Friends & Mothers - 2 decades of love, loyalty and compassion

Hullo, sunshine. I am in a bit of a writer's rut. It is not as if I am not writing, but as I complained to Russell earlier, the pleasure is a little dry. I was going through this restless Sunday and came across some pictures circa 1989-1991. It is always good to look to the past for inspiration. After all, how can I move forward (from a rut) if I do not know how I got here in the first place...

This is the Moses in my prose. Not the cat, but the man himself who plays Moses
to my Aaron. 20 years ago he can be seen drawing cars. And now he is, among other things,
a motoring journalist. I kinda figured that Law (for he was a law student) would not suit
his mettle after he forgot to show up for his law exams two years in a row. He is also a writer now with
6 children, of which 3 boys is from a set of triplets. After the triplets were born,
for 2 years I rarely saw him and his wife socially, grappling as they were with
the sudden doubling of their brood from 3 to 6.

This is another old friend from college. One of the bright sparks from our Royal Military College
who condescended to join us mere mortals in ITM before flying off to the UK. He used to trade in many,
many things, including hiring out elephants. Now he is also a gold trader. From jumbos to gold bars, Amirul is
a gentleman you would appreciate to be in your corner. He is not so slim now though. Like the rest of us.

This is 'John'. It is apt that he is seen here holding a law text book, for Faizal is still in harness,
practising law and shuffling up and down courts in his hometown and up to the Courts of Appeal
in Putrajaya, the administrative capital of Malaysia. I would like to share with you how he got
the nickname, but I fear he would sue me. So I will just shut up right here... for now.

And this is me. Pondering into the future, some 20 years ahead. I always thought that my life shall be
quite simple and ordinary. It is ordinary, but the elements of ordinariness is not as  how I could have
ever imagined it to be. And I am glad, life gets boring if you can foretell your future. But things have
changed so dramatically that I even have doubt if I can read the present accurately. As life continues
to educate me, the least educated I feel I am, and the more I 'know things', the more I am certain that
I actually know very, very little. So I hold God's hand more often nowadays. And I hope He will guide
this poor dumb sinner. Wherever I don't really care. So long as I feel He is near. That is good
enough for the likes of me.

I guess reminiscing about friends, must bring me around to this friend. She was my friend from the moment
I was born. She fed me (too well), she tried to teach me right and wrong, hard work and good manners. Not
by nagging me, but by living her life the way she did. It was bonus that she was a good cook and pleasant
looking to my eyes. She seldom shouted or screamed, though life has baked her some nasty surprises,
she never spoke bad of anyone to me. She was my mother, but had I not been her son, I would still be
profoundly proud and blessed to have someone like her as a friend. Had God not chosen her for me,
I myself would have chosen my mother. 

What is 2 decades? It is the blink of an eye for the Sun, the Moon and the Earth. But there we were, sunshine, young, fit, and looking forward to the future with a glint in our eye and a smile on our face. We did not set out to conquer the world. We did not set out to build megacorporations. We did not set out to change the world. And I am glad. Because for my friends at least, they have found that nothing can change the world, unless we change ourselves. We had no choice really, stepping out into the vast void of a future unknown. But now that I am here, I am very, very happy. And I hope they are too.

Come, sunshine. Let's take another step.

wa min Allah at-taufiq