of learning to be lonely
Cross-posted for ET's sake (the land of Maoism!)
A week ago, I set off for Toronto to meet up with 3 of my closest secondary school friends. It was a weird get-together: Wei flew down from Oxford, Aaron from Palo Alto, CT was at the hospital of toronto interning, and I from St. Louis. It struck me very much that somehow, we were a group of friends that had gotten into the rat race way too early. All of us had crazily busy schedules, or else sheer geographical differences kept us apart. It was awkward for me when I found out that CT's two other friends that travelled with us were either my Sierra wingmate or my fellow CCA-mate, and I had no impression of it at all! And I was the dumb one asking which wing he was from and what CCA she had in jc.
The days flew by very quickly (I have this urge to write about The Curse of O'hare but why spoil your mood when things can't be turned back? Let's just say that I faced numerous flight delays, cancellations, sleep-over at the airport and extra personal security checks, courtesy of racial profiling from our favorite idiot: George Bush). Toronto is not exactly an exciting city and it kinda looks and feels exactly the same as it did ten years ago. It's just a very sterile city without much interesting stuff going on. But the company more than made up for it. We talked about the good old days, KTV-ed at the Chinatown, had awesome seafood (lobsters included!), took photos at Niagara Falls like our lives depended on it, talked bad about each other in front of each other... God, I could live like this forever! When my flight was delayed from Dallas back to Saint Louis, I couldn't help but take out my personal travelling diary and wrote down as much as I could about the trip. It's a scary feeling of this beautiful photo fading away slowly in front of you and never coming back to you again.
When I got back to St. Louis, I was unhappy with the situation for a while. Firstly, my experiments at the lab were going out of hand. I couldn't manage all the new projects I had been given and it made me nervous all the time because each experiment was so expensive and my prof was so down my neck for results for the paper meant to be published in August. I used to think that academic research would be my life, but now I know that I can't be more wrong. Almost all the big discoveries that led to improvements in Man's life have been made. Almost all of science now is just the specifics: which enzyme triggers this, which proteins make up the cascade, which molecule is the cell marker for T cells infiltration. I now understand why this post-doc at my lab is always saying "Whatever!". When you have lost interest, whatever goes. The life of an immunologist is barely as interesting as it sounds. And I really need to get my flow cytometry working before Ms Klein has to work on me. At the same time, my housemates and one of their moms had bought a whole list of useless stuff for the house when I was away, of which the carbon monoxide detector had to be the winner of the lot. CARBON MONOXIDE DETECTOR! It was damn expensive and I asked the mom why we needed one: "Oh, I have seen on TV how whole families die from CO poisoning in their sleep!" So I asked "and where does the CO come from in our house?" "Oh, I have ABSOLUTELY no idea. But I have seen on TV how whole families die from CO poisoning in their sleep!"
Now, I have this huge bill waiting for me to settle because of their dumb shopping. To make things worse, my housemates and the mom came to have a heart-to-heart talk with me about my second hand furniture in my room being old and needing to be replaced. I have never seen such rude behavior before, and it was indeed a rude shock, because these are people that are my good friends here and you would think that being close would guarantee similar living habits but apparently I have been proven dead wrong. I really haven't seen people so dumb before. A table costs 100USD first hand and they bought it 2nd hand for $60 and it was half-broken! I have nothing against white american people (ok, this is getting personal, I mean them), but I have sense and sensibility to choose the appropriate physical stuff in my room, and at the appropriate price tag too my dear. And I don't take fruits and bread from the fridge that belongs to other people too. That got me completely dumbfounded: a mom comes to help her daughter move into college and stays with us and finishes all my fruits and bread without telling me until I find out when I am desperate to get breakfast just before work? Isn't it a little embarrassing for someone of her age?
I am willing to learn whatever lessons that life has to offer. But I have to say that this is the most unexpected one of all: being on good terms with a person is barely a good indicator for living together in harmony. Knowing a person in different contexts means very different things, and that said, things are going on fine again and I will learn it the hard way even if it means it's harder. Last night, I kept my grievances bottled and when Allison came over, we had too much of wine (2.5 bottles among Nicole, me and her). I have always been careful not to allow myself to get drunk because it's not something I like. But suddenly the overpouring dissatisfaction with life and all its subtleties just got to my head and next moment Nicole was blasting techno music and we were jumping to the music on Temu's bed while we took photos of which I am too embarrassed to show (booties and boobs; all covered though). It was like an outlet for all the pented unhappiness and I was just shouting at the top of my voice (I was told the next morning that when we got out of the house, I called our neighbour a womanizer; oops!).
