Repeating the Past

The year is 1999, or maybe 2000, or perhaps even 2001. It's an afternoon of a school day (or not, it could be a school holiday, but it's definitely in the mid or late afternoon), and I am with Mama in her room at the old family house in Jalan Setangkai. After sitting with me for probably an hour (but it definitely felt more), and dragging me reluctantly through either reading the Chinese textbook or doing assessment books, Mama is now forcing me to skip rope at least 500 times before I am free to do whatever (not that I remember 'whatever' is anymore).

I can still picture the scene as she sits on the bed, the old CRT TV in front of me, and the massage chair behind me, as I skip rope and try to avoid hitting things. I don't know if it's the same exact skipping rope I am using in this(ese) memor(ies), but I had a pink one and a purple one where the rope portion was filled with water and glitter. The late afternoon sun is a nice solid yellow, and you can see the dust motes float in the air. 

Today I am at least 2x heavier and 3x older than the girl I was in that memory, but today for the first time in decades I took a skipping rope and did 100 skips. And boy did those 100 skips seem bloody hard. I was inspired by one of those little clips (a FB reel? a YouTube short?) of a black lady who was skipping rope to lose weight, which is also something I sorely need to do. I feel all doughy and soft all over, and I don't like it one bit. Unfortunately it's been very hard to exercise consistently since having two kids, and I'm not sure if I want to commit to buying a treadmill even though jogging has been my most consistent form of exercise for ages. So, I got a skipping rope and a pair of walking shoes from Decathlon today, and after I got back from my physiotherapy session (and buying dinner for everyone from Domino's Pizza and My Cozy Corner), I skipped 100 times in the kitchen.

The similarity doesn't just end there however, because I've also started trying to read Chinese again. Even though I am working with a kid's book I picked up from Popular Bras Bersah when I went there at the beginning of the month with Tiffany and M, it is definitely harder than anything I remember actually reading and paying attention to. Ironically I only picked it up because I thought the cover was cute - of an orange cat dressed as a Chinese Emperor. I started this because I felt that I needed to practice my own Chinese skills if I was going to non-hypocritcally encourage my own two children to learn Chinese. 

And so there you have it, I am reapeating the past in a way that is unexpected and surprising even to myself. I suppose I should tell Mama about this, she would be quite pleased to know that the things and values she tried to inculcate in me still endure (and have suddenly popped up!) till today.

Fever

Unlike the last post, which took a little bit of thought and recall, I can easily recount what happened during the last 5 days because I was basically doing the same thing every day - dealing with a feverish 2 year old who was sleeping poorly. I had to give M child acetaminophen/paracetamol almost every 6h, because of how high and constant her fever was. 

In the end, we didn't celebrate M's birthday because she fell sick at 3am on her birthday. For the whole of Friday and Saturday too, I didn't leave the house and just stayed with her. Yesterday I was so wiped, the two of us basically spent the entire day sleeping, napping in both the morning and the afternoon. This morning however, when M and I both woke up at 10:30am (after a 3am wake up), she finally had no fever, though she started to get a non-itchy rash over her body. I don't recall E having ever had such a long fever with no other symptoms like this, even though apparently 3 to 5 days of a fever is normal for children.

Anyway thanks to that, I've gotten through almost 160 chapters of the manhwa version of the Omniscent Reader. Thank goodness for being able to read stuff for free on the Webtoons app.

SG Jan 2024

After spending a grand total of about a week living in the NJ house, Jon and I flew with the girls to SG on 11th Dec. As always, he had to leave earlier, and left on 28th Dec. Meanwhile, the girls and I will remain in SG until 15th Feb, enabling us to celebrate both Christmas and Chinese New Year in Singapore. I personally haven't celebrated Christmas in Singapore since I left in 2014 (so the last Christmas would have been 2013), so even though it's not such a big event here, it was nice to be around again. 

Anyway, a quick recounting of the days I can recall for the past week (time spent writing it all out a large limiting factor):

17 (Wednesday) - My parents had an important meeting at home with the social workers for Ryan today, so I brought the girls out. My parents dropped us off at Holland V, and I brought the girls to the Artgrounds at the new shopping mall (I don't actually know its name). We were the only 3 people there, and the girls had a lot of fun. Towards the end, they started to get hungry, and after being unable to get hold of my folks (still busy with the social worker), I ended up bringing the girls to lunch by myself. E said she wanted to eat ramen, so we went to Ippudo. Eating alone with the kids, was stressful and an ordeal as usual. They fought over the endamame, which I'm sure they enjoyed because it was very well salted, and the yakult that came with the kids meal. 

After that, I managed to manuver them through the hawker centre (2nd teh ping of the day), and through the old Holland V shopping centre and to Island Creamery. There, I got them to try my favourites (Isfahan and Milo Ping Pong), and they really enjoyed them, which felt gratifying. When they finished (somehow making minimal mess!), I managed to bring them up another floor to say hi to the TCM lady I've been seeing, Nana. She and her colleague were very charmed by the girls, and she said she now knows why I am so tired, because M was being naughty as usual. My parents had finished eating lunch nearby at this point, and so they came to pick us up to head home.

