Perspektif Tayar Pancit

Earlier today, while on the way to school on the motorcycle, I hit something on the road (a piece of rock, maybe) and it punched a hole in my front tire. I had to pull myself over to the side of the road with a flat tire (not an easy feat, I have discovered) and called my father for help and waited. I took advantage of that time I had while waiting by studying up on Laura Marling’s A Creature I Don’t Know and reading Murakami’s After The Quake that I brought with me and started the project that had long been kept in the stables.

After about half an hour of waiting, a 40-ish person on a motorcycle pulled over as well. I took out the earbuds out of my head and he asked “jadi apa?” so I answered “tayar depan pancit. Ada langgar sesuatu tadi.” and he replied with “dah panggil orang untuk tolong ka belum?” then I answered “dah, dah.” 

He nodded and continued on his journey to wherever he was going, leaving me smiling in his wake. It made me smile that there was a soul so caring about his fellow human being that when he saw a person who seemed stranded by the side of the road, took the time to stop and ask if everything was okay. It gave me hope that good people were indeed out there.

But then I checked myself and thought, hey, I could have totally gone the other way with the way I interpreted the situation. I could have taken offence to this brother who stopped to ask about a stranger. I could have thought, “ish, menyibuk gila pakcik ni. Bukan dia boleh tolong pun. Buat aku takut ja. Nasib baik dia tak curi apa-apa daripada aku. Dia dahla dok tengok aku atas bawah atlas bawah. Mesti dok usha tengok kot dia boleh amek apa-apa daripada aku.” and then probably complain about how my life sucks as a facebook status, saying dahla tayar pancit kat highway, kena kacau ngan a creepy pakcik plak tu ugh fml.

It’s all about perspective, if you haven’t picked up on that yet. Will we take in the things that happen around us or to us as things that will enrich our lives and allow us to come out of it a better person or simply just feeling a little bit better? Or are we going to brood over the negative aspects of those experiences and go “ugh fml”. We do have some control over our perspective, believe it or not. It makes sense to use that to our advantage rather than our detriment, don’t you think?