This morning, I woke up with a headache and I told myself that nope, this isn't gonna happen ever again. Complaining and whining and getting drunk gets one nowhere. But living in life, ar, that's a completely different thing.
I happened to patch back the relationship with a dear friend that had fallen out with me last summer. I think after so many years, we do care a lot for each other, but hurtful words are sometimes too hurtful for a close friendship and I am glad that she contacted me again and we got over things.
Phantom of the Opera is coming to St. Louis and I can't wait to watch it. Musicals remind me of a certain friend because he loves musicals so much. The other day, we had a talk online and after so many years, we finally came to such a beautiful understanding of things.
I have learned that the best way to make yourself lonely is to yearn for possession. Possession kills relationships and sours the beauty in everything. If one can be above possessing, then one needs not fear loneliness, for one has everything in this world already.
Some people are lonely. Some people want to be lonely. Some people are surrounded by people but still feel lonely. Some people think that they should appear lonely. Yet others put up a strong front and act loved when no one is in their lives. Many have loving families or loving other-halfs but feel like a fish out of water. Or some are loved but choose to leave, and end up regretting it even if it's only 3 months.
How far can we go down this long and winding road?
This song is dedicated to all who are lonely:
Learn To Be Lonely from the Phantom of the Opera
Child of the wilderness
Born into emptiness
Learn to be lonely
Learn to find your way in darkness
Who will be there for you
Comfort and care for you
Learn to be lonely
Learn to be your one companion
Never dreamed out in the world
There are arms to hold you
You’ve always known your heart was on its own
So laugh in your loneliness
Child of the wilderness
Learn to Be lonely
Learn how to love life that is lived alone
Learn to be lonely
Life can be lived life can be loved alone
A week ago, I set off for Toronto to meet up with 3 of my closest secondary school friends. It was a weird get-together: Wei flew down from Oxford, Aaron from Palo Alto, CT was at the hospital of toronto interning, and I from St. Louis. It struck me very much that somehow, we were a group of friends that had gotten into the rat race way too early. All of us had crazily busy schedules, or else sheer geographical differences kept us apart. It was awkward for me when I found out that CT's two other friends that travelled with us were either my Sierra wingmate or my fellow CCA-mate, and I had no impression of it at all! And I was the dumb one asking which wing he was from and what CCA she had in jc.
The days flew by very quickly (I have this urge to write about The Curse of O'hare but why spoil your mood when things can't be turned back? Let's just say that I faced numerous flight delays, cancellations, sleep-over at the airport and extra personal security checks, courtesy of racial profiling from our favorite idiot: George Bush). Toronto is not exactly an exciting city and it kinda looks and feels exactly the same as it did ten years ago. It's just a very sterile city without much interesting stuff going on. But the company more than made up for it. We talked about the good old days, KTV-ed at the Chinatown, had awesome seafood (lobsters included!), took photos at Niagara Falls like our lives depended on it, talked bad about each other in front of each other... God, I could live like this forever! When my flight was delayed from Dallas back to Saint Louis, I couldn't help but take out my personal travelling diary and wrote down as much as I could about the trip. It's a scary feeling of this beautiful photo fading away slowly in front of you and never coming back to you again.
