Utter disappointment

You can always choose your friends, but you can never choose your family. Famous words uttered by the Godfather himself.

Though I'm not close to any of my relatives, I don't harbour any ill-feeling nor malice against them. I'm simply detached. But try as I may, one can only evade so much. Many of them are actually quite nice people, if not for the expected (and enormously annoying) questions that follow after the initial greetings.

Though I usually parry them by joking back about my current status, it somehow puts me in an awkward position and brings about great discomfort. Being from a large extended family (5 uncles and 9 aunts), it takes alot of effort to be smiling through each and every "interrogation". And no, declaring the 302 status here is not advisable. Which brings me to the background story...

My 2nd uncle was celebrating his birthday and almost everyone showed up for the feast, including many cousins, nephews and nieces. Many of them already have partners with them so the target boards have largely whittled down to myself and my siblings, with me taking all the flak. And drawing on my taichi, I managed to parry most of it as I've already mentioned.

As the celebrations go on, I cannot help but be increasingly envious of all the married relatives I observed. Especially so when the Birthday "boy" was unable to take the toast, his wife gamely took over for him. They're both past their 70s mind you and one cannot help but admire their resilience and dedication to each other. All this while, I remain seated quietly in one corner, smiling along.

I cannot help but feel extremely disappointed with myself at this point in time. My limited achievements seem so insignificant all of a sudden as I stare into an abyss of failure. Perhaps that's the reason why I avoid these functions or stick around when people come visiting. Times like these you just want to up and move to somewhere and be alone for a while...

The writer is currently teetering on the edge of depression and desperately seeks solace in labouring on his models, and only finding very little of it. He also still reeks of his friend's terrier, which he had to cradle while on the ride back.