The Persistence of the Present

I woke up today with a few messages on my phone. One from one of my oldest and dearest friends, stating he was going to MOMA to see his favourite painting.

I reflected, as I am wont to whilst languidly taking in the sunshine-spackled view of my French garden through my bay windows; I remember that Dali was one of my all-time favourite artists, how Persistence of Memory was my the one painting that called out to me, watching the slideshow my art teacher was presenting when I was 11.

And yet, now I realize the difference in me. Whereas the old me, the one who is mostly all over this blog and my poetry blog, was so very much deeply entrenched in memory—the idea of living, reliving, not forgetting, cherishing, not relinquishing—the me today is so much more content to simply be here now.

In fact, I am so actively propelled into the moment I am living by my sheer joy in rediscovering what it means to do so. No more wallowing in old memories, no more wishing for times long gone. There is a very high-energy happiness that goes into rediscovering this very moment for exactly what it is. It is the spirit of simply being.

Be happy for this moment; this moment is your life.

Vavavoom

This morning I stood at my garden door, in the sunlit quiet, just enjoying the peace and serenity that comes with that feeling of being alone in a world that's still slumbering. As I stood there watching, I realized in front of me, almost camouflaged, was a huge monarch butterfly. It's wings were like a fine etched stain-glassed window, all gemstone oranges and gold and black.

As it quietly fed off my geraniums, I held my breath. I realized there was a part of me that itched to grab my camera and capture that moment for perpetuity. But for some reason I resisted, and let myself let go of that feeling of wanting to keep something for the future, and instead simply watched the butterfly as it nuzzled the flowers with its wings opening and closing in rapture.

I felt my breathe slow down, as I let myself simply enjoy the moment. Let the contentment and thrill of miracles wash through me. Sometimes it's okay to know that what you have now will soon flit away, maybe just be a nugget of doubt of "did I really experience that?" in memory..

But then again, perhaps simply letting yourself open yourself to the moment in the here, now and today, without worrying about what will come next, is what life is about.

Circles

Sometimes the best gift you can give yourself is to take that gift you thought was everything you every wanted and carefully wrap it back up, typing a perfect ribbon on top of where the old ribbon lay--and give it away.

and even though hurts you, still smile.

Slowing it down

Just because you have one plate doesn't mean you have to fill it up with just one dish at a time. It's okay to take just some at a time, putting a little of this and that, or a little of everything—allowing you to savour your favourite bit that much more.

Serendipity

Sometimes you find a $20 bill in the pocket of an old coat.

If you were broke or hungry, it feels like a miracle. It can feel like a miracle just simply by the mere serendipity of finding it when you didn't expect to. Maybe all this time you've missed it, or maybe all this time you didn't really know it was gone or what you'd lost.

It was always with you—until that moment you've found it again.

Whether you decide keep it forever as a memento or decide to spend it, you've already lost it.

Sea Glass: There's No Place Like

He’s sprawled on the couch, watching his latest favourite show while I am sprawled upside down, head on his lap and feet up on the back of the couch. Ostensibly reading, but really at this moment I am watching him from under my eyelashes, watching him upside down. It is a favourite place to be for me: not just there beside him or head on his lap but upside down, too. There is a infinite realism to experiencing the world this way, head over heels, or heels over head (...).

Life, I find, is sometimes too often experienced the way physics and biology, allegedly, designated us to do. But then if we didn’t let ourselves break rules, break hearts, break and fall over, trip, tumble, somersault or even get stuck when turned inside out and upside down, maybe we couldn’t really appreciate all there is to experience.

I can hear his heartbeat, the slow, steady and solid rhythm that’s often put me to sleep, has calmed me on nights when I’m wide awake and blinking in the dark. Same rhythm that has lulled me into a slow, lazy and content slumber. His face is a mask of ferocious grimace as he stares at the screen, inscrutable.

And yet, I watch and read so much. Not watchful as maybe an older, albeit younger, me would have done. There’s a peace in this place. Sometimes it is quiet, and not a word needs to pass. Sometimes, it is full of chatter, of giggles, hiccups, murmurs and sighs. A lot of times the peace of pure friendship, companionship, is cut through with a lightning bolt of electrical frisson as hairs spark on fire and emotions rage. This, to me, is the calmest place. This rocking ball of fire, topically rearranged as sensitivity, despair, uneasiness and anger, is sanctuary.

There once was a time and place when I wouldn’t have thought so. But edges of things broken have smoothed away. Sometimes it was time that did that smoothing, and sometimes I had to sequester myself in a dark closet armed with a nail file to metaphorically chisel away at those sharp broken edges to make them easier to live with. There once was a time when this left me bleeding and in puddles, ponds, oceans of tears. But a broken shard of glass lost in the sea returns to the shore as a smooth gemstone reflecting a million colours.

Now when we rage, I feel at home. Because that is the security of unconditional love. No matter how much you lambast the other, no matter how much you throw plates, books or grenades, you know that this is a safety net, an ever-expanding sanctuary that can contain all of that, can withstand all the flames and blasts. Boundaries of a certain brand of companionship that is far more elastic and accommodating than that of any other. That is home.

Even when we go quiet for days. Me in my place, he in his. Even when time just keeps going on its journey, the sanctuary of home exists.

It is this peace, this quintessence of love, that permeates the space of infinity. A place I continue to poke and prod, questioning its existence.  Sometimes it whispers back an inscrutable answer: I don’t need to understand it for it to happen.

