lifeproblemingcat

[lifeproblemingcat]

As they say, on Wednesdays we wear pink. and even more so during October. like i currently am. I'm not sure if my professor's choice of a satiny fuchsia shirt today was because of this, but still i was somewhat inspired.

it isn't something many people know, but when I was 9, we got the dreaded call.... even though I will always be thankful it was caught before it spread further, it was the first time I'd ever heard my mom cry - not even when my grandmother, her mother, had passed a few years prior. 

around two months later, after surgery, it was officially gone. that day after school I stayed with a family friend who had a family history of it and therefore only bought organic foods for her family, avoiding processed foods as much as possible.  

back then I was surprised people would go to such lengths, but as my mom began to deride everything as "cancer foods!!!" .... I'll just say I have never looked at a hot dog, Halloween candy, or many things the same again. For a while, beet soups and smoothies were commonplace in my house.  ...

Much as I would love to say "and that was that", it wasn't. the medication she took for five years afterward to prevent occurrence in the other side eventually led to her developing a rare blood condition that has been classified as a blood cancer. regular blood draws have somewhat helped, but between western and "traditional" medicine, there isn't really a treatment. 

...

I have performed the occasional self exam since I started going through puberty, like is that something we're supposed to do? no. they don't even tell people to get mammograms until age 40.  Umm... that's that, I guess. 

I'm not going to share everything. but honestly the way people hear about it and say "I'm sorry" makes me feel weird. I hate that we're at a place where I know I am privileged that she is still here, much as our relationship is up and down, and still able to work full time. and I hate that there have been so many people who do not have that privilege. the number increases every day. 

but yes, one of my biggest fears is that I, too, will get it.

so remember. and be aware.

[lifeproblemingcat]

If I've said this before, don't mind me. I'm just existing here anyways.

things i no longer do on ig:

post absolutely random stuff (looking back through my highlights / now archived postes i was like why did i...); look at number of views - or who is included in those viewers; have like counts enabled; actually care about my follower count...

i mean i still use it. after all, "the eternal question of life is, why not?" okay, that was not meant to be serious. but it's not like i don't post trip photo dumps and stuff like that.

anyways. (i refuse to spell it that way, even though it's hilarious to read. :) you know.) i feel like i sound so vain when i say i think i've become a lot more self-aware and conscious of my own habits over the last few years, but...

but maybe i stopped looking at it all like "you must prove you have a life". it's all so shallow to me now anyways, like i don't *actually* care if 90% of them have a single clue what i'm doing with my time. i don't think a lot of my actual friends go on there to begin with.

if it's truly a moment i want to share with those i care about, i often just directly send them pictures. i mean, why not? (i will stop with that some day, i promise.) i still have to vet them for quality purposes, but i don't go around like "ooh yeah i want to post that" or something. who cares?

my carousels, when they exist, are no longer for the audience. after all, as i said, actually experiencing it is worth far more than the picture. well i'm like a massive hypocrite right now - with ~8600 pictures in 2023 and ~7700 with 1.5 months left in this year - but point still being: if you weren't there and wouldn't care enough to think about it, there is no amount of pictures that can pull you into the moment. they're just there for me to look back on, to smile at the memories, to... many things, really. sometimes they're mixed feelings. I don't mean to sound selfish, but aren't we all?

this time i'm not at all trying to make some grandiose claim on what people should do or lament for the 500th time that people aren't listening, i'm just telling it how my life is. I was shocked thinking i hadn't taken many since everything started back up again, but well i surprise myself sometimes.

current "weather": sleepy droopy clouds. (what, is something wrong?)

[lifeproblemingcat]

sorry it's been like half a year or something.

if you know me well enough, i often say "I'm so done". but...

i will never be done caring, reading, or insisting that the people making the decisions to put others' lives in danger, to inflict such pain and suffering on people who have done nothing to deserve it, should have to spend time dealing firsthand with the effects that they have caused.

and that those who blindly support them and provide them with the means to do so, should take a veryyy long look at that. and if they care so much about what they say they care about, even more so! if you say you're pressuring for something, do something about it.

do something. real. about. it.

imagine being the physicians witnessing such horrors every day. much as it's easy to read their accounts, it's a lot harder to actually deal with.

a picture is worth a thousand words, they say, but experiencing the scenes of said picture is probably worth far more than that.

i am certainly not saying that the media is at all perfect, or that there aren't people saying this stuff to force a reaction from others. but genuinely, what is this?! why ARE we letting this happen?

i sometimes think i read a lot. but even i didn't know about the conventional arms transfer policy until - literally - last night. If this doesn't count, i don't know what does. you can surely call me out for not doing my research and not knowing about that earlier, but as a full-time student, i don't have all the time or resources that i wish i had.

where people are born and into what circumstances are not things they can control. so why are people, who are just as much people as the rest of us, treated as worthless? as "necessary costs"?

when the stakes are millions of lives, should the ends blindly justify the means? no. and what ARE the ends? what will they be? how long will this go on??!

you can go after me for not explicitly taking sides, but really, i'm just done with how, over the course of history, so many leaders have thought of continued war and violence as the only options.

i'm done with ignorance and people who just don't care enough to think about the real-life consequences of their actions.

that's what I really mean. people are not numbers or statistics.