18 (Thursday) - Everyone went along to drop Ryan off at his care centre today. My dad left and my mum brought the girls to the playground. Meanwhile I went off to a nearby kopitiam to have onion thosai and teh ping. This time the guy offered me fish curry with my thosai, and it was so deliciously satisfying. The kids played, ate ice cream, and had sugary drinks, and I was unable to intervene or offer an alternative. Around 11:30am, my dad picked us up and we went to a nearby placed to da bao our lunch. I managed to find chicken chop, which I had been craving for a while, so I was happy. 

After lunch, I made E do some work for a bit. Then I read some of a chinese book I have been working on. Finally around 2pm, my dad's friend came and we chatted to him for about an hour. When he left, I went upstairs to nap.

19 (Friday) - Took a bus to Orchard Road with M to meet Shu and check out her new place. We met her outside Wheelock Place, and walked to her new apartment with her. There, we hung out for a while, and E got a kick running around in circles. Eventually, she settled down and ended up watching two episodes of My Little Pony, before we left to get lunch. Lunch was at Prive outside Wheelock, and I really enjoyed the crayfish pasta I had, while also marvelling at how spicy the 'mild' level was - I should have known this would forbode bad things. 

After lunch, we continued to Toast Box downstairs, where I had a second teh ping (this probably did not help). I hadn't drank much of it however, when I noticed I was starting to get a headache. We walked out with Shu and towards the bus stop, and purposely waited for bus number 7, because E had been talking about wanting to ride a double decker bus for a while. I noticed I was feeling very exhausted. At Holland V, we changed to our regular bus and reached home.

At home I lay down for a bit, and noticed my stomach was starting to feel bloated. My headache got a little bit worse. However, I had already made an appointment with Nana, my TCM lady for 4:30pm, and so even though I wasn't feeling great, I still left the house again. During the TCM session, maybe because I was in so much pain (hello Tui Na, Gua Sha, Cupping, and Bloodletting), I didn't really notice much. When I stood up after the session however, I noticed I was feeling a little faint. My bloating and burping also felt way over the top. Not good. Still, I had also promised to pick up dinner and meet my dad at Holland Close market, and so I walked over there in the drizzle. 

It wasn't until the food was obtained and I had gotten into the car however, that I started to feel really, really, really, fucking sick. I was in 6/10 discomfort/pain. I had a pounding headache, and I was nauseous and bloated. I ended up throwing up multiple times, to find that I hadn't digested much of lunch at all, and that my nose now was REALLY FUCKING SPICY. Anyway I spent the rest of the night feeling like death and wishing I could be put out of my misery, and as usual I couldn't fall asleep until past midnight, and so I was awake and miserable, because life sucks. 

20 (Saturday) - Ryan's swimming lessons started again this week. We ended up at Clementi, and after my dad took Ryan off for class, I went to the hawker centre with my mum and the girls to have teh tarik and prata. I ended up barely having any prata, because the girls absolutely loved it with the sugar. There was also a point when M knocked a big cup of soy bean milk over and made a huge mess, so that was a small ordeal. We walked through Clementi central, stopping by the CNY market in the middle to buy random items. Then we ended up in the mall for a bit, but a lot of things were still closed, and then it was time for us to meet my dad and Ryan again. 

In the late afternoon, Uncle KL came to pick up me and the girls, but E threw a huge tantrum and in the end only M and I went with him. We went to Junction 8 in Bishan to meet Matt for dinner at Genki Sushi, and it's a good thing we ate early, because a formidable line started up around 5:45pm. After dinner, we wandered around random stores for a bit, like Popular and Best Denki, which was nice. Matt has gotten far more pleasant to hang around with than before, a sign of maturity I suppose. Then, Uncle KL dropped M and I home, and we discovered my parents had gone out with E and Ryan. It was nice enjoying the quiet for a bit, before everyone else came home.

21 (Sunday) - My mum and dad went to church in the morning so I watched the 3 kids(?) at home. While hanging up clothes to dry outside, I heard E yelling a lot but decided to ignore her (it was her MUMMYYYY non-urgent yell). By the time I finished almost 20 minutes later, I walked in to see her wrestling a diaper onto a naked M. Apparently M had pooped and E was trying to tell me, but when I didn't reply, thought that I had also left the house and hence decided to change her sister. M however, declined to be as cooparative when it came to putting on clothes, and instead ran away E tried to put clothes on her. Later, all 3 kids ended upstairs in Ryan's room, and they played around him and he lay on his bed and tried to serve him plastic play food. 

After my parents came back, I caught a ride with them to Holland V where I was meeting Deni and Ryan (another one, lol), for lunch. I didn't know what was unique and good, so I suggested Xiang Xiang again. The line this time was less forgiving, so by the time Deni and Ryan appeared I was still lining up. I'm glad we stayed though, because they ended up enjoying the food and agreeing that it was unique. Even though I was running thin on time, I couldn't resist grabbing another teh ping from the hawker centre with them. Then I made the mistake of sitting down to chat. By the time I realised the the time, I was going to be late for meeting up with Shu at MBS. Even the cab took a long time to finally arrive to pick me up. 

