miss stina

rmI was up late last night again reading a book I hadn't touched in ages. Michael and I went to the author's book signing a few years back, and we thought we were so smart. We waited in line, he gave her work about a 8/10, I complained that she wrote in too much of a rambling fashion. It was so stupid. Who were we to criticise? Everything she wrote about rang true to me at some stage in my life. She was a solicitor, a teacher and a writer. She was nothing short of a genius. I was engrossed by the book but at the same time, I despised her because she had managed to write and publish almost everything I had ever thought about writing myself. Her childhood almost mirrored mine. Damn us Asians! All leading identical, sheltered lives growing up.

"I asked him whether I made him happy, which was something I had never doubted before, but now I was losing faith in my own capacities. He laughed, there was no doubt about it, he gave me his answer and I knew he meant it. He had laughed because it was a stupid question with one obvious answer, and he meant the answer.

"Do I make you happy?" he asked me in return, and I knew he expected the same honesty. But the only answer I could give him was a white lie, and then I started to cry. He probably thought that this confirmed what I had said, but actually I was crying becaue I was a liar, and the truth was that being with him made me miserable. No longer did I feel the urge to share my observations of the world with him. He could see my world for what it was- a set of rules and finely drawn lines and fraudulent erasures."

-From Alice Pung's Unpolished Gem