On all things cute & kiddy

I have a lot lip balms. So many that my collection of lip balm should be a singular noun to indicate its un-countability.  Tube, tin, tub, strawberry, mint, gloss, organic. You name it, I have it. Possibly enough to supply a village truckload full of people.

I've vowed not to buy another one but I simply couldn't resist this limited edition Ettusais Lip Essence with The Little Twin Stars! This is an awesome lip balm which has always been one of my many favourites (read more on my previous post), so it's okay. It's justifiable. I can leave it at my work desk cos I need one at work. I'm sure there's some research out there that has shown employees with no lip balm at desk get less bonus. So yes, off to the cashier it went.

Well, I don't exactly need it but I just want The Little Twin Stars! I mean, hello! It's The Little Twin Stars! Not just random boring nondescript Ettusais Lip Essence but one with The Little Twin Stars on it!

Like most XX-chromosomed Asians, it's in my DNA to love all things cute, especially Japanese characters from Sanrio's entourage of cuteness personified. So yes, I've loved Hello Kitty and The Little Twin Stars unabashedly since age five and I don't see sign of it changing. Don't get me wrong, I'm not one of those freak adults who carry Hello Kitty bag, wear pink Hello Kitty tee shirt with purple bobby pins in my hair but I do like a small cutesy items here and there. A Hello Kitty note pad or key chain for the office keys or perhaps a small cute Little Twin Stars pouch to hold the tampons. Something like that. You get the drift. While friends have grown out of these cute and kiddy things, the compulsion to gravitate towards cutesy stuff is still in me, completely intact.

Being denied of cute kiddy stuff as a child while the rest of my peers had cool Hello Kitty and Sanrio everything, it doesn't take a shrink to tell that childhood deprivation drives my obsession. But another reason that I still do, sometimes excessively, is simply because these cute stuff reminds me of the time when things were simple and when I was easily satisfied with small things.

Childlike, not childish, I would tell whoever grimaced at my cute purchase. We're all supposed to grow up and be an adult and yes we all did, didn't we? After all, we've gone through the growing pains of bitchy high school days, some broken hearts, and perhaps occasional sleep nights of freaking out over credit card debts. So we all qualify to say that we have all grown in some ways. But then whatever happened to those little things that used to make us happy and thrilled? What the hell happened to the days when a chocolate ice cream or a devilishly big slice of Sara Lee pound cake used to be such a treat that you savored it like it's the best thing in the world? What about that thrill of having a new fancy scented erase? How about your good old teddy bear sitting forlornly in the corner of the room that you used to cuddle to sleep? What? You threw it away? How could you? You used to love it so much didn't you?

The magic is gone! What the hell happened?

But you know what? Cute things remind me of those days. The days when I got thrilled and all butterflied over what I take for granted these days. Go look at The Little Twin Stars, Hello Kitty, Miffy et all. They're all happy, chirpy, nothing bad ever happens, and that once magical feeling is back in a utopia of cuteness.

I'm not about to give them up because I've lost so many little things that used to light up my face and in my pensive mood, I mourn for their demise every now and then.

The innocent tube of The Little Twin Stars lip balm made me smile. So no, it's not JUST another lip balm. It's THE Little Twin Stars lip balm and it is quite a big deal! And I'm relieved that it still has that effect on me and I haven't entirely lost .