Welcome!: Content

Thursday 31 July 2008

Content

I'm grateful of still having school despite my various complaints previously, take it, I'm just a whiner and thus, I whine, that's what I do. And I feel this time around, I'm quite looking forward to classes every morning, and although I do yawn and (again) moan about it when I have to wake up at 6.30 am, the level of the whining has incredibly reduced to an impressive stage: at least only 5 minutes of cursing and muttering under my breath, usually consisting of 'god I hate morning class'. I know, now I'm just being contradictory, but that doesn't count, really. I don't resemble myself before I shower and brush my teeth. Something just has its order.

So, let's just say that before shower-time, it's a different me altogether. And now every morning 'different me' would whine for a relatively-tolerable minutes, and then after the hot water and the toothpaste, I would already have the positive energy to start the day. And note that beforehand, hot water or not, I would still be grumpy. I'd like to think I'm not just the morning person, but I pressume it just depends on the mood. Ironically, even though I'm having crappy days lately, I'm pretty okay in the morning [nowadays] so that means, my mood is relatively good? Beats me.

And then there's the joy, a bittersweet joy, I might add, to head out of the house when it's still, well, it's not really dawn, but you know, like the day has just started and you're there. And again, yes, I used to bloody whine about it during my working days. Maybe I have just been slacking around for weeks now that it's a nice change to have morning activities again. Either way, the fact remains unchanged that my attention span is short and chance is that I'm still enthusiastic about school cos it just started four days ago. [give it a few more days and I'll be back to being grumpy, you say? God, I'm sad.] And everyday as I sit there on the bus [or most oftenly, stand up] and I look over the sleepy looking working adults around, I can't help feeling rather lucky. Don't ask, I don't know why. Maybe purely for selfish reason, I feel young.

But anyway, the point is that I like my morning school now. I wake up feeling quite refreshed and not-unwillingly. I spent my morning studying in class, and by afternoon if I'm not going out with friends, I would already be home, relaxing and doing useful things, if not napping, and at night I would sleep earlier than usual and thus, I'm ready for the next morning.

Probably that's it. I mean, my class is only for three and a half hours, so I still enjoy it and it gives me plenty of time to do something else. Working, on the other hand, gives you little to be desired. On a normal working day previously, it's rare to be going off at exactly 6 pm and most oftenly I got stuck until 7 and counting the long tedious journey from town to Jurong, it wasn't until 8 or 8.30 pm that I got home, depending on traffic as well.

Okay, now I'm just talking about something entirely different altogether.

What was the point again? Yes, that I'm quite happy with being back to school now. I'm also glad for my sister, for my best friend whom despite the roller-coaster mood I am in these days [happy in the morning, sucky at night] always manage to lend their supports.

Now, talking about the roller-coaster mood, just speaking matter-of-factly, yesterday was one of my crappy day, and no, nothing major happened or anything, but it's just the little things which completely irritated me to no end. I'm apparetly quite irritable, it started from the usual story of the unreliableness of public transport in the morning which forced me to wait for more than half an hour and resulted my late arrival in class. It's not even the lateness which bugs me, but rather that the waiting process is incredibly freaking unpleasant. I mean, the heat?!! Hello? It might be only 8 in the morning, but the heat, man! And then the class which was so draggy yesterday, just so happened. And I was scheduled to make a presentation [with the mentality of just wanting to get it over with, soon], but time wasn't much of the essence for the lecturer cos he didn't comment on a previous presentation that went on for half an hour despite his ten-minutes-per-student-limit. And so it had to be postponed to today and with my crappiness, it just irritated me further.

Wanting to just bury the frustration I had [actually not necessary because of the presentation, my emotion has just been running wild that day of something else entirely], I took the bus home, sat on the back, and wished nobody bother to sit beside me 'cos I just needed the space. But of course, of course, even I couldn't get that! The bus was relatively empty, and so there was no reason to sit right beside me where most of the seats were vacant anyway. But this indian guy [oh my] went to the trouble by excusing himself to take a seat next to me, and then shamelessly lifted up his barefooted feet up to the empty seats in front!

To be fair, it's not like I could smell them or anything, but just the sight of it was incredibly unpleasant and unappealing. I just couldn't believe my luck, and what's even more annoying, and you may call me a paranoid here, but I could swear he was peeking through my shoulder to take a look at my mobile screen since I was busy texting the entire journey home. At that point I would have almost happily scolded him of how much pain he has caused me...[oops] and called him names. Poor man to be directed to such anger. Served him right!

Okay, like I said, they weren't anything major, but they irked me nevertheless. I know the world doesn't revolve around me but some days it feels like everyone is just out to annoy me. [I'm sure you all have those days too.] A lot has to do with the inhuman heat these days, I think. The weather's just unbelievable, how could people not get angry over frivolous things at this state?
But FYI, I don't need an anger management program. It's not just because of the heat, the bus and the [imaginary] smelly feet of an intrusive Indian guy. These things happen. What really bothers me, is something else I don't really wanna discuss here. The others just serve as catalyst, if you know what I mean.

