Frontal Lobotomy
Barbie stopped by for a visit earlier tonight. I didn't hear her call as Black Sabbath was drowning out everything with Dehumanizer. Plonking herself on my easy chair, I proceeded to give her backrubs as she purred in contentment. With eyes half-closed, she was comfortable and safe in my company. Then the strangest thing happened.
Would she sense it if I had the sudden urge of stabbing her with a kitchen knife? What does she actually see when she looks into my eyes? A lover of animals or a seething human being? I'm confident that my cats are well tooled to take care of themselves. And that was when I recalled the news today.
After a three month prison sentence for killing a kitten last October, the Bedok North Cat Killer has been collared again. Daniel Hooi was arrested last night for indulging a mastubatory habit which should see him pillored with a much harsher penalty. A kitten was found battered outside his flat, with injuries so severe, it had to be put to sleep.
It should have been clear to everyone, from the judge who presided over Hooi's first conviction to the lady who gave back the second kitten, that Hooi was certifiably psychopathic and posed a grave danger to animals. The three month sentence handed down was clearly inadequate and a grave injustice to the suffering visited upon his victim who died an excruciating death.
Singapore is a country of contrasts. The island city state has laws for everything from littering to public speaking, not withstanding the ten thousand dollar fine and twelve-month prison sentence for animal abusers. However follow-ups and monitoring of potential repeat offenders for this kind of behavior is grossly lacking. On the other extreme, justice is swift for murderers and drug traffickers. Singapore disposes of them efficiently.
How many cats would have to suffer the same fate before the authorities wake up to the fact that Singapore, as with the rest of the world, is inhibited with its share of sociopaths, psychopaths and mal-adjusted individuals? How many animals would have die at the hands of these individuals before harsher sentences are passed down, counselling sessions initiated or lobotomies performed?
There are some who argue that inventing new methods of punishment for such offenders is taking an extreme position. Well torturing and murdering animals is still torture and murder. Are the lives of animals worth less than human beings?
Only recently was The Community Court established to address this blindspot by ordering madatory counselling. This court should have been formed a long time ago, with the authority to dish out punishment equal of such reprehensible acts. But instead, the first three month sentence was an afront to the dignity animals. If Hooi had done this to a fellow human being, Hooi would have been hung by his neck on the nearest tree.
Typical of efficient rubber-stamping and the pressure-cooker environment like Singapore's, this is precisely the kind of outcome you get.
Three Kilograms
One of the great indulgences that home has to offer is food. And the food was magnificent! Eating like a refugee from Somalia, I wolfed down salads, dips, meats and pastas. Not forgetting Indian food, where a bevy of restaurants have sprung up like mushrooms around Sydney and Melbourne, some of their offerings were good while others were commercial.However the cold in Sydney and Melbourne made short work of anything I ate. I found myself eating five to six meals a day and still feeling hungry a short while later. The protein shakes only went so far. So much for padding up.
So today, I went on the weighing scale. Half expecting to either maintain my weight or at the very most, putting on a kilo or two, I found that I had actually lost three kilograms. What the fuck!
Thirteen
I met mother today for the first time in years. The journey that took me to Ingleburn was an instant replay of rage, blame, recrimination and acrimony.Sitting face to face, I saw that mother hadn't changed much at all. It seemed as if her vitroil had preserved her in time. Our meeting was one of those dialogues arranged by mediators. K's sister had invited me up again. This time however, the invitation wasn't an option: "Why don't you come visit? Mother will be here."
With the usual pleasentries parcelled, we began an unfurling of history "since then". Not that I needed going into much detail. Mother had known full well everything I had done "since then" and our lead up to pain was done without fanfare. Our exchange was brutally frank.
Mother wanted me to live out my life never knowing love or companionship ever again, fitting punishment for my stupidity those many years ago. Mother apologized for shutting me out when it felt so right to blame and point fingers. As we convulsed from loss, it occurred to neither of us that healing was more essential than the acrimony being dished out.
Hate kept mother going. I admitted that at times, it seemed that I had been cursed. My relationships since K's death have been a mixed bag of fulfilment and failure. Telling mother about my life, it somehow seemed that I had done alright in spite of it.So why the thaw now? Reading K's diary for the first time in a decade, a diary I didn't know about, mother realized that all she remembered was how much she hated me. She had blocked out all the memories of what made loving her daughter so fulfilling. It was just too painful. In an about face of amazing strength, mother made the near impossible choice to claw back memories of how happy K was and how loved she was by so many people. Mother thought it time to make peace with me.
And what of this boy here? I sought no help. I grappled with my guilt. I lived my pain. For what we could have had, it was a lifetime of happiness evaporated before my very eyes. It was the crushing realization that I could not give anything at all to bring her back. For as simple a choice of not using the overhead crossing that night, the price I paid was a lifetime. K was my friend, my companion, my lover, my adversary. She challenged me. She showed me a different way. She made me smile. K was one of a kind, ahead of her time in so many ways. I loved her so.It's a hell of a thing for a man to bury the woman he loves. Guilt and pain are feelings I have come to know all too well. They have been the subject of my life for a long time. My friends, to their misguided credit, have tried to help me find 'closure' to this terrible chapter of my life. However the thought of coming to a point when I would no longer think of K was obscene to me. There was no way around what I was feeling. It was a journey that I had to go through alone. Along the way, I experienced despair, hopelessness and contemplated suicide.I accepted that I would be a changed person. That some part, maybe the best part of me, would have been cut out and buried with her. So what was left, I wondered? What part of myself would I have left to give the next woman who shares my life? Now wouldn't that be interesting?
So here we are. Mother wants to begin a new chapter with me in it. How would this all play out, I wonder. After being shut out for so long, status-quo would have been simpler and so reassuringly familiar.
Mother lost her daughter thirteen years ago. Would she gain a son today?