By the time I got into the cab and was on the way to MBS, I realised I should not have had a second teh ping. My stomach felt awful and I didn't feel great. By the time the cab reached MBS, I wanted to run out and look for the nearest bathroom. Anyway, this meant I was exhausted and physically not feeling great, as Shu and I traversed the exhibition halls looking at all the art on display at ArtSG. We were struck by how crowded the place was, and she told me it had been even more packed on Thursday when there was a pre-opening party. On the upside, the B2 exhibition halls were less crowded, and the art appealed to us more. While wandering around there, we ran into a friend of HM, who said this meant we had more expensive taste, because the bigger and more reputable galleries were exhibiting downstairs, lol. 

My parents had someone decided to bring the kids out again in the evening, so after MBS, Shu and I took a bus to Marina Square to meet them. I was feeling very drained and not-great-at-all, and after being unable to contact my parents, we ended up just sitting on the stage set up for CNY for a while. When we finally found them at the indoor play area, my mum was so tickled as she kept recounting this story about this little girl who was so fascinated with M that she followed her around the play area. At one point M wanted to ride one of those coin-operated cars, and so she scrambled after M to put coins that she had in a little pouch in. When the car started moving, 5 different other kids all suddenly piled into the car, and then when it ended they all melted into the teeming mass of other manic kids in the play area. 

Shu declined to join us for dinner, and we ended up at Chickenboo. The kids loved the food, and my parents were happy, but I could have done without considering I was still feeling like I was dying by the second. By the time I reached the car, I felt so incredibly relieved that I had survived the day intact.

22 (Monday) - My mum and I took a bus to Holland V with the girls to bring them to Artgrounds before meeting family friends (Aunty SF and Uncle HC) for lunch. This time the Artgrounds was more full with lots of mums and their toddlers. E was the oldest kid there by far. While they had fun, by the 1hr mark the girls were bored and hungry. We left early and walked around for a bit before meeting Aunty SF and Uncle HC at La Nonna for lunch. The food was good and enjoyable. I left a little early towards the end with E to pick up a teh ping from the hawker centre and a coconut ice cream, before rejoining everyone else outside La Nonna. 

In the end, we finished the ice cream while waiting for Uncle HC to pick us up by car and head to their place. When we reached their place, the girls immediately gravitated towards their pool. Soon they were completely soaking wet, and my mum and I were tired from squatting by the girls to watch them/stopping M for jumping in. Both E and M were manically delirious from splashing at the pool. I haven't seen them so happy and enjoying themselves in a while. After they dried off and had some ice cream, they started playing with the rocks and the flowers in the garden while my mum chatted with Aunty SF. Finally, Uncle HC sent us home when we were done.

23 (Tuesday) - The stated agenda for today was to bring the girls to a water play area. After picking up my new passport at the Ghim Mo h post office, we were headed towards Kallang Wave, only for my mum to find out after a quick look-up that it was closed on a Tuesday. We diverted to the West towards Jurong, and went to the Science Center, only to find out that the water play area was closed for 2 days for maintenance. Lol. We then headed to Jurong Lake, and while there was a nice and large water area, it was very simple. E enjoyed herself nonetheless, while the rest of us waded in. M however, was not having it. She threw a fit and refused to go into the water. Even after I coaxed her in and she relaxed a little, she still wasn't very pleased. Go figure. 

We went for lunch at a kopitiam and I shared this really nice but spicy chicken curry with my mum. After that, my parents were still determined to find a 'proper water play place' for the kids (WHY???), and we ended up at Westgate, where they found the water area closed (LOL). I had wandered off by then to walk in circles around the 4th floor, and later found them with the kids doing the window colouring art. I managed to pop into Kiddy Palace and Popular during then, so my inner consumer was satiated. 

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Tomorrow M turns 2. Haven't yet quite figured out what to do, but it will probably involve some sort of indoor play area, and a chocolate cake.

Last Spin in St Louis

 

This will be the last spin I will ever do in St Louis, Missouri. It is corriedale, and from two braids (so 8oz total) that I bought off a dyer on Fiber Market Place. I will probably keep it as a single and hopefully use it for both warp and weft on my rigid heddle loom, after we move to New Jersey and get settled. If it wasn't for St Louis (and by extension the more relaxed nature of the Midwest), I don't think I would have nearly learned or picked up as much, or as fast, as I did in the fiber arts world. It is yet another thing that I will miss dearly after yet I leave here, but sometning I'll take with me for the rest of my life.

We have less than a week left in St Louis, and next week at this time we should be in Indianapolis. We are shipping our items in PODs, and will be driving the cars (and kids) together with my Dad, who has been staying with us the last month to help with the move. I am very nervous about the move and settling into NJ, but I know that I am in the best of company for doing so. 

St Louis, I will miss you and its people.

