Some time ago

The book shop was filled with people. I had two books that, like my brain, couldn't be more disparate in their subject matter - one about managing my moods, and the other a dummy's guide to C# and .NET.

Earlier, I had walked up and down Queen Street, purchasing stationery from little Asian shops. I'd forgotten the feeling of being in a shop filled with kooky things and bad English translations, and still a part of me was guarded as though because I didn't know who Matsomoto was, I wasn't entitled to buy his stationery. I did buy, though, spending the money as I often did - without the awareness of how much of it might be left in my bank account - hoping to fill my hole of despair with yet another new notebook or scheme for a grand idea.

And yet I was happy that I had taken the afternoon off, even if I had walked up and down the street exposed, because that afternoon I hadn't gone to bed and that in itself was a huge feat.

"Are you going to spend 4 hours in Borders?"

He asked me as I sat behind my finished plate of something I hadn't really felt like eating.

"Why not?" I replied. "I spend that much time at my desk anyway." It was true - some mornings and afternoons I would be at the desk for over four hours straight - achieving what? Still the paranoia as people moved toward me and I saw out of the corner of my eye, that struck me of being "caught" yet really I didn't care anymore. If someone asked me, I felt I would tell them.

"I'm depressed, severely. I have been untreated for many years and finally it has drowned me. Please have the rest of my Tiramisu tart."

There wasn't much left, maybe two bites. An insect had founds its way onto it and sucked down the decadent chocolate sauce that covered it. Two tables down, a pair of girls swapped life stories, sharing everything from intimate details of their parents psychological statuses to cosmetic tips and advice on how to reduce smile lines. One of them liked to talk more than the other.

As I read through the mood management book I was struck by a sudden realization, a sadness about the life of us three sisters. It helped me then to understand, and maybe let go, each of us manifesting our psychological grief in three completely different personalities, the case study dream of a postgraduate psych student: the depressed, the manic and the defensive. And while I knew that others had had it worse, I also knew that this knowledge was for understanding and forgiveness, not for excuses.

We wanted to love each other but didn't know how, our only understanding of support developed from my mother's overbearing action-oriented caring, and my father's hands-off money solves everything approach. Each of us feeling and overwhelming amount of love and frustration towards one another, living in the oddly dysfunctional but comfortable environment that nobody would understand.

We were the epitome of a love-hate relationship, the definition of chaos and somehow, a picture of intensive love. And of all the things that you saw and heard when you would enter our household, it was the feeling of the third that would leave you inexplicably longing for more.

previous - next; thanks, diaryland.