Feb 15, 2013

How much would you give to feel?

And if you're still breathing, you're the lucky ones
'Cause most of us are heaving through corrupted lungs
Setting fire to our insides for fun
Collecting names of the lovers that went wrong

(Youth - Daughter)

Here are two other girls with the voices of angels.

Skinny Love - Birdy (I've probably shared and quoted this song a lot)



Evaporate - Gabrielle Aplin



Flesh and bone wrapped up in skin, kept alive by oxygen
but right now breathing is so tough
They say they know what I can feel, and time will find a way to heal
but right now time is not enough
But then I feel you soaking in; I can feel the blood rushing again

Maybe it's a girl thing


I've been talking to some of my friends about some of my worries with regard to friendships and the next four years, lines to tread, a spider's web. The guys just don't get it. I've concluded that it's probably just a girls' thing.

I guess I do think far too much into things, and always assume the worst - even if not in my head, it happens in my heart - and I can't help but feel hurt and confused over something that probably doesn't even cross the mind of the other person. It makes me extremely vulnerable all the time, and I hate it. If only I were secure enough to look at it and think, oh well, whatever, it doesn't matter. I mean, I know I'm supposed to think that, and I really do tell myself so. But my heart can't help but panic and want to retreat.

I think I constantly fear that while I see particular people as very close to me, or as very special friends, they might not see me as the same. Maybe just as someone nice to talk to from time to time, but with whom they share nothing special. Or if they get annoyed by something I do or the way I act, and never have the courage to tell me. Like in Sec 1 when I keep saying "Go and die lah!" as a joke, and didn't realise it was hurting people until it was too late.

If this is a common thing among girls to think and worry like that, then good, it tells me I'll grow up and survive. If it's just me, I'm afraid I'll scream and die one day, and nobody will ever know what happened, because it was all in my head.

Think I've found the reason

In kindergarten, everyone was a part of Connie's gang, except anyone who was 'different' - Rachel Ho, a girl who wore spectacles; and Joan, a girl who was darker-skinned. The others shunned them both too, but only because Connie didn't like them. I played with Rachel and Joan until Connie and the rest came along, for fear of being left out, too.

In upper secondary, my best friend was a girl from China, Cui Xiao, whom people didn't mix with much 'cos she usually kept to herself or got really touchy around people (which was both hilarious and creepy). I didn't take pity on her or anything. I found her a great companion - not very sympathetic a friend, but she didn't put any pressure on me to keep up the conversations, and when she said things, it really struck people. It really made you think. At the same time, I spent a lot of my Sec 4 time wishing I were closer to a certain group of people - those who understood my own situations and issues. They also happened to be the popular bunch. Things didn't work out in the end, but it was for the better.

Right now I'm getting very much involved in a whole new group of friends and while trying to be great buddies with everyone, I recognise that I'll slowly stop running and retreat, too. I don't see myself hanging out with the loud, crazy bunch as much as I hope; I see a bit more time spent with those who might not be as popular. I see myself having quiet private one-to-one chats. I see myself going outside and laughing and going insane, and then retreating back to a small space, sharing some personal time with just one close friend.

I think the reason I shouted a storm and then pressed 'Delete and Exit' was because, at that point in time, it came across to me as something exclusive. (I mean, now I know otherwise, but at that point in time I had reached my boiling point, or whatever you call it.) I'd rather be left out with my friends than to be invited into something with an exclusive feel.

Campus Superstar!

So I heard that By Now song on TV again and was reminded of how I did a little parody of the song in Sec 1 during Chemistry class or something. It was about how this girl took extrim-x and looks fabulous now.


By the way, my Crescent Dance junior Valerie Loo is a Campus Superstar contestant this year! Support support support!!!

On Being Normal

"Is he a doctor or a patient?" I asked Reiko.

"He's a doctor," said Naoko. "Doctor Miyata."

"Yeah," said Reiko, "but I bet he's the craziest one here." "Mr Omura, the gatekeeper, is pretty crazy, too," answered Naoko.

"Sounds like patients and staff should swap places," I said.

"What makes us most normal," said Reiko, "is knowing that we're not normal."

- Norwegian Wood




That idea struck me a lot. I liked how in the hospital, the 'patients' with supposed mental problems seemed completely normal, friendly, sweet and reserved, while those that seemed more in need of mental professional help were the staff members - the ones employed to help the patients. We're all a little mental, really, because there is only one very elaborate and detailed definition of being perfectly mentally healthy, and I think we'd all deviate from this ideal a little, whether it's only at little points in our lives or if it's engraved in our personality. The difference lies in whether you look at who you are and recognise that you are individually, uniquely you, with parts that might make people laugh or think you're 'weird', or whether you think nothing about you is out of sorts and you're a perfect role model in an insane world. No one stays perfectly normal in a world like this.