My Days

My time spent every day is basically spent in a few broad categories:

1) Keep kids alive

2) Keep kids stimulated/enriched (that is, not parked in front of a device)

3) Cook

4) Clean

5) Laundry

6) House errands, like grocery shopping, addressing emails and things regarding the house

7) Keeping myself sane

8) Making sure I get adequate rest so I can perform the more critical duties like number 1

And thanks to Madeleine not sleeping by herself any more (she will instead scream/cry for 2h 30min+ without napping - that's the longest I've held out so I'm not sure how long she can actually tolerate), my time for doing all of these things is woefully constrained. 

Last night was the neighbourhood Block Party. While I really enjoyed it, it did push everyone's bed time later, and then E was awake throwing a fit in the middle of the night. I ended up sending her late to school. Meanwhile M is as clingy as ever and not sleeping alone. I know it's only these 2 weeks that I'm flying solo, and while I relish being independent and being able to make my own decisions with zero input as to how to spend the day, I am just tired.

Bye Pin Oak, Bye Silver Maple

When we first moved into our first

 house, it was partly because Jon and I fell in love with the landscaping and all the trees. In particular, I loved the big Pin Oak in our front yard. It provided a lot of nice shade, especially in the summer. As we don't have much space in the back yard, I used to inflate the baby wading pool/sprinkler toy in the front yard, under the shade of the tree, which was fine because we lived on such a quiet street anyway.

However we are are moving in a few months, and both big trees in our front yard, the Pin Oak and the Silver Maple, are sick and dying. Today the tree people finally came to cut them down, and I am feeling very sad. It costs over 5k to get them removed, and their loss will be keenly felt, especially since so many big trees have been dying around our little subdivision of Morwood Hills. Once shaded streets now feel the full blast of the Midwest sun. Maybe we will plant a new tree before we go, maybe we will leave it to the new house owners, but either way the removal of those trees is just yet another stage in our departure from St Louis.

Edit: this is how M has decided to watch the tree chopping 

The Very Hungry Caterpillar

Last week at Aldi, I bought 2 bags of Gala apples. This is because I noticed E had been eating a lot of apples recently, so I thought 2 bags of apples (3 pounds for each bag?) would be enough for us to last the week-ish until my next Aldi shop. When I opened both bags of apples, they overflowed out of the fruit bowl and into another container. Today after buying a bag of oranges from Sam's Club, I went to put them in the fruit bowls and found a grand total of 2 apples left. 2. Apples. I don't know how on earth she finished them all, because Jon doesn't eat apples (allergy), and M sure as heck doesn't know what to do with one. I eat apples at the rate of about 1 a day, but in order to have finished all the apples, E must have been eating about 4 a day. I am both befuddled and amazed.

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Last Sunday, I attended a beginner's drop spindle class as part of the Midwest Fiber Festival to learn how to spin yarn. I've been trying to practice everyday (10 minutes at least), and it's quite a fun new rabbit hole to get involved in. The class was 4h long, and at the end of it my mind and eyes were swimming from the sheer effort of focusing so long on a single thing - something I haven't done in years. At the same time, I haven't spent so long on just one non-child related thing in years. After that, I browsed the vendors at the Midwest Fiber Festival, and learnt a lot of new spinning/fiber vocabulary from the kind and knowledgeable vendors (combed/carded/top/batts/staple). Then I went to run errands. So I was gone from the house for close to 7 hours, which is definitely the longest Jon has been left alone with the girls. When I got home, Jon said he never knew they fought so much, haha. 

Anyway, this is how much yarn I've spun for the past week. As much as I enjoy the process so far, and all the new knowledge it brings, I'm still not sure what to do with the yarn I've spun. I'm not the best crocheter, and I don't really know how to knit. Still, there's something in the act of spinning that feels meditative, and makes me feel connected to history, like the huge nerd I am.

Muse

Last night, Jon and I attended a Muse concert at the Chaifetz Arena. It was a nice size, big yet cosy at the same time, and the surrounding infrastructure much less messy than the Enterprise Center. I have been listening to Muse a lot on and off since I was about 16, and seeing them live was one of my big wishes. This concert was by far, the best live act I have ever seen. 

Evanescence was the second act playing last night (we missed the opening act because of the kids), and we managed to catch the show in the nick of time. Then Muse came on at 9pm and played for a solid 2 hours, and it was amazing with the changing sets, pyrotechnics and assorted exploding confetti. As usual, they had a solid setlist that told a narrative, and yet incorporated a lot of older hits from almost all of their albums. I'm thankful that I finally got to see them live.

Reddit Comment

The best Reddit comment for Feb 2023 goes to the user who commented:

"Goodnight room,
Goodnight moon,
Goodnight Chinese high altitude surveillance balloon."

Cookie Baking and Breaking

 

Today out of the blue, Jon texted about how the nurses at the place he was rotating at were asking about cookies. Since I was planning the stay in today anyway, because it was a snow day (a failed winter storm that just became winter weather, boo), I decided to oblige and bake cookies. This time, I decided I'd break up the mixing of the dough into two batches, hoping it would result in a more even chocolate chip distribution in the dough. I felt very clever and thought this would prevent frustration on my end. In the end that strategy worked, but somehow during the process I managed to break two things. First, I somehow broke the plastic tupperware holding the sugar when I tried to use it as a scoop to get the sugar out of the sack - too much force? The second was when I was trying to use a plastic Chinese soup spoon to scoop portions of dough out of the mixing bowl. The handle snapped off, startling me. I continued to use it, but the broken end did feel a little sharp. When I was done, I tossed both broken items.