The Echo of Eccentricity

Falling in love again wasn't something I had planned. But then again, when is it ever a planned phenomenon? I've found myself asking, pondering whether it is really something in our control or not — sometimes it seems as if we subconsciously make that decision to go ahead and pursue that sensation, and yet sometimes I wonder if we ever really have a choice. If falling out of love was viable, then why not falling in love again?

I recall an age where I had compiled a list of requirements that with every year increasingly edging further into the teen years, grew and grew. He had to be funny, he had to be artistic, he should sing, he should be sporty, he should have abs, he should be smart, he should be kind, he should have a great smile or if not a smile, one that you could feel...and on it went, with extensive requirements that got more complicated and complex.

I'm not really sure if I ever actively sought out a candidate to fill all these requirements. Whatever happened just happened. But over time as I fell, flew, hurt, and got up again, I soon realized that everything that I wanted in my true love was everything I myself had become.

And now these days my heart is doing that little double-time skip, the corners of my mouth that little uplift of a secretive smile.

The Sublimity of Reunification

One of the best ways of recovering from anything is through friendship.

Time had passed like a blink of an eye, and yet the very moment I reconnected with one of my best friends it was as if no time at all had passed. And the funny thing is that both of us voiced that very thought, as the penultimate and long-overdue reunion finally happened.

We regressed to those same younger selves that we once were, and yet I reflected on the many ways we had transformed. We returned to the same hallowed halls where we once spent hours and days, and blanketed with memories and time and experience shared everything that has passed since we had went our own ways.

It is fascinating to realize how we were just children at that time we thought we were conquering the world. Perhaps in another ten years again, this realization will happen, looking at ourselves as we are today.

All the "remember when"s of nostalgia, of recounting old escapades as if it were just yesterday, of opening up about failed relationships and worries for the future — and realizing how much we have changed. Him more gentle, me more poised. If anything, I realized we had both survived a long weary journey, and were more laidback, calmer, and steadier from the experience.

I pointed out the full moon as we walked our last moments. "It's giving us its blessing," I joked.

Maybe blessings don't need to really have a point or outcome, maybe they are just appreciating the moments when you have them.

Missed Beats

I have, in the last several months, questioned almost everything: life, my own identity, my purpose, my worth, everyone else, love, trust...and God. Somewhere along the path of broken, sharp shattered glass on which I've had to trod on barefooted, I came to a really weird realization that maybe somewhere I lost a belief in this big G entity. I still have strong feelings about the physics of the cosmos though, as in a greater force, maybe big F.  This F is found in smaller, (arguably) less overpowering things, like music. Like, laughter. Or even tears. In that really really really great feeling that comes out of really really really great and insane friendships. And even those really really really horrible feelings that come out of them, when things are out of sync, and even in love. Like music, sometimes we just have to wait and find the rhythm again.

Thanksgiving Love Letter

A few posts ago, I wrote about being my own hero. I still stand by that - maybe more than ever. The thing is, I didn't count on the cavalry stampeding in.

I wasn't looted or ravaged (well...ahem...not quite). I was doing a good job of that myself, emotionally speaking. No: the cavalry stampeded in to my rescue.

Said cavalry is enumerated briefly by certain best friends (autocorrect+sloppy fingers made that butt fiends, which is also sort of correct). Not many. Not even a hand - and I am quite seriously including my cat to this list.

However small their number though, their force is legion.

To be sure, by dint of their very positions as bffs, it could just as well said to be a protracted outcome of my very selfsame heroism. Cuz, theyre my best friends cuz like I'm so totally cool right. (Should clarification be required, that was not a question. At all.) So, just by my awesomeness I perpetuated my own personal saving by cavalry therefore I am still my own hero. (Don't argue. Close your mouth. More on this later.)

There are three of you, plus my cat. And my cat is sleeping on the notebook I originally started writing this love letter upon which she settled very meaningfully: human, you give me all thy love, screw the others.

I actually sent a very cheesy ecard to thank one of you. Apparently it didn't go through or something, so yeah, if you didn't get it that was you.

Really though. Thank you. I still stand by being my own hero, but I also really do have some other heroes I never implicitly asked for and who really actually inspire me. Because, if you have to put up with me.....geez, you're a star.

My own star might fade today or tomorrow, or in the next 30 years, but in the last several days especially...well, if I have ever needed hope, it isn't as far off as I might think. In each moment I've been able to laugh, or make someone laugh, or share a thought that is so amazingly understood without further discourse, or engage in really weird languages and conversations, or to bother the next person's sleep and boss them around, or threaten to punch the light out of your boss, or kiss your warm, soft tummy....( THAT ONE WAS FOR MY CAT, LOSERS). These are instances right there that each moment, as miserable and dementingly depressed I think it is, is still being lived. Hallmark card dorkiness, I know! But trust me its the tip of the... tip of the iceberg of love I feel, and I really could never express how much love I feel in my heart so will thereby refrain from doing so herein.

Thank you bums for being my Justice League.

With love and hugs and OK enough now get lost, ugh.

Perfer et Obdura....

The thing is, I forget that I'm my own hero.