I laugh very loudly at things others don't find funny. I get extremely, extremely emotionally attached to a story or someone's issues. I tear up pretty badly reading lame things. Sometimes, out of nowhere, a small memory or joke jolts me and I cry or laugh out loud in the train. I can get so embarrassed that I cry when someone makes a normal comment or harmless joke. I usually assume the most negative of options when little friendship-related things arise, like when someone forgot to include my name or someone's talking about me without me around. I both love and hate looking at pretty girls. I like standing on tables and sitting in trolleys. Sweet romantic movies make me the most emo. I feel like kicking kids who fake-cry. These aren't even the interesting bits. If you're reading this and thinking, 'this is nothing, I've got cuter stuff to share', then congratulations!

What is normal, but being abnormal? It's the most normal and sane of people who are unusual. Who even came up with the concept of being 'normal', anyway? It's terribly subjective and ignorant, and who made 'weird' a bad thing?

We're all different, and those different parts are what makes us special. It's the coloured bit that juts out and makes people interested. It's what people remember, sometimes as an ugly mark - screw them - and sometimes as a gem. Everyone has different coloured bits that jut out. The person who doesn't is the one who isn't normal.

Norwegian Wood, and my own university fears

"You know, when I went to university I joined a folk-music club. I just wanted to sing songs. But the members were a load of frauds. I get goose-bumps just thinking about them. The first thing they tell you when you enter the club is you have to read Marx. "Read page so-and-so to such-and-such for next time.' Somebody gave a lecture on how folk songs have to be deeply involved with society and the radical movement. So, what the hell, I went home and tried as hard as I could to read it, but I didn't understand a thing. It was worse than the subjunctive. I gave up after three pages. So I went to the next week's meeting like a good little scout and said I had read it, but I couldn't understand it. From that point on they treated me like an idiot.

I had no critical awareness of the class struggle, they said, I was a social cripple. I mean, this was serious. And all because I said I couldn't understand a piece of writing. Don't you think they were terrible?"

"Uh-huh," I said.

"And their so-called discussions were terrible, too. Everybody would use big words and pretend they knew what was going on. But I would ask questions whenever I didn't understand something. "What is this imperialist exploitation stuff you're talking about? Is it connected somehow to the East India Company?' "Does smashing the educational-industrial complex mean we're not supposed to work for a company after we graduate?' And stuff like that. But nobody was willing to explain anything to me. Far from it - they got really angry. Can you believe it?"

"Yeah, I can," I said.

"One guy yelled at me, "You stupid bitch, how do you live like that with nothing in your brain?' Well, that did it. I wasn't going to put up with that. OK, so I'm not so smart. I'm working class. But it's the working class that keeps the world running, and it's the working classes that get exploited. What kind of revolution is it that just throws out big words that working-class people can't understand? What kind of crap social revolution is that? I mean, I'd like to make the world a better place, too. If somebody's really being exploited, we've got to put a stop to it. That's what I believe, and that's why I ask questions. Am I right, or what?"

"You're right."

"So that's when it hit me. These guys are fakes. All they've got on their minds is impressing the new girls with the big words they're so proud of, while sticking their hands up their skirts. And when they graduate, they cut their hair short and march off to work for Mitsubishi or IBM or Fuji Bank. They marry pretty wives who've never read Marx and have kids they give fancy new names to that are enough to make you puke. Smash what educational-industrial complex? Don't make me laugh! And the new members were just as bad. They didn't understand a thing either, but they pretended to and they were laughing at me. After the meeting, they told me, "Don't be silly! So what if you don't understand? Just agree with everything they say.'"

you retreat to remain sane

(kind of a follow-up to my previous post)

"The psychological foundation, upon which the metropolitan individuality is erected, is the intensification of emotional life due to the swift and continuous shift of external stimuli. Man is a creature whose...mind is simulated by...difference. ...Thus the metropolitan type...creates a protective organ for itself against the profound disruption with which the fluctuations and discontinuities of the external milieu threaten it. Instead of reacting emotionally, the metropolitan type reacts primarily in a rational manner..."

Prof Jane Jacobs gave us this extract at our Experience Yale-NUS Weekend's sample classes. It's a really dense paragraph, so I simplified it with a pictorial representation:



And so because there's way too much going on around us, if we let our natural emotional response to constant violent change take over, we will drown. We have to be above that. I'm a very feelings-based person and my friends keep telling me that I have to be above that. I used to try. 

Because there's too much pulling and crushing us from every side, we have to reject the natural emotional response to what feels like the unfavourable. We push away the natural response, which will only harm us in today's world - emotion - and replace it with rationalisation. That these 'fluctuations and discontinuities of the external milieu' are good for us. Financial stability. Success, in society's definition. Eventual happiness. 

