shape-shifter
Back in high school I would come home every afternoon and go straight to the backyard. My parents were perpetually with new tasks for our carpenter, they never ran out of antique furniture for him to restore, and so there was always an unvarnished table or unstained bench in the middle of the scarcely-used basketball court. I would carefully climb up the furniture and lie on my back. I would watch the clouds, making out (and up) a gazillion shapes and forming stories about them. Cumulus clouds usually churned out made up cartoon characters who join cheese mafias and who've funny rolling-pin wielding mothers. With cirrus clouds came beach memories, of sitting on the sand and making up stories in my head of revolutions and love stories while waiting for the Bataan sunset. Days with the boring stratus clouds are lazy ones, and I don't get to stay out for a long time because it'd usually start to drizzle before I even pick out a name for my lanky main character. Nimbus clouds were my enemy--I've always hated what they did to the sky. Still, I would take the little time I had to enjoy the outdoors and just stare up, not really thinking about anything. I found the "exercise" would always take the stress of high school pettiness away. And even when I wasn't stressed out, the cumulus-filled sky was still something I turned to if only to have something to look at whil I recounted a wonderful day.
When I got to college things got busier. There were too many group meetings to be had at the back lobby and too many JMA projects to attend to that I hardly ever got home before the sun had set. I didn't mind that I didn't get to spend as much time on one of the unfinished antique pieces; I was enjoying myself too much. And besides, there were a lot of org activities that were held outside that thus allowed me to still watch the sky. The crazy ultimate disc 'playoffs' at the sunken garden and the competitive slowpitch games at the track oval field were always something i looked forward to in the afternoons in the early months of the year, and the dead-end girls and I would often eat ice cream at the side of sunken to relax and catch the sunset.
Law school, law school has been different. The past two years have probably been the years when I've needed the funny-shaped clouds the most. Schoolwork's really grueling, and even though I would make it home before night falls almost half the time, I can never afford to just lie on my back and look up. I feel too guilty to 'do nothing,' even though making up stories about cloud shapes is nothing less than work, so I'd end up either catching up on badly-missed sleep or on badly-needed reading. The most I get to watch the sky is when I'm walking out of Malcolm Hall to my car, and I'd always take advantage of walking with blockmates so I'd have somebody lese watch out for cars as we cross the street--it always gave me a few more seconds to look up and admire the clouds.
It's summer vacation, and the past two afternoons have probably been two of the best afternoons to go back to my soul-soothing habit of watching the sky. The sky is a calm and peaceful blue after all the rains have washed the world clean in the morning, and the white fluffy clouds just glow as the soft rays of the sun hit them in the most subtle angles. There is a steady breeze that mellows the sensation of the warm summer sun touching your skin, creating just the perfect setting for an afternoon summer delight.
I can't, won't, go out to the backyard though. As beautiful as the sky is right now, I just can't bring myself to lie on my back and think. Thinking has been one activity I have tried so hard to avoid, and have ended up doing, during the summer. It hasn't done me any good, mostly because the "thinking" that has been happening often lead to replaying god-awful scenarios and not really into what I should be doing to get out of this endless-as-pi rut. I'm betting that whatever cloud shape gets formed in my head would just end up meshing with some other jagged image stuck in one of the dark corners there, and I would end up with some story that will put those made by storm clouds to shame. It's still a story, one would argue, but I don't want to ruin one of my favorite pasttimes in the world just because it's all dark inside me.
I'm hoping that this is just a phase. It's a weird one for sure, as nothing really stopped me from admiring the sky, even for just several seconds. I'm keeping my fingers crossed for the sky to give me some more time and hold off the terrible rainy season. One of these days things'll brighten up again, and I will be able to clear my head of crap to make room for marshmallow-filled cloud stories again.
---------------
In other stories, I curse the existence in the world of the symptom that is migraine associated vertigo. Curse, curse!
When I got to college things got busier. There were too many group meetings to be had at the back lobby and too many JMA projects to attend to that I hardly ever got home before the sun had set. I didn't mind that I didn't get to spend as much time on one of the unfinished antique pieces; I was enjoying myself too much. And besides, there were a lot of org activities that were held outside that thus allowed me to still watch the sky. The crazy ultimate disc 'playoffs' at the sunken garden and the competitive slowpitch games at the track oval field were always something i looked forward to in the afternoons in the early months of the year, and the dead-end girls and I would often eat ice cream at the side of sunken to relax and catch the sunset.
Law school, law school has been different. The past two years have probably been the years when I've needed the funny-shaped clouds the most. Schoolwork's really grueling, and even though I would make it home before night falls almost half the time, I can never afford to just lie on my back and look up. I feel too guilty to 'do nothing,' even though making up stories about cloud shapes is nothing less than work, so I'd end up either catching up on badly-missed sleep or on badly-needed reading. The most I get to watch the sky is when I'm walking out of Malcolm Hall to my car, and I'd always take advantage of walking with blockmates so I'd have somebody lese watch out for cars as we cross the street--it always gave me a few more seconds to look up and admire the clouds.
It's summer vacation, and the past two afternoons have probably been two of the best afternoons to go back to my soul-soothing habit of watching the sky. The sky is a calm and peaceful blue after all the rains have washed the world clean in the morning, and the white fluffy clouds just glow as the soft rays of the sun hit them in the most subtle angles. There is a steady breeze that mellows the sensation of the warm summer sun touching your skin, creating just the perfect setting for an afternoon summer delight.
I can't, won't, go out to the backyard though. As beautiful as the sky is right now, I just can't bring myself to lie on my back and think. Thinking has been one activity I have tried so hard to avoid, and have ended up doing, during the summer. It hasn't done me any good, mostly because the "thinking" that has been happening often lead to replaying god-awful scenarios and not really into what I should be doing to get out of this endless-as-pi rut. I'm betting that whatever cloud shape gets formed in my head would just end up meshing with some other jagged image stuck in one of the dark corners there, and I would end up with some story that will put those made by storm clouds to shame. It's still a story, one would argue, but I don't want to ruin one of my favorite pasttimes in the world just because it's all dark inside me.
I'm hoping that this is just a phase. It's a weird one for sure, as nothing really stopped me from admiring the sky, even for just several seconds. I'm keeping my fingers crossed for the sky to give me some more time and hold off the terrible rainy season. One of these days things'll brighten up again, and I will be able to clear my head of crap to make room for marshmallow-filled cloud stories again.
---------------
In other stories, I curse the existence in the world of the symptom that is migraine associated vertigo. Curse, curse!