Open Letter

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Dear Future Son, 

You don’t really exist yet. The concept of you is far from being conceived. But in the event that you do and you happen to stumble upon this letter, well don’t say I didn’t warn you.

Your surname is Lim, and as a certain Uncle Liow would say, angmoh miah si Smith Debert, or maybe Jones. But that’s not really important presently. What matters is that you understand where I’m coming from, and don’t blame me just because you don’t see things the way I do. And also, sometimes parents don’t have a clue. But more often then not, they know best. And that one lim peh also still learning about. So here’s five things that I’d like you to know, future son:

1) I’m not stopping your piano lessons. Especially during the early years. This may sound harsh, but you don’t know shit about what you wanna do  in the future when you’re a five year old kid. Seriously I’d rather you drop music later on in life when you’re capable of thinking about such issues, rather than not have a music background growing up and  ending up sighing wistfully each time you look at a Clayderman, or wishing that you have the theory to enhance your relationship with the music you love, and love to make.

2) We’re going to the gym, boy. The joys of having a glistening, chiseled body of being fit and healthy are immense. Like music lessons, it may seem difficult, arduous and meaningless at first, but trust me when I say all these 5 km runs together will be worth it. Really.

2.5) Oh yeah, ignore Mommy when she tells you that rugby’s too dangerous and you should stick to ping pong. I know that’s the sport you really enjoy, you’ve been playing it since pri 3, you’re pretty damn good at it and you don’t really know if you should try new things, but I can play ping pong with you. Join rugby, thanks. Or tennis. A certain Uncle Slow disrupted ping pong for tennis after primary 6. And look where he is now.

3) Son, you’ll be wearing a white shirt and blue trousers for 12 years of your life. You’ll start using phrases such as “I bleed blue, gold”, “AC Spirit”, “True Blue ACSian”, “Jennamen”, “XiaoJi owns this”, “The Best Is Yet To Be” and “Eh Chang“. You’ll probably develop a sense of confidence that at times masquarades as arrogance.  People may have false impressions of you and your ilk. But who cares. And in the rare event that you feel a sudden affinity with the colours white, green, black, yellowish brown, or gasp some bastardized combination of white and blue, let me know please. I’ll schedule crisis talks. 

Also, it’s not really advisable to put your secondary school choices as : ACS (I), ACS (BR), MGS, SCGS, RGS, RI, regardless of how low the cut off points for affiliated schools are. I do understand the rationale behind it though, and I will allow a small smirk,wink and the early signs of a guffaw before the admontion begins.

4) There are three kinds of people in the world. Those who take Math Studies, and those who don’t take Math Studies. I kid. There are two types of people in the world – Male and Female. You and I are male. Mommy’s female. And males and females are very different. But there’s something that you have in common with females son, and that’s the fact that Daddy’s present knowledge and understanding of you both is nonexistent.  So what else can I say. Come see me again in 20 years.

5) I’m sorry for imposing my hopes, dreams and fears on you. It’s not really fair for a child’s existence to possess the sole purpose of living out his father’s unfulfilled goals and alleviating some regrets. What can I say if you wanna become Billy Elliot, or worse, do HL Chem/Physics/Math? But anyway whatever happens, trust God. Yeah that’s the best piece of advice I can give you now that’s guaranteed not to backfire in my face.  Oh and ”bros before hos”.  2nd best piece of advice.

I’m going back to study the wonders of FSH, LH, and the menstrual cycle.

So see you around, you future ball of cells known as a blastocyst.

Kenneth

Oct 25th, 2007

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