Friday, June 24, 2011

(475) Insult Fermenter

Book name : The Race for the lost key stone
Author        : Val Rutt
Publisher     : Puffin

I am not reviewing this book. I am borrowing a term the author cooked up. Many things written in the book are like scientific fantasies. But I like the idea of an insult fermenter. In the story contempt was stored in this gadget that "ferment" and enlarged it to be released as a weapon to hit a bad guy.

Ordinarily, I would laugh and go on. But a few days before I read this children's book, I received an SOS from a friend. By the time I got the message and gotten in touch, other unofficial support network already helped her to overcome the crisis. Now you get the idea why I don't carry hand phones. Then I would not be thrust into a difficult situation of handling a few things at a time. I am not a multi-task person.

I have had my own share of sibling rivalry. Being the only girl with brothers, I must have been toughened in the process of being knocked and pushed about. So when I listened to my friend's reaction to her recent trauma: having an overseas sibling staying in her house on a short visit and having another sibling who acts like a tyrant  that breathe down her neck. I know it was not funny. But seriously what transpired amounted to just unreasonable demands. But the reaction: I saw hysterics, uncontrolled emotions that should not have arisen out of such trivial happenings.

For days I mulled over the inequality of action and reactions. The reactions seemed inappropriately large for the provocations. Then one day while taking a bath, I saw how an enlarged bubble popped and "click!" a linkage was made in my mind. Perhaps long ago things did happen in a bad way, our youngest girl(my friend) did not receive any protection from her busy parents. All the hurt, trauma, insult, condescension, humiliation, and whatever explosive emotions were released years later after many magnifications, then it is possible to understand how big and bad the explosion was.

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