jealousy

Shocking Expat Unfoldments, Part One

/ Emma-Jane Austen-Jones / 22 Comments

Three profoundly disturbing things have occurred this week:

1. My father, now in a home for peeps with dementia, has got himself intimately involved with another inmate, and apparently the two of them believe they have been happily married since 1968.

2. The loo brushes. I now know who the culprit is, and it’s not pretty.

3. I found some rather unpleasant material in the photos on Max’s iPad, which is synced with Don’s iCloud. There must be some mistake, though, because Don and I are the perfect example of expat marital bliss.

Paradise, lah

Paradise, lah

It has all been too much, so I’ve had to take myself off on a retreat to Nikoi Island, to meditate and drink Veuve with my girlies. They have all gone to bed now (well, they went somewhere, anyway), so I am allowing myself to percolate these horrendous issues, little by little. I am writing to you from a white sand beach, about my troubles in paradise.
Continue reading →

Young Women = Annoying

/ Emma-Jane Austen-Jones / 4 Comments

Sometimes I look at young people, well just the women, and I think, “UGH. You’re just so YOUNG and so PERFECT, aren’t you??! Well, UGH to you!!”

It’s not that I’m jealous. Jealousy is not a Thing for me at all. It’s more that until recently, I too was v young, and these girls just don’t care. Yes, kiddo on the street in your tiny shorts, I too had perfect long limbs. They’re actually still rather great, and attract lots of male attention (unwanted, I hasten to add). But what I’m trying to say is that I, too, was just like you girlies. It’s only all of sudden lately, so so suddenly… that I am apparently not : (

Being the tremendously positive and resilient person that I am though, I have developed a v clever way to turn that frown upside down. When I see one of these young fillies prancing along Orchard Road (no, sweetie, this isn’t bloody Fifth Avenue), I smile to myself, and think, “Ha, but you’re going to die too one day, you know! And it could be quite horrible!! In fact, you might not even make it to my age, let alone to your dotage. AND I bet that even if you do get to my age (only 38!), you won’t look half as good as moi.”

So that, dear reader(s), is how I do it. Try it some time, ladies!

I should think about becoming a life coach. I’d be awesomeness. I could trademark my unique approach, and call it something like EJ’s Transformative Total Resilience Technique TM. Likee.