I had my evaluation for driving today, and it was really disastrous. I was hoping to get Mr Malik as my instructor for the day, since I know that he’s at the driving centre today, and I’m really comfortable and relaxed during his lessons. But it just wasn’t meant to be. I got the strictest instructor, and the one that I liked the least in my group. I haven’t gotten him for my lessons in a really long time, and of all times I just had to get him for my evaluation. Great, I could feel my stress level increasing already.

I had completed all my test routes except for test route 8, and I don’t know why I thought that was the one I was going to be evaluated on. That made me feel even more stressed because I really don’t like that test route. It looks bad enough on the map, and it goes through Teck Whye. I really don’t like driving there because the traffic can be quite heavy, the roads are narrow and there are a lot of slopes and bends. It just seems so difficult to drive smoothly there.

Well, it turns out that when I got into the car, the instructor said that he doesn’t look at the points when doing evaluations, and test route 8 was just going to be a normal practice; the test route for “evaluation” would be another one. I thought that maybe the lesson was going to be better after all, but I really couldn’t be more wrong.

The practice was still ok. The circuit courses went quite well, except for 1 or 2 minor mistakes. The road was slightly worse, but hey, it’s Teck Whye. I still got through it in the end. Then the “evaluation” started, and somehow the directional change and crank course went rather badly. I usually don’t have any problems with all the courses, and I ended up striking the kerb today. I don’t know what’s my problem…

And when you start making mistakes like these, you end up getting increasingly stressed and nervous. Doesn’t help when you’re going on the road right after that. And it just went downhill from there. Somehow today there wasn’t enough time for me to finish the test route (when there’s usually enough time to finish 2 or sometimes even do 3), and even though I only finished half the test route I had 4 immediate failures. And if the instructor had counted points, who knows how many I would have had. Seriously, my driving sucks!

I was feeling so tired by the end of the whole thing, and I knew my instructor was going to have a lot to comment on my driving today. Sometimes when I make a lot of mistakes his tone would be an unhappy one by the end of the lesson, but today he was just telling me my mistakes and explaining in a nicer tone. Maybe he could tell that I was very stressed when I was driving.

Test date’s some time in August, but I’m hoping that someone cancels an earlier slot so that I can get an earlier date. Even better if it’s in july, so I won’t have to worry about having to miss lessons to take the test, since I don’t know how’s the timetable going to be like yet. I’m going for more practices before the test; that’s one thing for certain. Maybe it will be better if I keep getting this instructor for most of my remaining practices, so I’ll get used to driving in stressful conditions, and the test won’t feel so bad then. Sigh.

Half the time people write my chinese name wrongly, because the characters used are not the common ones. My chinese name is 敬聆 and not 静玲! Even people who are supposed to know how to write it correctly still write it the wrong way sometimes. The bad thing about using less common characters.

I hate it when I’m misunderstood. When my intentions are interpreted in another way by someone else, and nothing I say seems to clarify the situation. I try to explain my actions, not to make someone else look bad or push away any responsibility, but just to give an idea why I did those things, or why I did not. All I’m hoping for is that the other party can understand. I just hope for someone to hear me out, and even if it doesn’t change his/her opinion in the end, it’s fine, because I can’t force people to change whatever they think.

But when things like these keep repeating yourself, it just makes you fear making the smallest mistakes. Doing things that carry a risk of being misunderstood. I don’t think people should fear making mistakes, especially small ones, since we learn from our mistakes. (Not that I mean that we should intentionally make any just to learn…) I don’t want to be someone with so much fear in me. I don’t want to be a person who stands on her toes the whole day in fear of doing something wrongly and incurring the anger of others. Especially those that are close to me. But when these incidents occur repeatedly over long periods of time, subconsciously fear sets in. It’s so hard to push this fear away.

Sometimes I’m so afraid to make mistakes, because even with the smallest mistakes, the consequences seem so hard to bear. Can you please help me erase this fear from my heart?

Went out with Winnie and Christine today, and all of us bought a few things. The good thing about going out with girl friends is that sometimes certain shops have promotions or discount when you buy more than once piece of apparel. But sometimes you only like one thing, and so happens that it’s the same case for your friend. So you can just pool your purchases together and enjoy the benefits. Not that going out with boyfriends isn’t nice of course, they’re just different, but both special in their own ways.

My mum and I don’t always agree on my choice of clothes though. She’s a conservative dresser; anyone would be able to tell if they look through her wardrobe. Well of course age has some part to play in this as well. I like a lot of different types of things, from the normal t-shirts to sleveless tops, spaghetti-strap tops and halters… and the list goes on. But when I buy shirts with a wider neckline, she says that they’re too wide. She doesn’t really like spaghetti-strap tops and all that either – basically anything that she thinks reveals too much. I really don’t see what’s wrong with them though. It’s boring to wear similar stuff all the time! I know she probably has concerns that some clothes may be more revealing and all that, and even though sometimes they look all right when you bend down or something you may expose too much. But when I choose my clothes I won’t go for things that are excessively revealing, and I think my friends can all say that what I wear is really very decent. I do appreciate the concern, but hey, trust me on my choice of clothes for once ok? She likes to comment after I buy new stuff and she washes them, but at least she just says it once and never again. Until I buy something else of course. But maybe that’s because she realises that the clothes are all right after all. Hey sometimes necklines appear low, wide and all that, but when you wear it it really isn’t too bad! I shall prove her wrong again. Or maybe just wash my own clothes so she won’t start commenting.