Anyway, at least the cookies turned out perfect. It's always hard figuring the timing out, because my oven seems to be less warm than the purported temperature, and I prefer cookies on the crunchier side. This time, with about 15 mins at 375 Fahrenheit, the cookies turned out crunchy on the outside and soft on the inside. Hooray!

Happy Things

Things that have made me happy/inordinately excited recently (besides the usual happiness from Family and Seasonal Events):

1. Top freezers being installed in my local Aldi - twice the freezer space for more things for sale! 

2. Yarn Com - a yarn store/crafting space opening up in Creve Coeur, checking it out yesterday on it's opening day, and learning that they're planning to have a floor loom installed inside. Maybe they'll have Spinning and Table/Floor loom lessons too?

3. Finding a 2nd hand 10" Schacht Cricket Rigid Heddle Loom for sale on FB marketplace nearby, learning how to use it and weaving my first piece. Then learning about weaving on Rigid Heddle Looms in general

4. Then finding someone in Springfield IL selling a 2nd hand 32" Ashford Rigid Heddle Loom on FB Marketplace, and her driving all the way to St Louis to sell it to me, and then learning how to use it and weave my first piece on it

5. Learning how to make good Cantonese-style soup - learned it from my Mum. As I type this, I'm boiling Pork Ribs and Lotus Soup. I've also learned to not be afraid of adding dates and goji berries to soup.

6. Reading and finishing the Shadow and Bone trilogy by Leigh Bardugo - I first read the Six of Crows duology in 2019 when I was student teaching, and loved it, I purchased Shadow and Bone on my Kindle sometime later, but never started it. I managed to borrow the other two books of the trilogy from the STL County Library, and immensely enjoyed the series. I then also finished the first season of Shadow and Bone on Netflix, and am also awaiting the second season. 

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As an aside, on Monday I picked up a stroller wagon from someone off FB marketplace. She lived off Carman Road in Ballwin. When I was driving in the area to her place, I noticed how incredibly hilly that area was, and also noticed to my immense satisfaction that the road names were geographically accurate; roads with Heights and Ridge in their name were on ridges, and Valley was really a valley. This made the Geography nerd in me very pleased, especially since it's more common that not that these terms are applied willy-nilly to developments and roads because they 'sound nice'. 

Time

I got a message today from Aunty Cindy, wishing me and my family happy holidays. In the message, she told me that Pen was now in her first year of Uni. That message and thinking about how old Pen is now just makes me feel incredibly nostalgic, and also makes me just marvel at how all the time has passed. My two girls are now roughly the same age as Pen and Viv were, when I first met them back in 2009.

I first met Aunty Cindy, Uncle Bill, and their two girls when I went to London to study. They had lived in London for the longest time, and I had never met my Dad's cousin before that. Even after my Dad left, I'd meet up with them every once in a while, navigating the shitty TFL weekend transit links, to make my way to their place around the Finchley Road area. Once for a week, I even babysat Pen and Viv, when their nanny went back to the Caribbean for a vacation home.

My memories of my time spent with them over the 3 years come in little blips and blobs. Viv around 2 years old, covering herself with a sheet and pretending to be a ghost and running around, before smacking full force into a piano, and my incredulous response when Uncle Bill and Aunty Cindy just cracked up in laughter before consoling their upset child (I am now in this same school of parenting). Pen talking about how she wanted to buy a truck when she grew up, so she could transport her art work and supplies around easily. The two girls bamboozling me into reading them entire books at bedtime (when Uncle Bill came home, he said they usually only read a few pages). The feeling I had when I picked Pen up from school, waiting with all the nannies, and making sure I had adequate snacks (grapes) for the journey back to their home. Viv running Thomas the Tank Engine up all my arms and my head, until my hair got stuck wound tight around the train, and Aunty Cindy had to cut me free. Watching them brush their teeth, and then eating the toothpaste afterwards instead of gargling and spitting it out (I now see this with E of course, kids toothpaste and all that). 

My interactions with Pen and Viv were my first real meaningful interactions with children as an adult. Watching and learning from Uncle Bill and Aunty Cindy also provided frameworks for how I have ended up deciding to parent (largely chilled out, the kids will be fine). And at the same time all 4 of them provided an anchor for me in London as I learned how to become a young adult and navigate my own mental health. 

Since leaving London in 2012, I haven't seen the girls at all. A few years after that Aunty Cindy sent something that included a picture of the girls, and I stuck it up over my desk in Singapore. In 2017, Uncle Bill came to my wedding in in New York City, and a few years later Aunty Cindy came to visit NYC, and Jon and I met up for a meal with her then. Messages and emails go back and forth ever so often, but it wasn't until today that I really stopped and realised that 10 years has passed since I've been in London, and seen them all in person. I am grateful that Aunty Cindy always remembers to message, especially when I forget and feel like I'm in the thick of things.

