Basket.

You know, life really is a struggle.

On post-audit AAR today, I realised I was just about the only corporal to work so hard for this audit. Our NSF audit team was basically three members: one private with a long way to go (2008), a lance-corporal with a good amount of time left (mid-2007) and me... with one-and-a-half months to ORD, two weeks until I clear leave.

To round things off, I also got picked to take the knowledge test, which is next Tuesday. The SAF is certainly milking me for all I'm worth.

It was a fateful day in May when the powers-that-be manifested their heavy hand of fate within my Chief Clerk and got me made responsible for the audit recently transpired. It was to mark five months of battling tsunamis of paperwork, utterly baffling statistics from pasts far distant and, of course, completely unreasonable and/or stupid people. Somehow, it all ended well - and I certainly hope organisations out there have better ways of putting things together.

Life is, I suppose, forever a pair of scales; whenever we finish something, we weigh the sense of achievement and rewards tangible or intangible against the blood, sweat, toil, tears, frustration, pressure and mind-wounding fatigue. We feel good if the former outweighs all of the latter; we feel awful if it is vice-versa.

Usually, all I feel is exhaustion, and the end result is always anti-climactic. It's more relief than anything. It's like you have nothing left after putting your entire soul into it - and I have the tendency to do that.

We are always trying to maintain a balance, really. I try, but a lot of the time I really fail. It's not easy. How to put in enough effort and yet retain sufficient emotion for a suitably satisfying ending? How does one not appear a dreary pessimist yet not turn into an irritating sunshine optimist? How does one finely-tune one's friendships to keep as friends, enemies?

Speaking of friendships, I've found that I tend to make friends with so-called misfits - people removed from the usual social stage, interacting little with the general population. This is in no way denigrating them, because I know they are all wonderful people, or they wouldn't be my friends. But I just wonder. Could it be because I'm myself a misfit?

I also noticed that the friends I make tend to have most or all of the below characteristics:

- Short/violent temper (this is practically a MUST).
- Blunt and on occasion unnecessarily honest.
- Fertile and active... imagination.
- Gregarious.
- Intelligent and/or intellectual.
- Blinkered ie just as "sotong" or more so than I am.
- Quick-witted and sharp.
- Humorous (not that I would make friends with a person who can't tell a decent joke, of course)

Not that I'm complaining. I think such traits make people excellent companions, except maybe the short temper one... but that's the one I can't ever seem to avoid - to my detriment on the occasions when my mouth gets ahead of my mind.

Just an observation.

But back to misfits. Personally I didn't maintain a very large social circle until upper secondary. I tended to spend the time before that more or less keeping to myself and a few companions, reading book after book on peaceful afternoons in school and public libraries. For as far back as I can remember, one of my main hobbies has been reading. I can get quite lost in a book, although now I already read far, far, far less than I used to. I was a bit of a loner in those days, with me, my books and my small but close-knit circles.

Somehow I changed when I got to upper secondary. Perhaps something clicked in my mind, but I found more friends and kept to myself less. From then on I built the fairly extensive social network still in place today. Yet in many ways I think I still remain a loner - when meeting new people I seldom take the initiative, instead waiting for people to notice me. I also tend to place far too much emphasis on first impressions - once that goes bad the chances of ever knowing the person on a meaningful level are much reduced (conversely, of course, I have hit it off instantly with people). In addition, I have a disturbing tendency of allowing the conversation to ebb and flow all around as I sit and listen - leaving myself out, effectively. When I feel that I can't ever get into knowing a group of people, my response is to take out a good book and absorb myself in it.

Even when people begin talking to me, I tend to be hesitant and take a while to warm to them. Sometimes they give up before the while is over. Too bad, I suppose. But I do wonder sometimes how many potential friends I've lost that way. But worse than that is when there is simply nothing to be said - and when I try to fill the awkward silence, I only succeed in making it yet more awkward. You know the feeling.

What is more, I don't think I'm all that easy a person to get along with. I'm fairly easy-going, personally, but I tend to take offense at tiny, perceived slights; an undesirable habit I acknowledge and am trying to change. Also, my complete cynicism offends more than a few people. In addition, I always pass sardonic remarks during conversation, and some of these tend to have more bite than I intended. I don't blame people for being angry and offended; it's my fault because sometimes my mouth does get ahead of my mind. To round it all off, I'm incredibly vulgar in speech. It's not a good combination.

Despite it all, I somehow have friends, and a good number too. Here's to all of you - for taking the effort, and for putting up with me. Because I don't think I've ever dedicated a post to all my friends, new and old, who have been ever-so-important to me through times good and bad, here: this 550th post is for you all. Thank you for everything.