Sleepless

Of all of my vile and repugnant qualities, procrastination must the the most abhorrent of them all. I only have myself to blame for putting everything till the end. I want to keep this short because I've been staring at the screen far too long to be considered healthy. There is a petulant voice inside me that keeps telling me to push all these things away, and I am very obliging to it. As I sit here munching on my early morning toast and sipping on my way-too-sweet orange juice, I am constantly reminded that ICT is less than 2 hours away. I am also suddenly assaulted by the fact that it is pouring out there and I have so many things to carry to camp. It almost feels like this journey is meant to be wet and soggy, a considerably merciful comeuppance for my major screw up in my entrusted assignment and a way of saying "Hey, you better wake up your idea!"

I feel so dreadful now with these heavy eyelids and incompatible black spectacles that I need to put on just for this period. It's not that I haven't done sleepless nights before; we do it all the time for mahjong in the past. Perhaps it's only exhausting because I am getting old, and boring, and lethargic.

Just keep me alive until I get there please.

Mornings

Waking up early morning has proved to be therapeutic for me. I'm used to sleeping without the air-con on, despite this morbid weather. Given there were a few fitful nights of discomfort as I lay in mild perspiration, I'd say the nights are generally cool enough to make me sleep like a baby till the alarm goes off at 7 in the morning. What I enjoy the most, though, is waking up to the smell of fresh air as I peek out of the window. As the rays of sunshine begin to seep in and illuminate the neighbourhood, I immersed and basked in the serenity of the moment. Then, like the sun, the people trickled into motion. There it was - the neighbourhood unfolding itself before me, like an animal sprung into motion, like a baby awoken from the sweetest dreams, and like a flower blooming into its full glory. I let the gentle breeze caress my face as I closed my eyes and take in a deep breath.

It was a moment of seraphic peace.

Locked Doors

I have just finished watching one entire season of a TV series in one sitting (or at least multiple seatings in succession). As with every completion of a good book or film, I am usually overcome by the sense of inexplicable ambivalence. Some call it "withdrawal symptoms", and others call it "returning to reality", but the truth is, it just means the continuation of the search for another fantasy to fill the void caused by the mediocrity of my life. I am slowly beginning to understand why I gravitate towards film or literature - it is this innate emptiness in me that needs to constantly feed on the happiness of the whimsical fantasies created to please the gaping soul. It is the only escape to a world where I can demand to see protagonists be happy, the antagonists condemned, and the beauty of humanity restored to a derelict mankind.

If there is any consolation to the demise of a fictitious journey, it is that another awaits. The runaway train stops for no one. It carries on with its pilgrimage, purposeful and relentless, but with no destination in mind. It is like the shark that keeps swimming for its survival because if it halts, it ceases to live. There are hundreds and thousands of silos, basements, and dark rooms that people escape into; they are all but a figurative representation of a sensual experience in solitude. Writing, listening to sad music, or taking long, circuitous walks - we all become the habitual recluse once in awhile. Film and music just happen to be my drugs.

Each time I immerse myself in these escapades, I plug in, but I shut out. It is no secret that I have been estranged with my family for awhile now. I do not relish in the isolation, but I appreciate the corresponding freedom it awards. If I wanted to assuage the guilt of my alienation, I would console myself with the reason that they are better off without my involvement. It has become a habit now, that every time I enter my room I would lock my door. Sometimes even I feel the disenchantment it must bring to my parents when they hear the definitive click of the locking mechanism - a harbinger of another solitary confinement. Each time it happens it's like a part of me is locked away from them even more than it already is.

In film and music I would look for beautiful moments and words that evoke a deep desire for care and affection, just to assure myself that somewhere, somehow, somebody feels something more than the conventional sentiments of a wearied soul that is incapable of transcendence. To me, a world where currency signs and numbers dominate is a parallel universe. In my world, literary expressions are strangely gratifying.

So when I see you struggle in your endless pursuit of happiness amidst an arguably self-inflicted grief, I almost feel sorry for you. Ironic, I know. I sound like a sanctimonious idiot who probably doesn't even understand the meaning of true happiness - at least not enough to be giving a lecture about it to another - but if you ever see this, I just hope it strikes a chord in that delicate heart of yours. I truly, earnestly, hope that you would stop searching for a perfect happiness that would be the envy of many for years and years to come. It isn't that I don't believe in its existence. I do, but a fixation on finding it with every other person is not going to be helpful. In Before Midnight, Julie Delpy finds incomprehensible the notion of being conjoined in matrimony with another for 74 years. It may sound heretical to many, but I actually believe that the heart is capable of loving more than one person in a lifetime, or even at any one time. We grow, we change, and we evolve. At different junctures in our life we may want vastly different things than we did before, so is it really that surprising that there are different people who can fulfil these disparate desires? By insisting that a same person satisfy our changing needs is to force them to grow and keep pace with us. It is stifling to individualism. Yet if achieved, these spiritual evolutions in tandem would do more good than harm to a couple. Nobody will blame you for trying, but in its wake of destruction, try to look through the debris to see who are the people truly hurting.

Because I stayed for the party while your ship sailed away.

And all I could do is watch.

Don't Tell

I keep telling everyone around me that I am a very idle person, but there are always times when everything significant just aligns at a focal point and I feel myself suffocating for some reflection time. Lately I started wondering if I have become boring. To be fair, I've never been particularly interesting to anyone anyway, but recently I just feel I've become one of those people who has a tag on my forehead that says "leper". Social interaction has never been my forte, though intimate conversations tend to delight me. Despite an inherent lack of allure and charisma, I shamelessly yearn for company at times. Is this the feeling of being lonely? (Sorry I suddenly have the Backstreet Boys song playing in my head)

The time will come soon when I have an alarming revelation of the number of friends I can truly talk to about almost anything. Maybe I'm destined to be that piece of drifting wood in a vast sea, subject to the mercy of the ebb and flow of the waters, carried off to anyone who just need a temporary hold onto something insignificant. I wouldn't even dare call myself a safe harbour, because people actually want to dock at harbours, and right now I'm as undesirable as can be.

