2024 Week 16: Crybaby

One of the highlights of my week: pizza and beer with Jon on the playground swing!

The bunnies are fine. We also have Jill and Haybeon with us. We caught Haybeon with a big wad of fur and hay in her mouth!!! Freaked me out. I thought it was a hairball. After research, learnt it's nesting behaviour. 

Internship notes: Week 3

• MON: JBM food distribution, walkabout & RJC arts workshop
• TUE: (day off)
• WED: AWARE sexual safety workshop, meet Anne-Marie
• THU: (sick)
• FRI: admin, NVC group practice

I cried at work this week. I don't mean hiding in the toilet for a few surreptitious tears (although I did that) but actual full-on ugly-crying during the group NVC (non-violent communication) exercise. In front of Gerard, May Ling, and a whole bunch of colleagues I have been trying to make a good impression on for the past 3 weeks. An intern's worst nightmare, probably. 

What the somatic NVC movements unleashed was a tide of grief for Mel, who died some 15 months ago. Up until Friday, I had blocked out the grief; I moved on, never cried a single time. Amazingly, no one seemed to mind my tears. Far from making the whole room awkward, my crying episode seemed to draw my colleagues towards me.

I'm starting to feel emotionally invested in this workplace. That makes me anxious. Part of me wants to rush headlong into this new "relationship", but the other part (which has dominated my life in the past 4 years) wants to protect me and it screams "NO! Don't commit!!" I have been so used to dealing with life as though nothing is real. That was my form of self-protection. Could it be that my armour is now loosening, thus the mental and emotional upheaval?

I want to share the passage from Man's Search for Meaning that spurred me to email Gerard for a job at Beyond:

In robbing the present of its reality there lay a certain danger. It became easy to overlook the opportunities to make something positive of camp life, opportunities which really did exist. Regarding our “provisional existence” as unreal was in itself an important factor in causing the prisoners to lose their hold on life; everything in a way became pointless. Such people forgot that often it is just such an exceptionally difficult external situation which gives man the opportunity to grow spiritually beyond himself. Instead of taking the camp’s difficulties as a test of their inner strength, they did not take their life seriously and despised it as something of no consequence. They preferred to close their eyes and to live in the past. Life for such people became meaningless. (Viktor E. Frankl)

Spent all of Monday alone in the community, trying to experience what it would be like as a "real" community worker. And I discovered that I enjoyed it, though I don't feel competent at it.

It's hard to predict who you'll click with. I would never have expected to vibe with a 60-something pakcik - but that's just what happened that day. I did some door-knocking, looking for community members who were home, then went to the arts class a.k.a. neighbourhood kids going wild. Again, unexpected vibe with one of the boys. I am honestly shocked that these virtual strangers would be so open with me. That makes me treasure their confidences all the more.

The rest of the week, I got to know my colleagues better. It's striking how Beyond has staff from all kinds of backgrounds. I met a fellow introvert with an arts degree, i.e. no relevant qualifications or experience. After meeting her I felt suddenly relieved. I had thought I was at a huge disadvantage because of my "irrelevant" background and "unsuitable" personality.

I still find it hard to wrap my head around community work. Can walking around talking to people, looking for synergies, linking up resources... can all these normal and everyday activities really constitute a "job"? It seems unreal. Coming from the world of measurable "inputs and outputs", I still need time to get used to the radically non-linear way of working with humans. 

(Isn't it sad that mechanical factory logic makes more sense than messy humanity?)

Pictures I took around the rental flats. I like to look at how people use their common corridor space.  Some of these corners are decorated with great care and taste. Of course I would love to go inside their houses to look around too if I had the chance. For now too shy lah.