Bright Sized Life
I guess sometimes, we all need a pensieve. I thought I had it all sorted out in my mind, but fact of the matter is, we only use up to 3% of our brains’ inherent capacity, and I still need a good part of mine to take stock of equipment and how-not-to-get-into-trouble during next week’s field camp.
I’m tired and weary, I’m drained out and sleeping in till hours I shouldn’t be sleeping till. But there is no explanation for this. Why would a man who is used to sleeping at 2230 (+/- 1hr) and waking at 0515 (sans the +/- on this one) suddenly lax back to sleeping at 0200? Because he has so much on his mind that his mind refuses to take a break.
I haven’t gotten over you at all. Not a bit. I keep deceiving myself that I have but the truth is I just keep finding an activity to replace my focus. No, I’m not over you at all. It’s strange, because I feel so hamstrung and yet so joyful when I talk (sms) you. It’s strange, but maybe what is a mystery isn’t a real mystery at all. It’s just true that the more you feel for somebody, the greater the hole left behind when they just walk out on you. I’ve come to learn that holding your anger in isn’t always the solution. It always works in the short run, but in the long run, it causes one to cave in on themselves and take their world along with them. And that’s when I realise I have to get over you, to stop telling myself I might still have a shot at you giving me a chance to make you happy and care for you, because I can’t, and thus you wouldn’t.
I’m angry because you lifted my spirits and then you crushed it (I quote Wolf from Matthew Reilly’s Five Greatet Warriors ” ‘Consider your spirit crushed, my son’ “). I’m angry at myself because I allowed myself to be so drunk with excitation and hopes, after learning that my waiting 2 years actually resulted in something just as I was about to move on, that I set myself up for the fall. I’m angry because I had my whole heart torn to bits and you walked out and moved on without any apology, without any remorse and you treated it like an academic exercise. I’m angry because there are fuckers out there (yes, I AM going to use this word because it is apt) who steal girlfriends and treat their gfs like crap, esp behind their back and do all sorts of stuff, while sincerity and perseverance hardly counted for anything at all. I’m angry because you’ve moved on (maybe even to someone else) and I’m still here crying over spilt milk, spilt so long there barely is even the crust and curdles of it left. I got angry for the first time in a long while on CNY eve because a particular organisation boo-boo-ed up reporting time and I ended up having to miss dinner with my family. It felt surprisingly liberating. And the worst thing was being told last minute, after everything was arranged sui-sui. When you let such stuff get to you, you end up having countless sleepless nights, and nightmares on those that you do have sleep. (and you become a person that everybody hates).
However, this has to end, because (watching HIMYM and thinking and praying has made me comprehend the meaning of this) at this age, when we’re barely 20, we do all sorts of crap and believe in things that are essentially made up of cotton candy and butterscotch. True story though, that the hurt that comes out of these things can ruin lives or build them up, but once the change is there, hanging on to hope usually doesn’t work anymore if one intends to change things back. I still can’t believe you thanked me that night for “lessons learnt”, can’t believe why or how that could come out but a “sorry” couldn’t.
Friendship, something else I’ve been thinking about. How much of it out there is real and how much of it is for convenience? How much of it starts off real and then becomes convenience for keeping it real when it isn’t already? Sometimes I don’t really know who to try and keep around and who to let go, because I generally can’t read the signs, for fear that I over-read and under-read. Sometimes, we keep trying to make more friends and keep those new ones, that we forget the old ones and just let them rot. I know because I’ve burned people like that before, even though they try to keep them alive, but I burn them because I felt I could better spend more time on cultivating new and more invigorating friendships with the new people I meet in new environment. But of course now, as the age-old cliche goes, I regret it. How often does your environment change? You go to primary school, you go to secondary school, you go to junior college/polytechnic, you go to uni, you go to army and you go to work and the people around you just keeps changing, the world keeps turning, but there are always a subset of people who’ll stay with you through the changes, the challenge is to find out who these willing people are and to treasure them, because quite frankly, apart from them, no one else in this world, apart from family, really notices or remembers your presence at all. Which is why I’m saddened at the current state of our friendship, not the durations but the effort. I guess when one has too many friends, its already hard enough to give four hours, much less a night, to a friend who simply wishes to hear about your life, laugh through things with you and just learn more about you.
Inspiration. Passion. Progress. Three very sequential words that are so tightly interwoven together. It’s nice to know my very young 11-year old cousin has named me her inspiration in front of her teachers. It’s also nice to know that another cousin (who went through a very very very dark time during his Alvls) has finally re-picked up his art again, and is now a much happier person. I don’t know if its the sketcbook I gave him, or something else, but I’m just glad to see him so much better. Which brings me to this. I’m glad for Kenneth that he’s finally decided on pursuing Dance seriously. Have I really chosen music over frisbee, or anything else? I’m so half-hearted in practice it’s almost shameful, and I’m still so proud its also almost shameful. Pride is not an easy thing to live with, and an even harder character to control. So what am I really doing this for? For show, or for an intrinsic love of music? Or maybe, somewhere, somehow, inside that myriad of notes and chords and layers, I’ll just myself after searching and playing. I realise, being an inspiration does not mean you are the best or have to be the best. Too far ahead and the others will either look to you and admire you and/or be demoralised; too near and you’re “just another one who’s a little bit ahead”. You gotta be far enough that you stand out and majority of the people actually recognise you for something, recognise the hard work you put in, yet near enough that people beging to believe they can actually do it, that it is humanly possible with the right guidance and right attitude. However, you won’t always be as inspiring as you once were, for people always move on and become better and get closer to what you are (once were). Thus, I am not contented with the status quo and will continue to push on despite inertia to search for that deeper meaning behind the music I play.
Yes, I have a dark purple bedsheet and crimson quilt covers and three stuffed soft toys that are supposed to be cats on my bed. What up!
I quite frankly don't care who reads this, because what needs to be said, needs to be said. Tactfulness and bottling things up are two very very opposite concepts.