Somewhere in the middle of this

I’m worn out. After a solid 26 hours of work over the last three days, I’m pretty much beat, even though it’s been boring and not much has been happening at work besides random conversation and random semi-heavy repetitive lifting. The right shoulder blade has been bothering me for almost a month now, and it still hurts from time to time, especially when punching away at the computer, entering data, crunching numbers and doing analyses. But enough about me.

It just came to my attention that one of my Bros who just went back to Singapore for winter has not told anyone from our circle of friends that he has been back for nigh on three weeks now; and I can’t help wondering why. My other Bro just pegs it down to him simply not being bothered or interested in keeping contact. Thing is, the poor bloke doesn’t seem to get out much as far as I can tell anyway. Makes you wonder. I suppose on one hand I’m not too surprised because he’s always been a bit of a geeky home-boy and a loner, but on the other… Damn it, the few of us practically grew up together, is that any reason to not keep in contact once you’re home?

That you don’t tell your ex is pretty fine, but not telling your bros that you’re home for a couple of weeks is tantamount to going to a foreign country and spending the better part of your stay in your hotel room. One can always say that perhaps he has moved on and found other circles of friends, and that would be pretty fair. But then you have to wonder, if you or another of your bros always has to be the instigator of action before said bloke shows up, is he really all that interested anyway?

Maybe I’m just missing people who aren’t around (and I know I do), but some days I feel as if I’m the bloke who always has to initiate a conversation or start the ball rolling, and it gets tiresome to do that. Some days I’d really like someone else to take the lead, like call before I call, or do something before I do it, not just for the sake of me always seeming to be the catalyst in matters, but also because it is tiring, and sometimes demoralising.

If you’re always the bloke asking the other fellow out, it seems awfully one-sided, and you wonder if the other party (or in some cases, entire groups) even care, or can be bothered at all. Of course this leads to the whole self-doubt issue about whether other people truly care, or whether they care but kind of take you for granted. I suppose at the end of the day I’m the sort who likes that kind of reassurance? To my mind there’s never too many times you can say (or hear someone say) “I love you”, and there can never be too many hugs and random moments spent together; friends and loved ones alike.

I wish I could be back home, even if it was for a little while. And I wish I knew what’s going on in my Bro’s head that he didn’t even tell anyone he was back. I’d like to be there for him, but I know that being there (or attempting to do so) can be bloody damned frustrating for the person in question, not just oneself. Wait and see when he gets back down under, I guess.