When I got back to St. Louis, I was unhappy with the situation for a while. Firstly, my experiments at the lab were going out of hand. I couldn't manage all the new projects I had been given and it made me nervous all the time because each experiment was so expensive and my prof was so down my neck for results for the paper meant to be published in August. I used to think that academic research would be my life, but now I know that I can't be more wrong. Almost all the big discoveries that led to improvements in Man's life have been made. Almost all of science now is just the specifics: which enzyme triggers this, which proteins make up the cascade, which molecule is the cell marker for T cells infiltration. I now understand why this post-doc at my lab is always saying "Whatever!". When you have lost interest, whatever goes. The life of an immunologist is barely as interesting as it sounds. And I really need to get my flow cytometry working before Ms Klein has to work on me. At the same time, my housemates and one of their moms had bought a whole list of useless stuff for the house when I was away, of which the carbon monoxide detector had to be the winner of the lot. CARBON MONOXIDE DETECTOR! It was damn expensive and I asked the mom why we needed one: "Oh, I have seen on TV how whole families die from CO poisoning in their sleep!" So I asked "and where does the CO come from in our house?" "Oh, I have ABSOLUTELY no idea. But I have seen on TV how whole families die from CO poisoning in their sleep!"
Now, I have this huge bill waiting for me to settle because of their dumb shopping. To make things worse, my housemates and the mom came to have a heart-to-heart talk with me about my second hand furniture in my room being old and needing to be replaced. I have never seen such rude behavior before, and it was indeed a rude shock, because these are people that are my good friends here and you would think that being close would guarantee similar living habits but apparently I have been proven dead wrong. I really haven't seen people so dumb before. A table costs 100USD first hand and they bought it 2nd hand for $60 and it was half-broken! I have nothing against white american people (ok, this is getting personal, I mean them), but I have sense and sensibility to choose the appropriate physical stuff in my room, and at the appropriate price tag too my dear. And I don't take fruits and bread from the fridge that belongs to other people too. That got me completely dumbfounded: a mom comes to help her daughter move into college and stays with us and finishes all my fruits and bread without telling me until I find out when I am desperate to get breakfast just before work? Isn't it a little embarrassing for someone of her age?
I am willing to learn whatever lessons that life has to offer. But I have to say that this is the most unexpected one of all: being on good terms with a person is barely a good indicator for living together in harmony. Knowing a person in different contexts means very different things, and that said, things are going on fine again and I will learn it the hard way even if it means it's harder. Last night, I kept my grievances bottled and when Allison came over, we had too much of wine (2.5 bottles among Nicole, me and her). I have always been careful not to allow myself to get drunk because it's not something I like. But suddenly the overpouring dissatisfaction with life and all its subtleties just got to my head and next moment Nicole was blasting techno music and we were jumping to the music on Temu's bed while we took photos of which I am too embarrassed to show (booties and boobs; all covered though). It was like an outlet for all the pented unhappiness and I was just shouting at the top of my voice (I was told the next morning that when we got out of the house, I called our neighbour a womanizer; oops!).
This morning, I woke up with a headache and I told myself that nope, this isn't gonna happen ever again. Complaining and whining and getting drunk gets one nowhere. But living in life, ar, that's a completely different thing.
I happened to patch back the relationship with a dear friend that had fallen out with me last summer. I think after so many years, we do care a lot for each other, but hurtful words are sometimes too hurtful for a close friendship and I am glad that she contacted me again and we got over things.
Phantom of the Opera is coming to St. Louis and I can't wait to watch it. Musicals remind me of a certain friend because he loves musicals so much. The other day, we had a talk online and after so many years, we finally came to such a beautiful understanding of things.
I have learned that the best way to make yourself lonely is to yearn for possession. Possession kills relationships and sours the beauty in everything. If one can be above possessing, then one needs not fear loneliness, for one has everything in this world already.
Some people are lonely. Some people want to be lonely. Some people are surrounded by people but still feel lonely. Some people think that they should appear lonely. Yet others put up a strong front and act loved when no one is in their lives. Many have loving families or loving other-halfs but feel like a fish out of water. Or some are loved but choose to leave, and end up regretting it even if it's only 3 months.
How far can we go down this long and winding road?
This song is dedicated to all who are lonely:
Learn To Be Lonely from the Phantom of the Opera
Child of the wilderness
Born into emptiness
Learn to be lonely
Learn to find your way in darkness
Who will be there for you
Comfort and care for you
Learn to be lonely
Learn to be your one companion
Never dreamed out in the world
There are arms to hold you
You’ve always known your heart was on its own
So laugh in your loneliness
Child of the wilderness
Learn to Be lonely
Learn how to love life that is lived alone
Learn to be lonely
Life can be lived life can be loved alone