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| The sky this morning above Bali |
Note: I write this for my future self, who might be losing hope in her fight
Back in 2015, I felt that the airport was like a home.
I spent a lot of time in the airport, staying overnight for a stopover or waiting for connecting flights.
Being an introvert myself, I found it enjoyable to be surrounded by familiar strangers.
Then flying and seeing the blue, cloudy sky somehow calms me more than seeing the ocean.
Earlier this year, I found the airport as a home again.
Shortly after I learned about my mom's accident, I booked a flight and went straight to the airport. On my way to the airport, my dad called me and said that Mom couldn't make it.
No matter how difficult my relationship with my mom was, I was really sad. It was a mixed feeling: I hated it because humans are really f*cked up by their own inventions, which caused their death due to recklessness, yet relieved because it was her will to pass away in a relatively short, nonpainful death. Then I found myself sitting at the airport gate, all by myself and cried. A lot.
For me, it is not embarrassing to express and embrace our emotions. In psychology, recognizing our emotions is a way to deal with anxiety. It is much better than hiding it too much, even if we are introverts. A city in the northern part of the US suffers from a high number of males suicide because of the "cowboy" culture, where they often hide their feelings from significant others.
Crying after death is acceptable, and in that gate, no one even bothered to ask me what was just happened.
That was my first fight of this year.
Then I had another two fights, and I often found myself sitting alone in the Ngurah Rai or Soekarno Hatta airport to think about these fights. These two were worth fighting, so I had to deal with my savings to buy the tickets. I won one and lost one. Fair enough.
Then came the fourth fight.
I spared some time to think whether this fight was worth the effort - as far as I remember, I put a lot of effort into this one.
But then I lost. It was heartbreaking, though I made it.
The two airports are my witnesses in the battle of self-convincing that every step that I made for this fight was worth the result. Until the very end, when I left the airport and went home, I did still believe that my effort was sufficient - but as life taught me - sometimes, when things are unattainable no matter how hard we have tried, then just face it.
I lost in my last battle on the island where I was born and grew up.
At the hardest time, when I lost my grip, I remembered two kinds of things that people once said to me.
My dear academic supervisor once said when I was very young - the sky is your limit; keep your head high, no matter how hard it is, and keep learning; I know you can be the best version of yourself.
My best friend said, don't worry - you will be back as the independent woman whom I used to know in no time.
Then I remembered how I have been living alone since 2010 and financially independent since early 2014. I know I will be fine, and even though this is the second major heartbreak that I could recognize, I know this too shall pass.
And I am proud of myself.
I find myself as a person who is able to fight until her last round for something that she believes is right and worth fighting for.
It was like a rocky road to find that, on the other hand, in those fights, no one really tried to fly to Bali and tell me about things that they needed to say. The feeling of fighting alone really hit me that hard, but - this is the spirit I need to fight over climate change and environmental conflict issues.
I saw the sky, and I knew: I am a fighter - and will always be.