[lifeproblemingcat]

other people w two closest friends: yeah the three of us do everything together!

meanwhile I'm not sure if mine know each other and I love how equally passionate they are about many of the same things? and i could talk to each of them forever but honestly my mind is screaming "why do you sound just like each other???" half the time. it's hilarious to me but admittedly kinda distracting. okay no they're definitely not the same overall but still.

i would love to see just how "fun" the conversations would be (as one of them says), and us all actually meeting up sounds like the best thing but also the mere thought sends my anxiety spiking. so does the idea of making a chat. i mean the aforementioned one also has anxiety and understands this but every time i think about it i feel bad that i can't "just" do that.

ugh my brain cells don't exist anymore at this point.

[lifeproblemingcat]

nothing quite like two neurodivergent close friends who joke about each having half of the same brain cell. or the same people attempting to dissect friendships and wondering what even in the universe is "normal".

I'd argue "normal" is a concept and doesn't actually exist. but i don't know either. what is it?

[lifeproblemingcat]

our bathroom seems to be a breeding ground of flies... quick summary of my immediate family as epitomised by this:

My sister, who discovers this: oohhhh (takes a plastic cup and envelope, captures 10 or so of them alive, and runs up to show the rest of us in excitement)

My dad: where are they coming from?? squash them! (goes in and kills 3 of them)

Me deciding to go shower: okayyy hi just don't climb/land on me and i think we're fine (later shakes one off my pants) i think that's #6?

My mom after I tell her: SIX??? (look of fear) (turns to my dad) You better deal with this?!!!

my mom is also notoriously scared of spiders so that's not surprising. and no this isn't the end of this situation at all i just thought this was very correctly describing us

[lifeproblemingcat]

yesterday i saw (among many other things) : a billboard about how "hate hurts" (completely different context), and an article about a woman in Canada going on a tirade that included her basically saying HK is where the illegal drug supply comes from. In North America's most ethnic Chinese populated place, no less. Like what do you think you're doing?

I'll just share part of this conversation:

A: "do u not know what hk has been thru?? / im not even from there / and IK that... [British] colonization / China colonization / they do not need YOU categorizing them as the drug country"

Me: "hello it is literally not"

A: "exactly / i HATE it when people just use what they see on the news" ....

Me: "and maybe in the places where they do come from maybe consider the systemic problems that cause that to happen in the first place"

(obviously the convo continues but point being.)

and the part in the article where the author was like "hk is far more racist than Canada..." which might be true (idk i haven't been back in 5 years) but it doesn't make this any better in fact it sounds like you're dismissing it as a "one-time occurrence" and not as a part of a larger problem. just because the media stopped reporting so much on aapi directed hate doesn't mean it's not happening. it doesn't mean it doesn't hurt any less. it doesn't mean we shouldn't care. it doesn't mean we shouldn't be mad.

[lifeproblemingcat]

today's event: write something you like about yourself to get a cookie. prob a lot of people just did something random and fast to get the cookie honestly. thinking about that fact is unfortunate.

my other closest friend and i were walking back after getting our cookies and talking about stuff like how much we've grown in the last few years, when she said "i love myself more". me too. like that self confidence has skyrocketed in the last three years. and neither of us mean it in that selfish "I'm the best" way self-love is sometimes portrayed as.

in a world where there's just constant comparison everywhere whether you want it (which you prob don't) there's so little space for affirmations. that yes, you are enough as you are. that you have done amazing things. and even if we're way too likely to first think of our flaws, you yourself are amazing.

Valentine's Day might be seen as just about romantic love, but that's definitely not the only kind of love. :) remember that. i mean, random thought: I'd love to tell non-family members that are just so important to me that i love them without having to say "not in that way". especially today.

[lifeproblemingcat]

middle school me, reading a ton of fiction books that prob mostly include love stories and the stuff that comes with that: ooh is that what it's like to be older? ooh it's going to be so fun!

me now: umm sorry middle school me, i still haven't been in a relationship? and i find i don't really care? and no life isn't anywhere near as fun as the happy endings.

it's interesting to be the same age as the characters, yet i find my life is so different from theirs

[lifeproblemingcat]

(two pictures of a white cat - the first scratching the mailbox post with one paw, and the second, a frame from a video of the cat sniffing the road)

it's been two years since the last time any of us saw you - i still remember how excited you were when i came to visit, probably thinking i was my sister. i took these that last time (01.30.22). I'm still sorry that was the day my sister went back to college and so you couldn't see her. that by spring break just over a month later you were no longer here.

you weren't ours, not in that way, but sure had us wrapped around your paws. going to visit you almost every day was one of the things that got us through staying at home for months back in 2020. we miss you, Joey.

i pass by your house almost every day and i instinctively look towards the driveway like i did for two years. it's been another two years, but i still remember - and even if everyone who played the game i made out of our story has forgotten about it, i haven't.

