, accepting the help of another person is the heaviest ball and chain there is, tying you involuntarily and indefinitely to the mercy of that other person.  How I had managed to forget this...well, like I said, I have really bad memory.

Today, Saturday, March 19, 2011, at 3:26AM, I am going to try to improve my memory.