Halloween Candy

For the last two years after Halloween, I've been getting obsessed with different types of candy. Last year it was Reeses Peanut Butter Cups, and this year it's Three Musketeers. It starts with me rummaging through E's substantial pile of junky treats and fishing out a few pieces, then devolves into me googling the aforementioned candy on Wikipedia (why? useless knowledge acquisition perhaps?) and then lastly scouring for the cheapest possible place to acquire more of the candy. Last year it was Walgreen's the day after Halloween for clearance Reeses Peanut Butter Pumpkins. This year it was Walmart, some two weeks after Halloween itself, for a small pack of two full-size bars of Three Musketeers, after slowly going through E's pile for tiny morsels. 

Halloween was fun this year. We all dressed up as a family with a theme. Jon was a bumblebee, E was a butterfly, M was a ladybug, my Mum was Autumn leaves, and I was a flower. This year I also got to partake in the spiked Apple cider that a neighbour was offering - and it was very good! Halloween is definitely one of my favourite holidays. 

Covid-19

About two weeks ago, we finally got striken with Covid-19. I had been sick a few days before (starting Tuesday), and tested negative on Wednesday. Regardless of my status, I started to feel ill on Wednesday and Thursday, and was starting to feel sort of better by Saturday. Sunday however, Jon woke up feeling ill and we tested ourselves + the girls, and boom, the tests were all positive. I was still feeling OK however, and wondered if my earlier bout was Covid-19 and I just hadn't known. I thought maybe the worst was over, and I was patient zero and had unknowingly spread it to my poor family. 

Then Monday came around, and by late morning I was rapidly feeling terrible. By early afternoon, I wanted to go to the hospital because I felt so weak and in so much pain and discomfort from stomach issues, and I was throwing up repeatedly. Adding to my stress was that the girls were sick, and E was running high (or at least what felt to me like high) fevers at night, and I still had to take care of M as she woke up repeatedly screaming in the middle of the night. Finally on Wednesday mid-morning, I started to feel somewhat human again, and no longer dreaded being conscious and awake. Thursday, I think I brought the kids out for a short walk around the neighbourhood, and felt utterly drained afterwards. All I can say is, the experience sucked, and I am so very thankful that my Dad was with us the whole time AND had already gotten Covid-19 recently, and so he escaped getting infected this time and was able to help with the children, chores, and making food. 

Since then, my Dad and I (with the girls), visited Aunty WY and Uncle George in the D.C. area. We went from last week Tuesday to Saturday, and it was nice seeing them again after a few years. Lauren and Alex also swung by for dinner one night. It was a nice short trip, though I really did not enjoy having to share a room with M at night (as if taking care of her and her constant wakeups wasn't painful enough).

Today, E started her first day of Preschool. I wasn't able to get the cute photos and dress her up nicely because I had a migraine that started yesterday in the early evening, and E also woke up late because she had a stomachache in the wee hours (cue: blood curling screaming at 5am). So she went to school late, while I staggered around disoriented after a shitty night. 

Anyway after E and I got home from the park (her request before she went to school), we saw one of neighbours, Cathy, fixing her fence and coughing away. E saw this and said, "Oh! She has Covid". And I just burst out laughing.

Singapore - May to July 2022

For the last one and a half months, the girls and I have been back in Singapore. We flew off with Jon and my Mum on 15 May, and arrived on 17 May. It was the worst flight on my life to date, travelling with 2 children, and transiting in LAX. The girls took turns being cranky and upset, and as a result Jon and I got barely any rest during the flight(s), plus I still had to find ways to squeeze in pumping breastmilk/dealing with being engorged and in discomfort. Then trying to schlep all our luggage from the domestic terminal to the international terminal was another ordeal in itself. Luckily the LAX international terminal in itself was pleasant, and the TSA agents there were actually really nice (the best I've experienced so far). Still, it was a total of 25 hours of travelling time (not including the wait from when we left our house in St Louis), and it felt like every single minute of it. 

Anyway I arrived back to Singapore, and within 6 hours was promptly hit by one of the worst colds I've had in my life with a fever and chills. It was shit and I basically spent the whole week out of it, so Jon and I were unable to do many touristy things with the girls. In the end we at least managed to visit the SEA aquarium the Friday afternoon of the following week, just before Jon was due to fly off back home. Jon and I also managed to go out together briefly, without the girls, for lunch on Saturday, which was nice. But in general it was a pretty low key week.