At least, having class now gives me purpose. Word! And I'm quite looking forward to the next chapter, whatever it may be. I have all the things I need, and for the rest, I'll cope.

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Quotes

There's a hundred million different ways of writing, and it takes you a long time to sort through that stuff. And I think it takes anyone a long time to find a voice.

You must learn to take the good with the bad, the happy with the sad, love what you’ve got and remember what you had. Learn to forgive, but never forget, learn from your mistakes but never regret. People change and things go wrong, but you just have to remember that life goes on.

The day before I’m supposed to be meeting Caroline for a drink, I develop all the textbook symptoms of a crush: nervous stomach, long periods spent daydreaming, an inability to remember what she looks like. I can bring back the dress and the boots, and I can see her bangs, but her face is a blank.

I don't know, I think that if I could just accept the fact that my life is supposed to be difficult. You know, that's what to be expected, then I might not get so pissed-off about it and I'll just be glad when something nice happens.

I can see now I never really committed to Laura. I always had one foot out the door, and that prevented me from doing a lot of things, like thinking about my future and... I guess it made more sense to commit to nothing, keep my options open. And that's suicide. By tiny, tiny increments.

There's a big fucking world out there. It's messy, and it's chaotic, and it's never, never ever the thing you'd expect. It is ok to be scared, but you cannot allow your fears to turn you into an asshole, not when it comes to the people that love you, the people that need you.

Maybe what I'm saying is, is the world might be evolving the way a person evolves. Right? Like, I mean, me for example. Am I getting worse? Am I improving? I don't know. When I was younger, I was healthier, but I was, uh, whacked with insecurity, you know? Now I'm older and my problems are deeper, but I'm more equipped to handle them.

I am nothing special; just a common man with common thoughts, and I've led a common life. There are no monuments dedicated to me and my name will soon be forgotten. But in one respect I have succeeded as gloriously as anyone who's ever lived: I've loved another with all my heart and soul; and to me, this has always been enough.

Later that day I got to thinking about relationships. There are those that open you up to something new and exotic, those that are old and familiar, those that bring up lots of questions, those that bring you somewhere unexpected, those that bring you far from where you started, and those that bring you back. But the most exciting, challenging and significant relationship of all is the one you have with yourself. And if you can find someone to love the you you love, well, that's just fabulous.

A woman needs to be held, even, and science has shown this, if its with someone she doesn't care about. Protective hormones are released, and the amount of hormones released depends on the degree to which she is held. The first and best is the complete surround. He wraps you in both arms, whispers how beautiful you are. Second best is the 'arm around.' He is next to you but with one arm around you. Third is he's just next to you on his elbow, but he rests his hand on your stomach and looks at you. Fourth is you snuggling up to him with your head on his chest, while he looks away into space. But when the first best happens, you feel completely, wonderfully like a woman.

So, so what, so fuck off, go home, leave you alone? I'll tell you something Paul, there isn't anything that I've wanted for eighteen years, cause I was a kid eighteen years ago. And if I did still want the same things I'd think I'd gone wrong somewhere, because actually I don't want to marry David Cassidy, I don't want bigger tits, I don't want to do better on my marks. I've stopped worrying about that kind of thing and maybe you should try.

Well maybe there's a big bit of you that's gone missing somewhere, maybe everyone should want something they've always wanted.

Why is it that adults aren't supposed to go mad about anything? You gotta keep a lid on it. And if you don't then people are apparently entitled to say what they like. "You haven't grown up. You're a moron. Your conversation is trivial and boorish. You can't express your emotional needs. You can't relate to your children." And you die, lonely and miserable. But you know, what the hell, every cloud has a silver lining.

I just woke up one morning and didn't feel the same way. Where did it go? It was like there had been a lot of food on a plate in front of us, and we ate it all really quickly, and then there was nothing left. Maybe that's how couples stay together: they're not greedy. They know that what they have in front of them has to last a long time, so they kind of pick at it. I hope it's not like that, though. I hope that when people are happy together, it feels as though someone keeps piling seconds and thirds on their plates.

That is what I have learned: Sex is destructive. Love is nothing to be fooled with. I learned that I was dangerous, not to be trusted. I wondered if my parents were right, with all of their stiff lovelessness. Maybe they knew better. My parents don't dole out love for the deserving or the undeserving. I was learning that love could cost me.

You could say all you liked about reason and logic and common sense and imagination, but when the chips were down, the one skill you needed was the ability to think about absolutely nothing whatsoever.

There is a comfort in never making an effort, but it's a lonely comfort. What keeps you going is the knowledge that you're only playing with only four cards showing. But when you see other people succeeding with their mediocre hands, you have to make a decision. If you turn over that final card you're certain of victory, but it also means you have nothing in reserve.

I’d gone through life believing in the strength and competence of others; never in my own. Now, dazzled, I discovered that my capacities were real. It was like finding a fortune in the lining of an old coat.

Maybe we all live life at too high a pitch, those of us who absorb emotional things all day, and as mere consequence we can never feel merely content: we have to be unhappy, or ecstatically, head-over-heels happy, and those states are difficult to achieve within a stable, solid relationship.