Live and Let Die

When you were young and your heart was an open book
You used to say live and let live
But in this ever changing world in which we live in
Makes you give in and cry
Say live and let die

- Paul McCartney, "Live and Let Die"

Somebody put a few pictures of an obscure production by the NUS law faculty online. Through the Proust effect I suddenly remembered about what it was like to attend that production.

It was a musical about the Tiananmen square revolt, and it was written by a Law student who by coincidence was a senior of mine in my school. When I was in sec 3 I saw a school play of his, and I thought, this is great. I didn’t know that sec 4 students could write so well. Next year I wrote a play and staged it for the same event, and although it was a less happy experience than I expected, it was a dream come true for me and it feels great when you can cross out 1 item from your “things to do with your life” list.

But that was not the reason I attended the production. It was because of a violinist who was playing a bit part in that production. I had a crush on that violinist, who was codfish, whom you know from a few articles back.

I can still tell you what it was like to go there. I didn’t have a “reason” to be there. It was weird. There were ppl I sorda knew, and they were like, “who’s he with?”

To recap, I had met codfish while temping, and probably started having a crush on her without fully realising it at that time. But I KIV’ed her, probably for 4 years and then after a chance meeting we started corresponding by mail. (Yes when I say that I’m KIV’ing somebody it’s not the same as saying that I’m giving her up).

I was a little bruised and battered after my first year studying overseas. But towards the end of that first year I started writing to her. After I came home for a visit, we started talking on the phone. She happened to mention that she was involved in this production.

It took place at a location that almost certainly doesn’t exist anymore: the old harbourfront auditorium that got converted into offices probably.

I can certainly tell you that if I hadn’t lived through those emotions before and somebody tried to describe them to me, I wouldn’t have the faintest clue what he was talking about. But when you’re teetering on the brink, it’s this mixture of awe and fear and at the same time the expectancy of a wondrous and delightful experience. Even back then I was a little old to never have asked out a girl before.

I thought it was weird for me to pop into the dressing room and say hi when I hadn’t yet gotten to know her better. So I left. I didn’t want to admit that I had gone to a show all alone (I had faith in the playwright, though but still…) just because I had a schoolboy crush on some obscure fiddler in one corner of the orchestral pit.

Well even though I was pretty pleased that it turned out to be more than just a schoolboy crush, even though we did end up as friends after that, I ended up severing ties with her a few years ago. Probably I was fed up with her condescending attitude, probably we found that I was getting less interested in film (she’s a film graduate student, and I wonder how her PhD’s coming along – it’s been quite some time already), and she was emphatically no engineer. She used to say that the best thing I said to her was that I would never leave her. I think I just wanted to piss her off.

I’ve been tempted to get back in touch with her, particularly after one time when she gave me a shout out on her blog. I decided not to, and for some funny reason not long after that her blog was locked.

I was a much more open person in those days. I genuinely thought I was going to become a new person – kinder, gentler, more open. Some parts of my teenage years were really nasty and it seemed to be all over at that point. But things didn’t work out. Or maybe I just didn’t have enough faith. There was a haze of confusion after the relationship ended, but after that for some strange reason I turned away from that kinder gentler thing. I became more hard, more dead. Maybe it was too much maths.

And that’s why that picture startled me a little bit – because you go back to all those times when there were forks in the road in your life, and you’re always wondering, “what would have happened if I had turned out differently? What if I went to this school instead of that, worked for this company instead of that?” What if I became the kinder gentler version of numbernine instead of being lazy and becoming a spoilt brat?

She looked great. She always looks great. But there’s something hidden, something vaguely inscrutable about her, as though she wears a mask. She looks a little like a sphinx. I’d wager she’s got a great sphincter although to my eternal regret I never got to find out.

She told me details of her unhappy childhood. At first, I thought, OK – not bad we got that much in common. (There is a significant correlation between those people who have unhappy childhoods and those people who leave their countries after they grow up.) But I don’t know how to put this nicely – she’s damaged goods. I wish she had her head screwed on properly – but if she did, she would be out of my league. That’s the tragic part – at that time I genuinely believed that I would not have had a shot at a chiobu unless she was a little sick in the head. I could have saved myself some problems if I had had walked out on her, but I stuck this one out because I believed that if I found somebody better she would want to walk out on me. I guess that’s why you find some people getting onto heroin even though they know what it entails – because they don’t really think they’re going to find other better forms of happiness.

For somebody as good looking as her to not be able to hold on to a permanent relationship, that is sad. For somebody as smart as her not to be able to achieve more in life, that is also sad.

So as much through laziness I will not contact her again. But during those first few days while I was corresponding with her, I was happy. It was a wild crazy sort of happiness in the beginning, and maybe a calm peaceful sort of happiness before all the problems started. And when I look back, I think that it’s that happiness that I miss and not her. That as much as she inspired it, I also created much of it in my own mind’s eye. Except that it’s probably long ago enough for me to not really understand it anymore.