After Jon left, I moved back to my parent's place with E. Before that we had been staying at Mama and Yeh Yeh's place (M had been long sent to the care of my parents and Merlina, because I had physically collapsed so spectacularly after arriving back in Singapore). It took a little time getting used to the schedule of my family again, and we sort of fell into my parent's usual routine:

Mondays are when my Dad has to bring Yeh Yeh and Rosie (their helper) to acupuncture in Toa Payoh. So E and I have been follwing them them, and usally go to the library to wait until my Dad has finished checking Yeh Yeh in, before we have lunch together. On Tuesdays, Ryan has art class so we all go for lunch (M included), and while Ryan has his art class at the Devan Nair Institute, M has a baby spa session where she floats about a small tub with an inflatable tube around her neck. Wednesdays/Thursdays/Fridays the past few weeks have been when E and I either go out for lunch with Uncle KL or Mama. Saturdays are when Ryan has swimming lessons at Clementi, so E and I wander around Clementi central having a snack or going to the library in the interrim, then we have lunch out with my parents. Lastly on Sundays, my Dad goes to church in the mornings, then has to take care of Yeh Yeh from lunch time to mid-afternoon, and so I usually try to follow him out with E when he goes out to buy lunch for all of us. When I have gone out with friends, it's generally been for dinners that start at either 7 or 7:30pm (which feels unfanthomably late to me as the mother of two young children), and after this upcoming weekened, I would have pretty much met everyone that I have aimed to meet. 

On 14 July, in a week's time, I'll be heading off to St Louis with my Dad and the girls. I'm not looking forward to the actual flight back, and am feeling a little anxious about leaving behind this new routine (routines are a salve for my generalised anxiety), but I am looking forward to being back in my own house. The temperature in St Louis however, has been insane the past week, hovering been about 100 to 110 Fahrenheit (which I don't even want to think about in terms of Celcius because it would then make the horror concrete), so I hoping that at least abates a little before we arrives back. Still haven't begun packing yet, but I don't think there will be much to pack. 

'Good' Friday

On Friday last week, while E was in school, I stayed at home with my Mum and did errands. Two of them entailed calling insurance twice, for two different matters. For the second call, which was more specifically regarding my prescriptions, I made it after I picked up E from school. So while E was outside playing on the lawn (and my Mum came out holding M), I paced around studying the growth of my plants while on hold on the phone. Somewhere during this time, I spotted my neighbour Mike, walking his granddog April, and I waved from afar. 

When I was done with the phone call, I glanced at an alert on my phone from KMOV that part of the I-64 East was closed downtown due to a fatal motorcycle accident, mentally shook my head and then put my phone away to continue hanging out with my family outside. It was a nice sunny day, and I was pleased that it seemed like majority of my plants had survived the winter. I was also happy that I had 'adulted' and finished a list of pesky chores that had been outstanding for a while.

That night I tried to go to bed early-ish as usual, but E was up making noise. Her noisemaking, coupled with the need to having to go out and yell at her (too tired and stretched thin for much gentle parenting nowadays unfortunately), made me sleep even later. Just as I came out of the bathroom and was prepared to turn off the lights, my phone lit up with a phone call from Ilse, and immediately my heart quickened. Like most friends, no one calls each other unless an emergency, or something bad has happened. 

I picked up the phone and Ilse told me Randy, our friend Jennifer's ex-husband, had passed away earlier in the day. On a motorcycle accident, on the highway. And I knew right away it was the news alert I had seen at 4pm. We were all in shock. Randy had just taken care of his son, A, for a week. Ilse and her husband Moises had hung out with him while Austin had a playdate with Leo. Ilse and I had been texted about how it had been for her hanging out with Randy, and we were all happy that he seemed to have been getting his shit together to be a good Dad to Austin. And now a week later, Randy was no more.

It's a very strange thing to be mourning the sudden, violent death of a friend's ex-husband. I had a (sort of) front seat to all the self-destructive behaviour that led to the split up between him and Jennifer. He was a huge mess, and I was pissed at his behaviour and its negative impact on Jennifer and A. I was also annoyed that Jennifer seemed to be taking it and enabling him, because she (understandably) did not want her family to be broken up. And this was complicated because on a personal level, self-destructive behaviour aside, Randy was the kind of person that Jon and I get along well with. Our biggest memory with him is watching meme videos (specifically Cat Vibing to Home Depot song) together after Christmas Dinner in 2020. At the same time he seemed on the mend, and of course Jennifer and A loved him dearly. Humans always have a chance to reform and turn things around, and it seemed like he was. 

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As a bystander and somewhat participant, I feel a bit like Nick Carraway in The Great Gatsby, watching things at they unfolded before me. It all started last year with the motorcycle. In the latest iteration of a round of self-sabotaging behaviour (and to be fair, the only one I experienced), Randy decided to spend the money that they had saved for the down payment of a house on a motorcycle. 

More terrible behaviour soon followed, and I heard about it all as the marriage became more unsalvagable with every new thing. As Jennifer prepared to leave, Randy managed to fall off his newly purchased motorcycle and hurt himself slightly. We shook our heads and said that motorcycle would be the death of him. I told Lynne and Mike about it, because I hang out with Lynne and we frequently commiserate about things. Mike (which I why I mentioned him early), said something pithy about how dangerous motorcycles are, something along the lines of hoping he had good life insurance, which made me laugh at the time. 

Memorial Day weekend 2021, Jennifer and Austin drove with another friend of her's and a U-Haul trailer to Houston. I had made a big pile of cookies, per her request, for the trip. It was a mixture of chocolate chip cookies and double chocolate mint chip cookies. 

Finally, the accident which happened last Friday, now brings the whole story full circle. That motorcycle, really was the undoing of Randy. While on the I-64 by the Busch stadium, he hit a trailer being pulled by a truck and was flung off his motorcycle. I can only hope that he did not suffer. 