The class broke down that paragraph and tried to define certain terms - "external stimuli", for example, being the environment of people and networks; society and its pace; economies; competition, which has a heavy bearing on our individual and corporate aspirations. 

And this 'protective organ' against 'the profound disruption' - whether it's retreating to a Singsoc or people of your own culture, faith or ethnicity when you look at it externally; whether, within ourselves individually, it's adopting an attitude of indifference, or developing the ability to rationalise while putting your emotions on the side - is a coping mechanism we all need, but it's pretty scary how much we depend on this 'protective organ' to seek some form of stability and reassurance in the midst of the tide of the world.

Feb 14, 2013

Naive

I'm a beaten, weathered idealist. People look at me and think I'm so naive and sheltered, just waiting for the tide of maturity to bring down my view of the world.

Being naive has a pretty negative connotation. It says I'm gullible, unthinking, childish in thought. It spills over into other things - my not-very-private Facebook profile, my personal and very public blog, Christianity and my church, my values - and people tend to dismiss them all as being the result of naïveté. They look at my baby face and my 1.57m stature and the way I talk to people and it completes the picture. 

I'm very sheltered - grew up around good people, had supportive groups of friends who shared my values. Among my close friends, not one smokes or isn't a virgin (not that I know of, anyway), and most of them didn't get into a relationship until they were 17/18 or older, many of whom are still evergreen. Not that I have many close friends, but still. 

But I don't like to think I'm that naive. People look at my decision to join Yale-NUS and what I'm planning to major in in university and City Harvest and my faith and they think I don't question. They think I've never thought through the points they're listing off in their heads. Look, I have a devil of a man in my mind taunting and questioning me at every corner with a whip. I've fought so many inner wars in my head that when people confront me about these things, or tell me I'm just immature, I don't even want to fight back. I've thought through all the questions myself, too, and when you think about something for weeks on end, you never want to tell someone else about the thought process. They only see the end product, and assume you didn't give it much thought. That you're a brainwashed mouthpiece.

These are big things. My university choice is a huge thing. My faith is something I give my life to. Why would I not give it a constant, good, hard think-though? Why would I ever stop questioning myself and everything I'm giving up? I'm so tired of the cynic in my own mind, and more tired of those who assume I've never been anywhere near there. 

I've digressed a lot.

So people look at my the way I describe the world and think that I assume it's full of only beautiful people, people who are compassionate and who love selflessly and who all have a soft spot and will help me out with sincerity as I leap and stumble through life. 

People forget that as I have a more idealistic picture of the world, I also get disappointed a lot more. I just don't believe that someone would use me or give away a piece of myself that I've entrusted them with. I don't believe that my closest friends or loved ones will give me nothing less than the fullness of their hearts. I don't believe that people will choose to be heartless. I don't expect people not to acknowledge and reciprocate. I don't expect ugly things to happen, and more often than not, my expectations get the better of me, and they come crashing down. I know it - the pang that strikes you; the staring at the screen, unmoving; the sudden tears that come when you'd rather have no one there. Wondering what you're supposed to put your trust in now. Wondering if the people you felt were your closest friends don't see you that way at all. Wondering what you can tell about anyone.

To deal with disappointment or doubt, I tend to back off from the deepening pit really quickly. I shut off my mind and cover up the hole with bad thoughts and run from the pile of sweet milk turned sour and immerse myself in other things to forget the pain. That's how my mind defends itself against madness.

I have friends who have developed a different defence mechanism: a more 'realistic' outlook of the world. I have friends whose view of the world is that it is inherently ugly. Beauty is a wonderful addition that some people bring into the world, but it isn't a given, so don't expect it. Expecting nothing from anyone and taking good things to be an unexpected blessing is an attitude you have to force yourself into, because it defies the theory of give and take if looked at in its extreme. 

I have friends who look at how I expect everyone to be kind, and tell me I will get trampled over. That I'm making myself too easy a target for the kill. I have to learn to cut certain ropes and stay afloat. I have to recognise that all the dangerous hopes I'm carrying will only sink me deeper. What am I doing fighting the confusion? I have to stop trying to swim in that current and just throw off the weight of my idealistic picture of the world to get some oxygen. To survive.

I don't know, but when I try to adopt these, I don't see a way of doing it without numbing myself to the world first - of everything good and bad. And I don't understand why my belief that everything is inherently good is deemed naive. I didn't say "everything is good". I said "everything is inherently good" - when you peel off the layers and layers of mud and grime, something sparkling remains. 

