Special Day

Today was just an ordinary day. One like any other. But today’s date is special. As I gloss over the date I celebrate, I remember my brother is another year older. Of course, he’s not at home—out with his girlfriend and shared loved ones, I presume. And I’m glad he gets to enjoy today, not just sitting at his desk, watching YouTube Shorts. Though there is a little sadness in knowing I couldn’t wish him a happy birthday in person.

Perhaps I should have bothered his sleep before I left home this morning.

Today was just an ordinary day. Another day of lamenting my lack of mobility, my injury, my helplessness. And in my period of forced rest, there has been excitement too. What can I say? The final episodes of Physical: Asia were incredibly thrilling. A great distraction from this very plain and ordinary day… it has been a good day.

But as the day draws to a close, strange feelings creep in. And they are not good feelings.

Today was just an ordinary day. And five years ago, I could say the same. It was… just an ordinary day. I fought through my disgruntled and perturbed soul, reflecting on living through a finite relationship as someone spoke life through their testimony about dating an unbeliever. A hysterical parallel to my choice in dating someone who ultimately walked away from faith.

But I never really had much faith that he believed to begin with.

Five years ago, it was just an ordinary day. I powered through the anger and annoyance by spending time with treasured friends who entertained me by recording a silly video with birthday wishes, addressed to my dear brother. It’s strange how much detail I remember about this particularly ordinary day, isn’t it? By now, you must have gathered that it wasn’t an ordinary day at all.

I remember you.

From the red room with that spinny chair, to the testimony I had just about blocked out, and the movie classic I delightfully watched with a friend afterwards… it really was just an ordinary day. After all, many of my days are filled with a childlike wonder for this world I currently call home. And despite these happy vignettes I seem to remember, the filter was definitely a little greyer back then. Because I was desperate to go home and be alone.

Nothing would have started if you hadn’t said hello.

On the walk to Central Station, as I began to make my way home with my friend, why is it that I remember this memory like a scene in a movie? People from that other event I had left—the summer club I departed to see that movie with my friend—were making their way home from dinner around the same time. And most of us ended up on the same train platform. It was my mistake to have given this very ordinary day so much importance.

It’s only a day to celebrate your brother. Nothing too out of the ordinary.

It was just an ordinary day, and it was going to end soon. You will get on the train with your friend and talk until she gets off at her station. Then you can enjoy the silence. But that’s not what happened. As the people I recognised made conversation amongst each other, I stood on the outskirts of the circle, looking at the screen with the time I needed to wait. And all of a sudden, you decided to introduce yourself.

I was annoyed that someone had used the social rules against me and forced me into conversation.

As much as I would have liked to give you the cold shoulder, I have some social etiquette. And thus we exchanged pleasantries. I provided details about myself that you would later forget, and I would call you out on it. I was both impressed and unimpressed with you. Impressed by your boldness to single me out and “make friends”, and unimpressed that it seemed like some strange obligation.

Sometimes, I curse at myself for having this ability to remember all these little things.

It was just an ordinary day… until it wasn’t. Like always, I was grumpy, unimpressed, and bothered by so many things. But that ordinary day in 2020 has stayed at the forefront of my mind as I think about my brother’s birthday. I remember the lights on the station platform and the clock tower in the distance—how it shone against the night sky. How everything looked before all the major renovations and the Central Metro.

I see all the little vignettes of what happened on that day as if it were part of a Wes Anderson film.

I don’t forget. And sometimes, I desperately wish that I could.