i started this post with "am nursing a slight stomachache.", then all at once felt the urge to poop. i dashed, went, and now i'm back feeling better. i don't know how reading this will benefit you, but it goes to show that while some people read archie's comics to poop, others just have to type it out to get things going.

had a really short sisters dinner just now, where the dajie and i agreed that my erjie was being especially annoying. that, coupled with the fact that my pants were a little too tight, made a rather frustrating meal. but God made us a little more tolerant to each other, so my sister is still well and alive.

was whisked away to go bathe by, who else, my erjie who tattled on me to my mum that i "didn't want to bathe". i don't know where that came from, but i had to go cos my mum started to exclaim in shock that "you haven't bathed?!?!?", as if i hadn't done so in a month. anyway.

was pondering very much after dinner and in the shower (after which i came out with brows permanently furrowed), about the fact that i still had no clue what i was to do after i graduate. that would be in about, half a year more. and for the first time, i wished that school life would never end, though i did just spend an entire afternoon today doing my FYP, or the year-long project that is to eat up half of my december holidays (i'm all for work-life balance). and before long, people will start (actually, they have already started) to ask what you are going to do after you graduate, and if you don't have an answer, they will raise their eyebrows in alarm or offer you a pitying "oh", while furrowing their brows like i did while i was in the shower. it's an absolute pain in the arse but it's a reality that i'll have to face soon, i know that.

and i have to admit, much as i said that i will pray about it, as the days go on i'm caught up with the daily happenings and "i will pray for you"s that this prayer item goes lost. it's as if i forgot that i SHOULD, for my future 10 kids' sake, be worrying about my potential job.

and when i do spend the time pondering - quite wistfully, or unseriously, as i would describe it - i don't put in much effort in the act of pondering. and often, i think of my future relative to the people around me -- my family, my future partner, the people at the volunteering place who want me to go back to help etc, that i forget to think of my future relative to myself, and to God. it's a startling fact i realised today, when my sister asked me what i would want to do next time, and instead of saying what I want to do, i went straight to saying what other people are expecting me to do, and what i would do with respect to that.

and then it comes to the issue of how what you decide for your future affects the people around you. how things will change if you do this and that. especially if you decide to 'be true to yourself', or to 'follow your heart', that sort of thing. what are the things at stake? what if, God wants you to do something drastically different, something that will bring you to the other end of the world, something you will never dream of doing? i can just imagine what my mother will do. i think she will pray. ("dear God, please tell me my daughter is joking. please make her decide to stay home and be a piano teacher.")

(forgive me Lord, for making fun of my mother.)

but i know, wherever i may go, wherever He may lead, i would want to be building lives, encouraging disheartened souls, bringing hope.

i think it's time to pray. really pray.