I kept falling and kept having to eventually -after the period of laughing at myself while down - pick myself up again each time. Even if I got hurt, I had to heal. But somehow the very fact that I was always my own doctor cut open a wound of itself. A wound that maybe was always there for various traumatic reasons, but it widened and became more raw and festering each time I healed myself. I feel it right now; sometimes it is deep, deep inside, sometimes it's the very physical ache in my bones, or the way my chest tightens in a pain that is like having a metal vise around me. But the wound is always there.

Even still, I realize now that subconsciously I feel that the girl I was in the past was weaker and today somehow I am stronger to her. Maybe simply because I have endured this wound to date, and the latent knowledge of everything I have gone through has made me therefore better equipped by the very fact of existence. 

But the funniest thing is that today I went back in time. And all of a sudden I was looking at this beautiful, happy, cheerful, positive, and err, cheesy bundle of joy -- and she was me. She was me.

But I look at that me: I was so happy. And yet that was a time in my life when I literally had nothing.

And I wonder, who was this girl who had so much courage? Was she really so brave, so hopeful? -- Or was she delusional?

I mean, this was right at the edge of a period where I was in a pit so deep and dark, it wasn't even a pit anymore. I was buried under the fragments of my life, and it was as if all the physical world was the burden of rubble atop me. I had nothing and no one. But I had myself.

I still had myself. And I dug out. I climbed out. Suffocating. Blind. Reincarnated. I lived again.

But being myself meant that I was the me that still had that everlasting wound. That wound was me. It festered in my old life, and it threw me into freefall.

Yet it also taught me to fly.

Today I find it so much harder to be that brave girl who could be so happy in the darkest of times. The irony is that I am not alone in the personal sense and yet in this knowledge I am so much more. 

When I was in high-school, my motto was staunchly 'expectation is the cause of disappointment'. This was my internal warning  to prevent any collision. Yet being human, how it could it have ever be prevented except in a vacuum? In university, the dude who eventually became my best friend told me that for the first year before our actual mutual acquaintancy, he had this certain impression of me because of the way I did what I had to do without any nonsense - studied, classed, worked out, socialized politely yet aloofly - and that I was some kickass tough girl. But really I was just trying hard not to give a damn lest I get hurt (again). But of course, I gave a damn.

Do I regret it? I'm not sure I do. In fact, I'm pretty damn sure I don't. I've gone through so many cycles of heartbreak and despair that counting is just nonviable. In each of these experiences the crux is not what I've learnt from them, but rather what I have learnt of myself.

Just for some context, right now my heart is broken over giving a damn - a bit too much of a damn - over someone who says they also do but their actions and words signify otherwise. To be honest, it actually is not their fault - yet it is.

But this time, I'm not going to let my heartbreak break me, or even define me. It's a tough battle because I want them to see and understand that I am not alright: that I am hurting and I am hurting because of them. And yet, I want to be strong - and if that is what they see they will find some solace in knowing that despite their actions and their behaviour, it's OK, that I am and will be OK.

But you know what? It's not OK. I'm not OK.  However, a person who actually cares will know, or make an effort to really know, even if I seem OK. 

I look back at the happy girl I was, even when I was the saddest girl inside, and it's me who really knows. 

So dudes and dudettes, there is no holding back. I am my own hero. 

All I have to do is look back at who I was and I inspire myself, to continue to be inspiring to the girl I will be.

Because I am my own hero.

Peripeteia

Yesterday I had a conversation with one of my oldest friends that lasted way into the early hours - way past my usual bedtime anyway.

This is one of my friends who fall into that special category wherein you can not talk/communicate for a lengthy period of time and yet when you do connect, there are no hangups - no recriminations about why didn't you stay in touch, I won't talk to you if you don't, etc. - and it's as if that long period of radio silence had never existed.

Coming after my last post, it seems sort of like I have no idea what I'm talking about. Having no one, being nobody vs. having these kind of friends who know that there is absolutely no chance of being taken for granted, either way of the relationship. But strangely, it's all the same. 

One topic we went over was the corroded mental states we both were experiencing; both similarly disparaged and yet both on two different sides of a coin. One, the state of perpetual loneliness and the aching void that remains yet unfulfilled despite the growing residual feeling of yearning. The other, the agonies of being in a relationship that seems to be fracturing with a multitude of deeply felt problems.  And somehow in the meeting of minds we realized the commonality that there is never a meadow of permanent happiness (chorus: the grass is greener...). 

Happiness is so fleeting. And it is thus because we have made it so. Fleeting indicates the passage of time. And in this day and age everything is so temporally dependent. Time is money etc., etc. But what if we had the ability to live forever? We wouldn't have this embedded calendar of time ticking away, of the grains of sand depleting, of racing to accomplish x number of things by x units of time. Perhaps we would have no need for happiness; contentment would be king. (Or queen, if you prefer.)

If I lived forever, I would know that I had a tomorrow. I would have a tomorrow to wait for if today it could not happen. I could wait for love forever, because there would be no ending in loneliness. And I would have no end of patience. And patience is that which we all need a whole whopping load of.

I can feel my heartbeat slow down, my very breaths calm at the very thought of taking things slowly, at the idea of a forever forever. And yet, why can't I apply the ideal to our specimen of mortality?

Why am I building up these walls of bricks made of instances of time, effectively barricading myself into a cube of claustrophobia? Why am I resenting everything around me with my own conceived and self-constructed perceptions? I don't know. It is like shooting myself in the foot. Then shooting myself in the foot. Then shooting myself in the foot. And blaming everything else that brought me to that moment; without realizing maybe there is something I can be doing differently.  

