REBIRTH

The blog which I had painstakingly laboured upon, is somehow gone to the wind. Moir does not know why and have given up trying to see what can be done to undo the technical glitch..

So very much UNLIKE LIFE, I will start again...rebirth. (Yeah, I know people claim they can be born-again whatever, but man, the past sticks on to you like stubborn lint!)

Yesterday, I attended the funeral of a friend from a much rather distant past. Last night, today and probably for some time more, life will not be the same.

Have you ever wondered what if tonight, is literally your last night on Earth? No more encores, no more re-dos, no more re-plays..

Six feet under, cremated or even preserved in cryogenic matter, the game ends here. You can purchase another ten dollars worth of tokens for the slot machine to churn your life into action but dead as a log, life ends there. FULL-STOP. DONE.

I thought once before when I lost the LOVE of my life, it meant life was done for. ZILCH. No more. I thought that's what it feels like to lose that last ounce of life. Completely devastated, you think life has ended and you might as well throw the towel in.

But yesterday, past mid-day, when I received the news that Y*** has passed on, this spirited, personable woman, who in part, reminds me of myself, time stood still.

I teach my students this phrase; 'rooted to the ground', my heart felt like that. It refused to budge for a nanosecond as I try not to let all the air be sucked right off my throat.

Impossible! In her prime, mid thirties. How can a person, so big in stature, suddenly in an instant, become part of a set of funeral rites? Unnatural..or is it?

I'm not close to her. She was an individual who formed part of a past memory. And yet, here I am today, rebirthing this blog with her story in mind.

Death is so final.

I laid up all night thinking. How much more awful it would have been if it was an actual close friend's funeral? What is 'Y***' 'doing' now? What if instead of 'Y***' it was me whose lying in that cold, dark grave? Would I know how to face the angel of death who faith decrees will come up to me..my soul..whichever?

Would I have had the chance to make peace or say good-bye to the light of my life? Would I rest in peace?

What would it feel like not to have to wake up and go to work anymore? Or play with the children? Or eat breakfast? Or even brush your teeth?

Then the inevitable happens..I knew I'm not prepared to go. No matter how I had once childishly ranted I was only because life threw a curve ball. Not when death feels this final.

I have not worked like I would live a thousand years more and I have not practised my faith like I would die tomorrow.

I'm not done preparing for that finality. The work must go on. As my darling 5-year old puts it, "She's gone to see Allah, ya Mama. We cannot talk anymore. We bathe her then we climb into the hole. Then we take her and put her in there. We call Papa, ya Mama. We ask him to come back. Singaporeans stay in Singapore, not Indonesia."

"Yes dear, we call Papa, ask him to come back soon. Then we continue to work some more. We stay in Singapore."

I still need to stay put here, alive and kicking.