Yesterday after scolding me about my grab bike experiences in BKK, the pseudo father asked me if I was really okay with attending the work event happening today. I dismissed his concerns with an assurance that it was behind me and a thing of the past.

Yet this morning as I got ready, part of me was filled with a familiar dread. I steadied the breath and prepped with a prayer. On the way there, my mind worked out a million and one ways of backing out.

When I reached, it was awkwardly familiar yet strange. Conversations were had and I was glad for them.

Thinking of what the "father" said, I don't think it's me being a bigger person. Sure, that environment was a trigger (not in the dumbass millennial sense). Sure, the meds were awful and my emotional and mental being were in a mess. The spaceyness and nausea and constant out of body voidness weren't fun. But that was 2 years ago.

I haven't forgotten it. But I'm letting that change me and transform me. If I let it go and pretend that it didn't happen, how I react and respond to other moments in my life would be different too.

And I'm sure I don't want that.

I'm grateful for the time and memories, good and bad. They remind me of how good God is. They challenge me to respond to His love in a way He desires, not how the world "naturally" would.

So I'm not running away. I'm not cutting people out of my life. I'm not erasing anything and pretending that that one year of my life didn't exist.

The door to be part of my life is always open. My heart will just have to be kinder and gentler and stronger to deal with it. And I'm glad to see people wanting to enter again. I am not looking for apologies. But as these people come back to my life, I'll accommodate them and love them the way God demands me to. Unconditionally.

And it's okay. Cos if God can see me through my depression on both occasions, I know He will see me through anything.

During a Sunday morning run, I fell around the halfway mark of my route. I tripped, skidded, and hit gravel, accompanied by watchful eyes of all at the bus stop and a single exclamation of Aiyoh. As I paused to collect my senses and slowly pick myself up in front of the bus stop, it was clear that the several beings I had fallen in front of weren't going to help me.

As I recovered my nerves after cleaning up at the petrol station, the concept of reliability, or at least the lack of it, swarm my mind. But what made me think I could rely on strangers?

Social morals? My mind worked out that there was no room for that. There were no moral rewards to be gain. My fall didn't deserve reciprocated help.

Social graces then? Similarly, moral rewards were not available. (Do social graces demand or expect non-rewards? Something to think about..). In essence, people are not gracious.

That said, when I got home, my mom asked if anyone helped me. I shook my head and the look of disappointment on her face spoke volumes. While she always stressed that charity started at home, she knew that I was that weird child that would help a person who had fallen off a bike. She knew I was that weirdo who would walk to strangers with maps and offer help. She knew I would readily top up someone's cash on the bus for a bus ride.

Behind that look, I saw a mother disappointed that the world had failed in being a better place for her daughter who was trying to make it a better place.

Sigh.