It probably speaks to how long my brain has atrophied as a stay at home mother that I cannot remember the exact literary device to describe the role of the motorcycle in all of this. And I cannot help but also wonder is it insensitive to even think about such a real human tragedy in literary terms. 

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Right after I got the call from Ilse, I left the bedroom and went downstairs to tell Jon. As we ran through different gamuts of emotions (mine undoubtedly containing a lot more shock and anger), we had a shot of whiskey. It was my first drink in more than a year. That night, both Jon and I slept terribly. It's hard for me to elucidate on quite how numb and how complicated all my emotions felt that night. 72 hours has elapsed since I received that call, and the constant thoughts and worrying about all 3 of the has finally receded into a dull worry.

The worst thing about any human tragedy like this is always the impact on the loved ones that have been left behind.

Fussy Baby

One of the best sensations in the world is feeling the hair on top of a baby's head rest against your cheek. Another one is seeing a baby smile contentedly as it drifts off to sleep after drinking it's fill of milk. Last night M was the fussiest she has ever been since she was born over 2 months ago, and so it was a trying night. Still, I am thankful for the little things, and thankful that overall she is far less fussy than E ever was.

World Events

One of my biggest memories during my first postpartum fog after the birth of E was sitting in front of the TV in my grandparent's dining room, watching the HK protestors storm the Legislative Council. It felt absolutely surreal to think of the world marching on and world history unfolding as I sat in my weird bubble/fog of postpartum depression. And yet there I sat, watching protestors climb over tables and lecterns, and spray painting things on the wooden paneling. All I could think of was, "Oh my goodness" and "WTF". 

When I first had a baby, it felt like the world immediately contracted to just me and whoever was in the house, even though logically I knew that was not the case. I felt like I was on an island, cut off from everything and helpless in the face of the world. Taking even a walk outside without the baby felt taboo, and verboten, even though my anxiety was screaming at me to literally just bolt out the door and get as far away as possible from my baby. Now I don't know how often this negative feeling is experienced by other new mothers, but that's how I felt then in 2019, and how I felt again recently just a few weeks ago.

Well last week I definitely experienced that weird feeling again about being postpartum, and world events. I was up at 1am pumping again after taking care of M, and that's when I found out Russia had invaded Ukraine. It didn't feel real, even though Putin had been sabre-rattling for quite a while prior. Unfortunately 5 days into the conflict, things have becoming more and more real to my addled mind. When I saw an article about a Ukrainian woman having to give birth in a subway while sheltering from bombing, my stress levels immediately went though the roof. 

Anyway all I can say is, Russian Warship, Go Fuck Yourself.

Schedule at 4 Weeks + 1 Day Old

My daily schedule currently looks like this:

10am - Wake up, pump, eat breakfast

Early afternoon - Lunch, go out (sometimes)

Mid afternoon - Quick walk around the neighbourhood, pump

5:30pm - Shower

6pm - Dinner (though the past few days, these have all inched later by 15 to 30 mins)

6:30pm - Pump

7pm - Go to bed

7:30pm - Switch off lights, try to sleep

11:30pm to 12:30am (time varies) - Get woken up by crying M, feed, put to sleep. Pump and eat. Go and lie down and try to sleep for an hour

2 hours from putting M down (repeats at 2 hour intervals, ex. 1am, 3am, 5am) - Get woken up by crying M, feed, put to sleep, change a diaper somewhere around 1 or 3am. Go back to sleep for a bit.

If it's the 5am or 6am feed - Pump and eat

6:30am - My Mum gets up and takes over responsibility for M; I go to sleep

Next week however, I need to send E to school at 8:30am on Tuesday and Friday, so that throws the schedule into disarray. And given that my anxiety is barely held at bay by this schedule, I'm really not looking forward to this change. Still, it's good that E's school has been able to take her now for Monday, Tuesday, and Friday until 3:30pm, which gives my Mum and I some respite at home. 

M turned 4 weeks yesterday, and will be 1 month old in 2 days on the 24th. 

Postpartum Songs

 After I first had E, the song that kept playing in my head was You Can Call Me Al by Paul Simon. I was going through the throes of postpartum anxiety and depression without being aware of it, and something about the song just struck a chord in me. To me the song made me think of being a middle-aged adult, going through a midlife crisis, being dissatisfied and wondering wtf is going on with their life.

In contrast, the song that kept playing throughout my head during the labour and postpartum period of M, is Chop Suey! by System of a Down. The sheer anger, pain, and desperation in the song echo my current darkest emotions as I go through the whole rigmarole of postpartum whatsit yet again. At night when I can't sleep, because I need to take care of M (who is generally up every 1-2 hours), the biblical portion of the lyrics replay over and over in my head.

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Today my in-laws left STL. M is also 3 weeks old. Although my Mum is here, I can't help but feel anxious at the change. Thankfully I am mentally in a better place now than a week ago (which is when my in-laws were originally slated to leave), but I still have a long way to go before I feel comfortable in my own body again.