Again, I don't know. But I've promised myself to put my energies into something productive, and not let them fester and become infected. Maybe if I think hard enough I will discover the way to foreverhood.

Breakout

YESTERDAY- For some reason, my face had erupted into the moon. Overnight. All those bollywood 'chand' songs could now be dedicated to me. Y'all, begin.  *poses*

Okay, well no. It's not thaaat bad, but for a person who relishes good skincare (...but then again, who doesn't?...) it was a problem for me. But you know how it is, when we find some little blemish on ourselves its a BIG deal, but noone else even notices. Right?

"WHAT HAPPENED TO YOUR FACE?" The accountant at work asked.

Wrong.

"Geez," I deadpanned, "that was so polite."

"No really, what happened to it?"

"I think my cat kissed me a few times too many, or pawed at my face with her dirty paws."

I'd take a picture for you, but.....no.

The problem was that it was basically a few...wait, for full disclosure, let me count for you....yep, four spots. And all on my right side. Which also correlates to the side of my face which my kitty nuzzles. Also the side where the accountant comes to sit when he attends my office.

But anyways, I figured it was Easter Monday. Noone was really hanging about. Traffic was sparse. The transit commute was sparse. I never really bump into anyone I know when I'm travelling normally, so noooo problem.

The bus stops at the town center. Girl gets on empty seat beside me. I'm reading on my tablet when my elbow is jogged a few times by this girl. That's when I notice she's not just being fat, but trying to get my attention.

"Hi, I know you right?"

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO DONT LOOK AT MY FACEEEEEEEEEEE!"

Well, to be honest, no I did not say that.

Not like that. It was like, "Great! I was hoping I wouldn't bump into anyone I know but now you've gone and did it, don't look at my face will ya, it's gone and had itself a breakout."

So I had to resort to preemptive measures and did what I could only do in this circumstance. I proceeded to yapyapyapyapyapyapyapyapyapyap. Hey, I knew her twenty years ago so there was a lot of ground to cover in the reuniting-comparing-contrasting-reminiscing-catchingup process. So I yapped so much in the short span of 3 and a half minutes that there was nothing more to say and I had successfully forestalled her by making her look the other way in fear that if she turned her head even a small fraction of an angle I would start again.

Then I got home and sank into the heaven that was washing my face with my Exfo-brusher rolling it with Yes-to-Tomatoes and dousing it with ACV. Phewww.

December

Now that it's near approaching the holiday season, I feel something inside me want to break out of my fragile eggshell bubble. I'm not sure if it is the lessening of workloads, or the way the congestion of traffic has slowed down. The increased empty seats on the commute to and from. Somehow, now, I kind of feel I can actually breathe. And I feel it has been a very, very long time.

We have all pulled away onto our own respective paths, all the while knowing deep down that we are always connected. I'm not sure if it was the cumulative effect of one being absent, and the other in reaction filling in that space with their own absence; a tumultous tidal motion of moving bodies all forming one wave, but never in the same place.

I feel, however, this has somewhat been a theme I have kept going over, again and again, each time I make an appearance here. Maybe it's just my repeated attempts to justify how far away I have pulled myself, maybe to soothe some unconscious  guilt within for failing to be there for whoever whenever they may have needed me, or maybe it's just something akin to the baby bird's beak tapping, tapping again and tap tap tapping to break free.

I feel the need to say I am sorry. And also to let you know that I miss you. I don't know why, I just feel the need to do it. Maybe we can blame it on my flu, and mixed up sensations and sensibilities churning away within me as my lymphocytes and whatnot are running about hunting and exorcising demons.

Blahhh. Anyways yo, it's holiday season! Happyyyyyyyyyyyy holidays, loveyall.

From Us All - With Love

Symbiosis

While I turn to writing as solace, without expecting anything in return other than the expenditure of those built-up emotions through the act of writing, I was very much overwhelmed with the feedback I got recently. Not just in quantity but the quality of what you guys gave back to me - thank you, thank you, and thank you!

Really and truly, I don't think I have felt such immense gratitude through my blog before. Sure most of you are absolutely amazing with how frequent you praise me and my writing and there are those special ones who go beyond to show this in more ways than one. But this time, it was different. I guess it was different for me because I haven't been used to letting go of my restraints and just showing my vulnerabilities. 

That said, I really did not expect anything at all - maybe the briefest lines of commiseration - but what I got in return just...it simply made my heart smile. But yup, I didn't expect the mini-essays of support in whichever form you chose to express it, and that was because of my 'disclaimer'. 

As one of you noticed, it's there as an addendum to my posts, and I am not sure why it is still there - I guess that only means that I'm going to try to be 'keeping it real' with my expressing myself. It's a bit of a hard thing to do actually, because usually I feel really dumb about having let myself go down into a state of depression, and because they don't last too long, I feel that it's something like making a drama out of things, by doing so. I don't know.

The main reason I put that disclaimer up and have worded the way I did is pretty much rooted in the same reason why I feel hesitant about even writing about my struggles and sadnesses. I'm pretty self-sufficient, and usually my depressions are based on the fact that the few emotional dependencies I allow myself haven't been too stable - either in my mind or for some real reason... so yeah you can imagine the state of chaos going on inside my carefully constructed emotional self. 

