Skip to main content

Settling the Argument


For those of you who have taken a good look at my face, and not lost you sanity, would have noticed a small scar between my eyebrows. A scar that I got as a child when I chose to pick a fight with a group of boys older than me for reasons that I cannot remember. But what I do remember is that the fight had started with my signature move, whereby I bit the guy's hair. While I was left disgusted by the hair that got stuck between my teeth, my victim gave me a shove that sent me flying against a strong teak bed that cut open a small wound on my forehead.

Those were the times, when arguments were won by fights, when the strongest of your friends was always right, when I only argued with those I was sure I could beat if I had to. Which was pretty much just this thin guy in my class who was too weak even to start an argument. And then I grew up, with my last known punch thrown in aggression being sometime in Secondary 2.

Lately, I realised that as you grow older, sometimes the differences between you and the people around you became more obvious and more unnerving. These differences were avoidable during your secondary school and JC years when you usually tended to stick with the people you knew. But in university, a time when patience ran extremely low, you came across a variety of people, some with opinions that left you wondering if they even bothered to think. And you would try to reason with them, but to no avail and you would be left fuming and seething. The whole day, or sometimes days, would turn sour as a result of this.

I have no proven solution to this conundrum. Some people say. respect the other's opinion. Some say don't waste your breath arguing and some say stand up for what you believe in.


Long gone are the days when there was but one way to settle it. 


Not regretting. Just reminiscing... 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

An Eye for an Eye

"Something that three or four years ago you told me was one of the touchstones of maturity: being nice to people even when they’re not nice to you…" - William Styron It was an plan that came out of nowhere. Perhaps half depressed by the winter and half depressed by the inactivity at work, there was sufficient turmoil in the mind to create these type of plans and then let it fester, until something that started off with a what-if turned into a why-not. It would have been the perfect revenge for the past hurt and humiliation that was yet to completely heal.  The circumstances were similar. On one side, an eager visitor who had traveled far to say "Hello" and on the other side, a host, bewildered and surprised by this visit. In the first case, the host would not receive the visitor, who would turn back humiliated and vowing never again. Now the roles were reversed and I was the host. What if I agreed to receive? What if in reality I did not plan to receive? ...
Post a Comment
Read more

An Ode to Marriage

I remember pondering about the need for marriage during a certain period of my life. Partially inspired by stoicism, I saw a man as an island in a big ocean, continuously being battered by the waves and storms, but holding fort and growing strong with each test. It was also when the idea of monasticism greatly appealed to me, to leave behind, for the lack of a better work, the bullshit of society and trying to attain enlightenment.  Somehow that idea fell apart after a brief meditation stint in a monastery, but the idea of marriage I resisted. The freedom that came from being single seemed too precious to let go. Furthermore life was complicated as it is. Why complicate it further by introducing another person to that life, someone who would bring her own mannerisms, rules, habits, many that might end up conflicting with your own. However, a lot of these ideas and beliefs start to die when friends of yours each start getting into their own relationships and have no more time for yo...
Post a Comment
Read more

Sparing the Rod

 She gave me a look of deep displeasure, not very atypical of the look most members of the opposite gender gave me. “You know you can’t do that in Germany?”, she asserted with the same authority my mother used to tell me about not messing around in her kitchen.  “Yes I am aware”, I meekly responded, knowing well that any kind of argument about this would not end well, so it was better to close off the topic quietly and unlike the kitchen, I could not afford to get kicked out of Germany. She was not the first to respond with such hostility to what seemed like the most natural of things in my experience. The last one who told me the same was a teacher I had met at a party. When she sounded shocked that I was ok with it and said it was not right, I (with some alcoholic courage) had retorted, “How would you discipline them then if they do something wrong?” “I would tell them I am very disappointed with them”. I almost laughed. However, that was very much the theory of my new frien...
Post a Comment
Read more