[lifeproblemingcat]

(two pictures of a white cat - the first scratching the mailbox post with one paw, and the second, a frame from a video of the cat sniffing the road)

it's been two years since the last time any of us saw you - i still remember how excited you were when i came to visit, probably thinking i was my sister. i took these that last time (01.30.22). I'm still sorry that was the day my sister went back to college and so you couldn't see her. that by spring break just over a month later you were no longer here.

you weren't ours, not in that way, but sure had us wrapped around your paws. going to visit you almost every day was one of the things that got us through staying at home for months back in 2020. we miss you, Joey.

i pass by your house almost every day and i instinctively look towards the driveway like i did for two years. it's been another two years, but i still remember - and even if everyone who played the game i made out of our story has forgotten about it, i haven't.

[lifeproblemingcat]

i sometimes go on about how i feel like i don't care about anything anymore - like tests. it took me a semester to realize: is it that i actually don't care or that I'm way less anxious about school stuff this year than i was before? yeah probably the second. tho it was confirmed like half a year ago nothing really changed. maybe knowing for sure helped me figure out ways that let me do my work earlier. i mean last year I'd probably start stuff at like 10 pm after talking to like 5 different people. okay not everything was like that but point being.

basically just applies to school stuff. other things? oh, like how my entire hand was shaking as I tried to journal about how anxious i was and how i couldn't sleep much the night before what turned out to be one of my favorite days of break? okay i could go on about that but I'll spare you the details.

back to the actual point. I'm also doing a lot better academically than before? I mean not everything's easy and i do have to put in more work and time, but wow. i surprise myself. i also study less? but maybe that's based on the subject / how well i conceptually get stuff. sorry i can't do physics.

sometimes i think i don't care about how i do and then - for example stay up until 3 trying to resolve the what felt like 5000 comments (prob less than 120 irl). i care so much still even if i don't even want to? even if i don't really feel motivated to do stuff early esp if it's boring (certain classes be like) it's a lot better than when i just. couldn't. it's still weird it took me this long to realize.

[lifeproblemingcat]

boredom. nostalgia. while i love being able to talk to ppl basically whenever....

maybe looking at social media and how elementary school life is like now is making me nostalgic of my childhood. i mean technically I'm still in childhood but i mean the kind kids not even 10 years younger than me won't get to have. i miss when everything was simpler, back when i didn't really care about the news (pre 2017).

i miss when status symbols were how far you could do the splits, how well you knew Disney channel shows, whether you brought "good" snacks like cookies...

not how many Stanley cups you owned, what shoes you wore, what phone you had - barely anyone had one in elementary school in the first place. we sure didn't go raiding Sephora for retinol and bronzing drops.

sure, it wasn't the "go out to play and don't come back until dark" or whatever of previous decades. but i miss playing pretend with my sister, building pillow forts with the neighbors, doing cannonballs into the pool with friends. i miss baking at friends' houses, even if we messed up, instead of watching influencers make perfectly aesthetic cakes.

i remember the summer between middle and high school where my friends insisted on doing TikTok dances for half of our time together. the way half my high school hangouts were centered around "where can we take aesthetic photos???" that after posting i don't think anyone looked at and went "we had a great time". half of them were at a mall or something.

i genuinely laughed way more near a few boat docks, my best friend and me watching the seagulls on them chasing around a worn out tennis ball - which i realised then that many of my other friends would just walk past without really caring. we stopped so many times to stare at ducks and geese :) pretending like the museum we were heading towards wasn't going to eventually close. we didn't even take any pics together - though i didn't rly care...

looking at old pictures everyone had their own fashion sense and their own look. i don't know. today i saw some post about how social media turned everyone into clones and the more i thought about the explanation given, i found it so true - once we reached middle school and half my classmates at least had Instagram, everyone seemed to start wearing the same kind of thing. passing by the children's clothes in stores i wonder why 6 year olds have basically mini versions of the women's clothes. while I look back at what i wore in elementary school and think "I'd never wear that now" - definitely not that Justice penguin shirt - at the end of the day kids are still kids. if we're so insistent on "kids are not just mini adults" why do their clothes suggest the opposite?

so many people i used to know have had such massive glow ups it's crazy. sure i look probably a lot more put together than i did a few years ago but i don't try to look like everyone else.

we were probably all messes back in elementary school, but we seemed like way more authentic versions of ourselves.