(If I am not really making sense right now it would be because I am listening to some really great Buddha Bar and it's really distracting me; it puts me into a total different mood and sometimes I feel like I am in an intoxicated fugue while listening, so yeah...)

Aah what was I even saying? 

(Oh wow, I just checked which track was playing on my extensive Buddha Bar playlist and whatdyaknow, it's Opium. See? There was some subliminal thing going on there..)

*falls into a trance*

Professed Love

'NO!' Wanda seethed, 'No no no no no! Why won't they stop?'

She pushed her phone away from her in frustration, and glared stonily ahead. The professor at the front of the class at that moment turned, and his eyes met Wanda's stony glare and he stopped, startled.

Wanda dropped her eyes shamefacedly and picked up her pen, making some haphazard scribbles. Great, just great, even the professor is staring at me, just what I need. 

With the class resumed and the attention of the professor restored on his power point presentation, Wanda reached out and slid her phone back toward her. She sighed gustily, and scrolled back to the conversation she had silently screamed at.

Great, now IQ was tweeting about mini-professor-babies that Wanda would have with the Professor. Yuck! Ew! Ugh! Her professor - professors, all of them were old, married men! What was wrong with IQ and Ajay, they just would not stop with this whole teasing thing. How did this even start? It was beyond frustrating! It wasn't even funny.

Wanda was having a sad-smiley-face moment. She just wished she had a bubble above her with a huge ":(" so everyone could see that she was not amused. Especially IQ.

Class having ended, Wanda was now in the library. She knew if she tweeted about how the professor had stopped in mid-sentence meeting Wanda's eyes, IQ would have a huge field day about it, and would never stop teasing her about it, and Ajay would just join right in and keep the whole teasing malarkey going. Sad face moment. Sad face moment, most definitely.

Pulling up her secret-blog, Wanda sat down with a furrowed brow and started tapping away.

Dear secret blog,

I don't know what is happening! Somehow IQ started this story about a love story between me and my professor! That's just disgusting! And what is worse, she just won't stop.  I don't know how to deal with this because it's IQ!!! I mean, IQ (grr her name is already in caps I can't even yell (capslocks) to emphasize her name grr grr.)

This really bugs me because it's like she is human! HOW CAN THAT BE POSSIBLE? She is supposed to be PERFECT! How can I be like her if she's being..... annoying? And that is just the whole problem, IQ IS ANNOYING. I never thought I could admit it, but I did. And I feel like I committed blasphemy because I said it. Yes, I realize this is my 'secret-blog' so she won't see it, or well, noone will see it (I HOPE), but still. I see it, and now I will be HAUNTED by remembering I said it. Now it is undoable. OH NO WHAT DID I DO!!

P.S. If anyone hacks this blog and reads this please do me a favour and ignore this post, and whatever you do not copy or distribute it, thank you.



Wanda hit Publish, and sat back, letting out a huge sigh. She looked up and spotted someone looking at her. What the heck is everyone's problem today? Is there something wrong with my face? 

She picked up her phone and went to Twitter: 'Weird guy staring at me in library o.O Wonder what is wrong with my face.'

Almost immediately she received a reply. IQ: Ooh Professor staring at you in the library! *wink wink*
And just as quickly another. Ajay: Haha lol. I agree! 

Wanda slapped her forehead. She stabbed Reply and typed 'Ajay you always agree with everything IQ says! Don't you have a brain of your ow'  No no no, she hit backspace backspace backspace backspace until she deleted it all. That was mean. And uncalled for. Okay, maybe not uncalled for, but definitely mean. 

'The guy,' She typed instead, 'happens to be a kid! So, kindly stop with the Professor thing, I do not appreciate it.'

She rolled her eyes and then caught the same guy, tables away, still looking at her, somewhat bemusedly. Um, okay then. Weirdo.  



To be 
continued.

In Celebration of Love

Every morning when I get off the bus at the final terminal station, I take a 'shortcut' through the huge neighbouring mall to get to my office building.

This is the time when most of us are still bleary-eyed and cold, half asleep and ready to crash back into our seats at our desks with our first cup of coffee. At least, that's usually me. But, every morning as I take that 10 minute walk through the mall to get to the egress closest to my office building, I traverse by the food court, where a phalanx of elderly folks have already spent most of their mornings taking their daily exercise around the mall a few times, then settling down for their cups of coffee, tea, bagels and biscuits from the Tim Horton's which opens early to cater to them.

I admire them. They still have the will to get up that early in the frigid cold and make their ways to still exercise. They have the willpower yet still to remain healthy, and if you take a moment to look at them, they've still got that lovely sparkle in their eyes telling you that life is still worth it.

As I approach the final 30 seconds toward the exiting doors, every morning as I turn the corner I come upon two very frail elderly persons. Arm in arm supporting one another, white-haired, support-shoed, dentured, hunched over, they are there almost every morning. Some mornings I see them smiling politely with another elderly person, or involved in early morning chit-chat, some mornings she's holding him carefully as he's breathing through nose-nubs, or leaning on a walker, but they are always, always together.

This morning as I came upon the food court area, there is a bench that's just outside the seating plan of the eating area, and upon this bench was this elderly white haired couple. Arm in arm, hand in hand, they sat, and they couldn't have noticed anyone else, for they - as old as they may be - were lost in their own world, giggling to one another, sharing moments of mirth, in their own conversation, sparkling eyes fixed upon one another, in love.


