Christmas holiday

I have just booked myself a holiday for Christmas. Inspired by a former lecturer, I will be going to a place I've wanted to go for a long time but just never got around to, or maybe, never had the guts to. I asked two people to go with me. The first said yes and then had a minor meltdown. The second said Christmas is so far away and she would think about it. In the meantime, I just went ahead and booked myself a bed.

Why not?

I hated Christmas last year. I spent most of the day cooking for people who were ultimately ungrateful and I thought, hang on, this is not how I want to spend Christmas in 2015. I want to pick my own party. Even if it's a party of one. Far from the madding crowd's ignoble strife.

I've become really good at being by myself. I prefer doing things along. Why not, after all, why ever not?

Alone, I can read. Alone, I can write. Alone, I can think my own thoughts without the screaming of another soul beside me.

So, alone it is. Alone it is.

My father, I think, sensing my growing distance and not happy with the diet I happen to be on which makes him not cook for himself...has started making his funeral plans. He feels ill now. So ill that today he started talking about death again. He told he that he has a fixed deposit at Maybank and to be sure to make a claim on it should anything happen to him.

So, tomorrow, with the new cleaner's coming in the morning, I will go pack some food for him to have both for lunch and dinner. Maybe if he eats, he will feel better.

The thing is, when I cook enough for it to last the whole week, he wastes the food. He finds fault with it. And then it has to be thrown away. And now he acts neglected. Dying. Sad. Abandoned.

So I will do the best I can.

But I will also be getting on with my life.

And I will people it with those I really want to be around.