Today's Muse: Hard Sugar Icing

Today I had cake to supplement my writing diet of grain and water - you don't really feel like eating if there's no one around - courtesy of my niece Tara. She turned five today, and had a very, very, very, pink birthday in school.

I await the day - a tad fearfully, of course - when she decides that pink is a baby colour.

Do you remember that moment? When you started singing "Barney's Dead On the Floor" instead of "I Love You"? When knock-knock jokes lost their flavour? When dresses became a bother, and you took to wearing long sleeves?

I don't. Perhaps it hasn't happened yet. Little Brother Kim sure seems to. He's hit the age when

all life seems bleak, and there isn't a point in trying. He doesn't smile as much; he's always so guarded. He prefers black, now, and sitting alone in a corner thinking. What happened to the noisy kid who kept tailing me?

Y'know, when I discovered anime, I was about nine or ten. Flame Of Recca - not exactly kid's fare, but I lapped it up. So did Kim. Every thing I embarked on - be it the comic books, the shows, the music, the philosophies - Kim learnt about it too, and usually adopted it. Sometimes it annoyed me. Kim, though younger, knew as much as I did about the world, and then some. He learnt how to manipulate people into doing what we wanted from watching me, learnt how to lie effectively from me.

And then some.

And then suddenly he veered away. Now determined to beat his own path, he rejects ideas I voice. He still reads the books I get from the library, and he and I still share music sometimes. I accept he'll always be a better gamer, but I'm the one who searches for the help guides, and he does agree an XBox 360 will be a waste of money.

I guess, right now, he's angst and gloom. Well, I was (I hope it is was) angst and gloom. It's not easy holding my temper in check sometimes, and other days I can't stand the negativity, but, hey. It's probably retribution for all the people I pissed off when I was thirteen.

At least he knows proper forum etiquette. And how to decently flame - something, again, he seems to be better at.

Damn, I'm good.