In celebrating love, I wish you all a Happy Valentine's Day: may the love at its foundation resonate through all your other days of the year.

Metamorphosis of the Butterfly

Somehow, I seem to find connections between almost everything and anything. They just pop up. When I may be thinking some odd thought randomly, then another thought comes around and connects to the previous one, or something happens to make me think, hey, that's just an extension to this thought...or sometimes, someone else comes out expressing their own thoughts and their thought just somehow aligns itself in symphony with all those already going along the motorways of the mind.

Technology

For some time, I have had this ongoing love-hate relationship with technology. No-brainer, right? Because, who doesn't? We've developed a high level of dependency upon technology so that when something actually goes wrong with whatever gadget we are dependent on, it's almost as if the world's ending. Waiting just an extra two seconds more for something to perform or load drives us insane. If the microwave doesn't work, 'oh my God, how do we eat?'.  We lose a phone, our life has become traumatizing. If, God forbid, the power goes out, well, gee, we may as well die. 

Microwave example aside, I'm going to pick on those devices which entail furthering communication. It boggles my mind, observing how dependent people have become on their devices; getting on a bus and just observing people, dozens, hundreds, all just focused on this tiny rectangle. That's become their world. If something happens to their phone - they lose it or it just doesn't work - it suddenly catapults the person into a whole new sphere, almost like rendering them on a deserted island, in total blackout, radio silence, traumatic isolation.

I can say this with my idealistic scorn of course, because I have absolutely no dependency on cell phones. Or, to be more honest, on my own possession of one. In full disclosure of asserting this, I have to admit that I do depend on others' having cell phones to fully optimize our communication. But other than that, my sole technological dependency is via the computer system. My laptop. 

While I spend a good amount of time at a computer - all day at work, and often hours at home also - I do enjoy the time away from being 'on line'. I enjoy being unfettered while outside, and not being one of those phone-absorbed people. Maybe I am old-fashioned, but having phones when outside were once just things to be used in case of an emergency. Now they have meshed so tightly with our everyday lives that they have superseded all other activities.

My 'beef' is with how less we are using our minds with the progress of technology. I harbour this deeply embedded sensation of us as civilization creeping up this graphical curve, slow at first with our lack of technology, then zooming ahead faster and faster at full speed as we develop technology that allows us to perform the most basic actions with greater facility and efficiency, but then we suddenly start slowing down, because with so many machines doing the work for us, suddenly our dependency has become our handicap, and we have forgotten how to actually think.

Imagination

Kids these days have so many options with which to engage their time. Computer games, video games, television, talking books, ...iPads for their own personal use to do all of that. They're born into this new technology-drenched era, so much that to think of any other possibility does not even occur to their mind. It's become taken for granted now that they are entitled. 

But, while it's normal for kids to be able to get a handle on utilizing the most advanced technology and programs, being able to text and type without even trying - things which make the older generations gawk, somehow in the broadening of their accessibility to the world in general, they (we) have in fact put a border on how our minds can grow. 

Imagination, for example, seems to have become one of the foremost casualties in this burgeoning world of technology. You hardly find children today being able to 'make-believe': giving them a bunch of lifeless and unconnected items and they will lose any interest in them almost immediately. Gone is the potential of using our own minds to infuse creativity and life into otherwise lifeless objects and circumstances. I spent my entire childhood creating stories, games, entire story-worlds; hand-me-down toys from other well-off children came alive with their own personalities and entire background stories. Pocahontas became Quasimoto's sister-in-law, John Smith became an Amitabh-Bachchan-song dancer in the Smith Brother's Pub & Grill. Kitty, the Simba-replicated stuffed animal with absolutely no batteries became the official family pet and went everywhere we travelled. Our tiny square of backyard became a huge world wherein our tiny toys had their own farmland, kingdoms, and camping grounds. 

Now, the idea of 'make-believe' almost doesn't exist for children. It has evolved with the last generations to remember what it was, and has almost taken more carnal and definitely adult meanings: "role-play". Once upon a time, role-play was what kindergarten kids did with the random props and dress-up box. Now, I don't even have to explain what has become of the word, because so ubiquitous this evolution, it becomes unnecessary. 

Oh, I know I sound like an aged old woman, and while I am the kiddiest girl around for my age, I also know that while I am a kid at heart, I have an ancient soul. I grieve for the coming generations. Rather than their brains developing new and exciting neuro-pathways creating vast portals of discovery and intellect, the networks that are actually lighting up are those of machines. 

Interaction

The loss of performing what may be perceived as useless activities, such as fooling around with inanimate objects or running around on the streets, comes with the gain of greater interpersonal interaction. Connections are available at the press of a button, communication is accessible round the clock. We've spanned the world hundreds of times, and when once you could be anywhere just by imagining it in your mind, now it's feasible: through technology you are actually capable of connecting to that same place, actually speaking with someone 928502394823 miles away and not just in your imagination.

In elementary school, I was one of just 3 people who put up their hands when our geography teacher asked us who had a computer at home. Then that total number of people went down to two when he then asked who had Internet, my hand still up in the air. I had very little idea of how profound that word, Internet, would actually become, despite being one of the special ones in possession of this Holy Grail.

Perhaps that is what demarcates the concept in my mind so emphatically. I have been on both sides of that line; witness to and part of a generation undergoing profound revolution, consequently I am less susceptible to that sense of entitlement.