I spent the last semester learning about self-esteem, self-efficacy, self-fulfilling prophecies, etc., but they all seem so pointless to me at the moment. All these methods on how to feel better about yourself, self-encouragement, self-belief - BULLSHIT. It's all self-aggrandisement. Realise how all these words start with a self- at the front? What if I'm tired of doing it all by myself? (Celine Dion starts playing here) At the end of the day, I get by like I have to, I exist even if I don't mean it, and I only serve to antagonise myself further each day as I see the mockery I am.

There are dark places where I roam without reign. Perhaps something is wrong with me. I just don't want to admit it yet.

Brave

And so the wait is over.

My reply came in today and I'm beyond ecstatic, yet all jittery at the same time as I contemplated what this means for my future. In some sense, this decision conforms to the societal equivalent of "throwing away your future", but I just have a very good feeling about this. I used to think that venturing into foreign ground is a jeopardy to myself. Familiarity was a particularly important component in decision analyses.

Now I am no longer afraid.

Cast aside the wishy-washy trepidation and hesitance and instead embrace what a new challenge can bring to your life. I cannot guarantee you or myself an easy journey but I think adventures always prove to be more fulfilling than daunting after we're past the first impression. Seek your own today, and be brave.

Why Are We Waiting?

The only obsession that has been filling my mind the past week is the impending reply of my application. In the most gruelling sort of agony, it has consumed me in a way that I am not proud of. While my superfluous concern might be an affirmation of my tenacious desire for a positive outcome, it has also unhinged my usual calm and collected self. Indeed, the over-zealous and anxious anticipation of answers always seemed rather familiar with me, probably due to the need for some sort of ratification that is characteristic of the middle child. These expectations are analogous to being perched on the verge of a very tall cliff - one motion away from descending into an abysmal imbroglio and being graciously rescued onto safe ground.

I happen to be the type that dwell and brood too long over matters that are already beyond my control, typically job interviews, examination results, romantic could-have conversations that I thought might have impressed, and other issues of similar nature. There must be a term for this behaviour. Not paranoia, I hope.

The new week starts tomorrow, and hence also the vicious expectancy cycle of an outcome I pretend to be sanguine about. I really ought to be less neurotic about such things. Geez.

Random Thought

Today marks my first driving experience on an expressway. I'll admit I was a little nervous because I haven't touched a steering wheel in months and surely it would be daunting to do this after such a long hiatus. But I have my father to thank. He was guiding me patiently by my side and somehow I do feel more confident for the entire journey.

I was actually heading to school for a short briefing, but ended up getting stuck there for awhile due to the torrential rain. I usually don't drink my coffee hot, but I thought with the weather and all, it might be more sensible to savour a cup of my favourite beverage warm. I don't attempt to illustrate in an exaggerating or particularly artistic manner the pitter-patter of droplets on the stony peripheral of the walkway, but it did produce a rather rhythmic pulse that evoked more melancholy than excitement. In moments as such it seems difficult not to be tempted to allow oneself to muse deeply. So as I stared out to the pouring rain, it dawned on me that so many things in my life are taken for granted. We usually find the heart to award gratitude to the major events in our lives, but somehow unconsciously neglect the mundane and repetitive activities that have imprinted themselves to be nothing more than a routine norm, to be expected of unhindered performance in most ordinary circumstances. Isn't it wonderful that the kettle is always filled with water to quench a thirst? Isn't it wonderful that the water is heated for a shower on such a cold day? Isn't it wonderful that all the clothes are neatly folded and hanged in their rightful places? So I asked myself, "How long has my father been driving the family around now?"

Of so many things I can't imagine myself living without, it seems odd that only a few manage to pop up on my list of items to be thankful for. I urge you to review your habits once in a while so that you might consider dishing out a few thank-yous where they might be due.

There is no certainty for eternity.

Watching

In a perpetual state of loneliness I seek the company of another being. Part of growing up is to lose people in your lives, but nobody really taught us how to deal with it. We ultimately choose the outlet of expression most representative of our disappointment, frustration, anguish and pain. I've read that the saddest people write the most beautiful stories and songs. Perhaps it is the raw authenticity of emotions evoked during the creation of these pieces that really reaches the heart of the audience. I cannot tell how many times I must have "felt" a story or song, and related to its words. I remember the times I would come across a song from one of the oh-so-many flicks I've watched, fall in love with it, loop it on replay, and just try to understand what it is about the song that makes me gravitate towards it, like how two unlike magnetic poles invariably attract each other. I can't help but think that the most delicate of sentimentalities must have been conceived in this particular process.

I've been bombarding myself with endless films from a bottomless supply of them since the start of vacation break. This egregious and decadent manner of passing one's time must be the envy of many, I suppose. How liberating it must be to cast away all the tiresome responsibilities of adulthood and instead indulge in a delightful hobby that must seem pretty vacuous. Thankfully, my investment in this endeavour is not entirely imprudent. I've taken an interest in films, and exposing myself to different genres and styles of TV and film would considerably broaden my perspective of them. To appreciate the works of auteurs such as Alfred Hitchcock and Wes Anderson is just as refreshing as enjoying the comedic productions of the wonderful Richard Curtis. Of course, once in a while, I come across a few films that do not deserve my already thinning disk space, so naturally they are ruthlessly booted. Keeping all these films is such an unsustainable enterprise.

I will now return to my beckoning collection of visual wonderments.