But then again, I grew into that generation at a younger age, and taking that in consideration, I can then also understand how parents of our generation would have been even more suspicious of connecting with others through electronic devices. Once upon a time, suspicion of anyone absolutely unknown in person was already in place, now where you cannot even see who it is that you are communicating with - not even a voice, as even with the telephone - imagine the horror.

Years after that moment in my geography class - my short-lived temporary glamour dissipating with the concept becoming so much more mainstream - in high-school, one of my best friends one day told me about this guy she met on the internet, and how they were...well, involved. At that time, I couldn't fathom it. I was already enduring the teenager-fixation of high-school crushology at that time (and boy, was I swimming in that!) that to even comprehend this strange idea of my best friend talking to this random guy on the internet, then somehow falling in love, was totally mind-boggling. Of course, being an open-minded carefree soul, I just accepted it (or maybe I was too entrenched in the drama of my own 239842039840923 crushes at that time) and figured as most crushes at that time and age, it would also be a short-lived thing.

Boy was I wrong. Years (and years) later, she is now engaged to him. And this is amazing taking into consideration 1. the number of years that has actually passed since they first met and 2. they still live where they lived when they met. Her in Toronto, he in California. Of course, there've been numerous visits. But yes, they made it!

But that doesn't even come to me as a shock. Not now. Somewhere down the line, I somehow aligned my appreciation for the internet with my innate belief in love being possible in any form. After high-school, I still wasn't in the fold yet. I went through another year of university before the total unrestricted access to computers and internet finally seeped into my bones and took root.

First came writing. Writing, as I have discussed before, was my companion. When disaster struck and I found myself totally surrounded by a tormenting bubble of loneliness, it was writing that became my balm.
But, even before I really needed it for this reason, I had stumbled upon a blogging site when stalking my new uni best friend's crush for her. (Yes! After all this lengthy and somewhat dry discussion, you finally get some juicy gossip.)

So, this is how it went down. Calculus tutorial. I met her, she met me. We became friends. Became best friends. She confessed a crush on dude. I tormented her by teasing her in millions of ways, i.e. going to talk to him, dancing behind his back for her to notice him, well---let me stop the list before you really think I am crazy. If I haven't really told the story before, I shall save it for another post. In summary, we were in the library one day (well we were usually there, duh) and he happened to be using one of those computers you stand at to do a quick check for whatever, and while she did her usual freeze-wideneyes-hyperventilate routine, I managed to sneak up behind him, but him being 6 feet tall I couldn't see much,  then he just picked up his bag in his usual fastidious and oblivious manner and left, and that's when I noticed he'd left his page open. And it was his blog.

There you have it folks. The key to this portal.


Granted, his blog was on a totally different server, and it took a lot of random stalking his url and dropping random comments under weird aliases (like ApplePie Is Yummy) just to make her have panic attacks (for whatever reason she worried (more like freaked out) that he would know these weird comments ("Hey Grandpa, green apples.") were connected to her. Like really.

But that's how the flicker of a butterfly's wing can create a tsunami across the world.


Connecting

The evolution is predictable. From dropping anonymous comments, to becoming a registered member, to having my own blog, to recording preposterously insane moments with my university friends, to one day having a traumatic experience then suddenly really, actually NEEDING to write for my own solace. Then being on the internet, it only was natural that I encountered people I never met.

I've always been pretty cautious with regards to actually getting close to anyone. Not just strangers on the internet. Friendly, sure, I can do friendly, and everyone who meets me usually gets that impression - unless I want you not to because I do not like you. I have said this before, and I say so again, I have always preferred just having a very select few of very quality friends over a large group of acquaintances. Experience is talking here - the sort which makes a person need writing for solace in the first place.

Then I landed in a place where I was suddenly as anonymous as I chose to be. Then I realized, this is a two-way street. We've been looking at the fact that in the anonymity of the internet therein existed the threat, when on the other side of the coin, there was immeasurable safety and freedom in being anyone - or better yet, no one at all. Then I became liked, and being liked, I became a friend. I became a sister, a confidante, a role model and a best friend. With people who were strangers over the internet.

10 years later. I'm here. I've lived a whole lifetime with those people who became my family. When we have more or less gone our own ways, reminiscing makes me feel as if I am recollecting a previous life. And the sensation is another confusing experience. It once again propagated me into a phase wherein loneliness was my companion, and somehow, I've become even more discriminating about who I let get close to me, and at what distance and for how long.



 Kindred Spirits

When I consider the ease with which children - or rather not only children but those younger than myself seem to be much more vulnerable, no? - are sharing their personal information, sending across pictures, voice chatting, facetiming, whatsapping, with strangers, I cannot help but feel uneasy. I've encountered my own fair share of really really strange individuals on the internet for whom exploiting such information, making threats etc. is apparently what entertains them.

I'm not usually quick to trust just anyone, and this should obviously be how we all are. I have this...thing...with regards to being able to 'feel' a person's personality. Again, this is something I just can't explain. It's what allows me to understand and empathize with a person. It's what makes my literary caricatures of those individuals I put into stories seem so aptly like them.

But those special few. I don't know. There is something even more ineffable about the circumstances of how they happen. We could consider the myriad 'what ifs' that could have taken us on very different paths, but for some reason I really feel that no matter what other hand of cards we'd been dealt and however else we chose to play them, somehow we'd have still inevitably met. Like the dove coming home to its roost every night, somehow perhaps that is how the soul works.

We have connections with everything and everyone simply by our very existence within this huge ecosystem. But sometimes, special connections just pop up. Cherish them.

Luxury

Emotional isolation is usually conducive to the optimization of creativity. Experience, at least, indicates this is so. I have always found a natural rapport with my creativity through the inevitable sense of loneliness that has always accompanied me wherever I went. Wherever I go. Even in the closest intimacies of friendship and love, in companionship with those closest to heart, it accompanies me. Perhaps this might be concerning, and definitely would be to one more practically and logically inclined, but to my own mind - inexplicably emotional and sensitive - this is only natural.

Duality has always existed; black, white, dark, light, good, bad. It exists as existence itself. To be, therefore somehow only balances this immeasurable sense of loneliness. Maybe, therefore, it exists for each and everyone  of us, but as each individual is as unique as its DNA, our own capacity to recognize it varies on millions upon millions of frequencies.

I have always seemed to find a mutual and comfortable rapport with those similar in emotional-frequency to myself - which after having been said, seems already an obvious observation. But I do: I feel at home with those who also recognize and bear witness to their solitary dependency on feeling. I hesitated there to label the sentiment and restrict it to that label; that feeling is melancholy, even sadness, but it is not only that. The poignant place within oneself where words clash with emotions and churn out beautiful masterpieces on one end of its spectrum, or equally nullify themselves into a white noise of a blank canvas of silence.

Labeling to maintain order sometimes makes things more confusing. This post, for example, would naturally be posted in my "Prose" blog at Lucid Iridescence, for all the emotional sentiments shared herein, but for some reason, I am not posting it there. This post was initiated by a intention to explain myself - perhaps once again, and maybe at the risk of becoming a tedious repetitive bore - and my inability to write the way I have been used to. Oh, I know that I don't need to explain a thing, but for some reason I do.

Maybe it is only to myself, afterall that I seek explanation. January has seemed to come in its own stead a whiteness and coldness that has isolated us all within the warm cocoons of our own being. I miss a lot of people, and yet, somehow I do not. Because I accept that we are all in our own places and that this too will pass. But I do miss them. I miss you. If it has been understood, perhaps I feel a need to have it said regardless. Friendship is that which I have always maintained as important, crucial. And when you make some which are deep and resonate beyond normal frequencies of superficiality, sometimes it is often as if we have merged as one and consequently become incomplete without that strong resonance coming down the string of our instrument.

As an empath, I've always felt the being of others very profoundly. It has allowed me to understand and absorb the aura of that person within me, and to learn to be another person through that connection. This is a phenomenon that is almost indefinable because it involves letting go of words and descriptions, because they only form barriers and restrictions, and to open oneself up to actually being. 

Like my prior post which entails the conversion of "ME" to "WE", I have found myself observing a number of abstract ideas all superimposing: in one way, maybe we have all been submerged under the waters of recovery; under water we do not dare open our mouths to speak for we shall drown. Our silences could be our time for 'me'. And yet, it has been noted, we have also been quite much more busier with the practical aspect of life, and consequently had less time to devote to 'me'. Even as I have been loitering around on my own blog, and those of others, I had undergone a phase of not wanting to actually 'talk' - I felt an inexplicable resistance to comment, or respond to comments. In sorting out cause and effect, I am not entirely sure which came first. Was it because I had grown used to being silent because of being too busy 'with life' that I was more reluctant to communicate more? Or was it because of something deeper within, which had triggered a phase of radio silence and only prolonged more through the excuse of being busy?

Another blogger recently wrote a post that put to words another of my thoughts: the disparity in walking in another person's shoes vs. still not being able to be able to see life through their eyes and mind. This blogger is one of the few persons who this entire post is somewhat dedicated to. This blogger has made an effort recently to write more often, and interestingly, though no longer surprisingly, the thoughts which have been expressed have been mirroring my own. Another blogger, impressively, has been writing (obviously) undeterred, and the theme and sentiments which always pour forth from this blogger's mind and heart have always soothed my own because of how easy it is for me to slip into that same melancholic place.

I somehow stumbled on a quote a few days back that said something with regards to melancholy (one of my favourite words), by one of my favourite authors. And I find it again for my reader's sake:

"..Melancholy - that cheapest and most accessible of luxuries . . .” -- Charles Dickens

For, despite it being a torrential affair that could involve a plethora of negative connotations, it is a beautiful luxury. I firmly assert that it is this state wherein some of the most beautiful creations are born. 

Maybe, we are given the opportunity to rail away at what we do not like or want just for the realization what exactly it is that we do like, what we want. If we were always appeased and content, we would not know better. 

I want to be able to write again, and I want to because I know I have done so and done it well in the past. But then I have to remind myself, that most often in the past writing has been my sole companion; it is because of my loneliness that most of my best writing has occurred. Once, in longing for that one soulmate to be able to share and tell everything to, I turned instead to the pen and paper, and put words down to keep my memories intact. Now, I am at a loss for things to write, but again, this is because what I wanted most has happened. Brings to mind that classic warning: be careful what you wish for. Because I got it, I guess...and yet I shouldn't be railing against this fate, because it is the best thing life's given me. 

In duality again, perhaps one passion could be viewed to oppose another, one as a substitution for another. But why, exactly does this have to be that way? It doesn't. That's all.