That sparkle could be the yearn for a mother's love as a toddler. It could be the need to feel worthy. It could be your childhood longing for your parents' approval. It could be the wish for the ending of misery, or the ending of the cold stone walls, the ending of numbness, you just want to fly a stream of colours. Everyone needs love and self-worth and colour.

Babies are creatures that need love and attention. They are expressive and compassionate by nature. They're also curious - about what happens when you cut different things, or what things look like when they break, or funny feelings - which can have good or bad consequences. They also learn to fake-cry and throw tantrums and lie, yes, but all kids need is love and support from those around them. 

Some people and situations have so many layers of mud that the sparkle is only a grey ash-like speck, seemingly impossible to find. Maybe it's too far down, and crushed into pieces too small, to be redeemable. But it's definitely there. 

I can't adopt the attitudes of my friends even though it seems a lot more painless and mature. To me, forcing them on is admitting that the world is, in its most basic form, useless. Bare. A wasteland. I can't do that.

I live for the diamond in that wasteland, the diamond that tells of the beauty of the whole place before the age of neglect and numbness, and I will carve my world around it. There's a lot of pain and confusion in the fight, but I refuse to believe beauty is only a bonus. I can't. It is what sustains me.

Feb 11, 2013

Anyway, does anyone read this blog?

Quite a number of people have emailed me to tell me that they read my blog and stuff before, and a couple have added me on Facebook. I know of a couple of people who said my blog inspired them to do certain things... Everytime someone tells me something like this, that they don't know me but they bookmarked my blog or that I inspired them to join ACJC / Council / to restart their own blog and stuff, I feel very thankful. After all, it's always been my dream to write to let someone else feel that she isn't alone; to make others realise that the things that they're going through are perfectly normal, written on their screen by another; to be the comforting words that soothes a soul, like a friend.

I used to write a lot more emo stuff, and maybe those posts resonated better with other sad people (although my friends used to say they avoided my blog because it was so emo it was stupid). I didn't really like talking about my own life and things like how my days were going, but since I graduated from school the topics of my blog posts has changed a lot.

It's okay if I don't really get readers anymore, because this blog is primarily for myself; blogging's the only and best way I know to soothe my heart and clear my head. But I'm just wondering if I've got any other silent readers, whom I may or may not know, who come and visit and like (or don't like) what I write. Do let me know! Email or Facebook message me or something. Don't think it's weird, please. I'd be really really touched to know you read this, being someone who likes to connect to others through writing and all. I mean, I really don't even know if anyone reads this thing. (Other than HW ^_^)

Feb 10, 2013

Emotional anesthesia

“And those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music.” 
- Friedrich Nietzsche

I went through a whole lot of pain in the past couple of years or so, and then a few months back I told myself I would stop letting my feelings for anything grow. Never get overly attached to things or memories or people; that way, you wouldn't get hurt. It worked for a while, and the freedom from pain was bliss. And then I stumbled into a pit again. And again. You know the feeling of getting stuck in a rut that you'll never get out of - when you feel a certain way for someone and you know it'll never be reciprocated; when you've lost the precious ones around you too far to do anything about it anymore; when you really want a long hug from a friend but can't bring yourself to ask; when you look back at pictures from secondary school or JC and wonder what happened; when you look at those around you and feel infinite and then a pang strikes you when you wonder how long it'll last after you move on to a different stage in life. When any friendship is imbalanced, basically, and you're on the losing end.

I keep telling myself to stop letting my heart get close to anyone who won't feel the same way about me. I do yearn for the old and now-distant friendships, and I do wish friendships were always balanced, but I'm trying to force my brain into the heck-care attitude. If they don't care about you the same way, don't care about them, too. Stop letting your heart get run over by people who don't even notice; you're only doing it to yourself, after all.

I'm still not very good at this whole letting-go thing, but I'm improving. My heart still stumbles, but my brain is quite good at forcing myself to let go. The less I love, or feel closer to anyone than they do about me, the less I hurt. It's quite good just going about your days happy like that, and not thinking about the if-onlys.

Hsieh Wen noticed that about me, and he said it wasn't good that I was trying to hurt less. By shying away from hurt, I was forcing my heart to stop loving, and by doing that, I was numbing myself. I didn't agree with that. I was still able to feel intensely; I was just really sick of the pain, and the only way to stop my heart from wrenching all the time was to limit my own feelings to the boundaries set by the other half of the friendship.

But I guess now I realise that I am, in fact, just forcing myself into numbness, going through rounds and rounds of anesthesia. Trying very hard to distance myself from people and get caught up in everyone and everything else, spreading my heart out so that I don't give too much to anyone who won't give an equal amount back, so that I'm safe. I just don't see it as a bad thing right now. I'm very very sick of the pain, and I don't want to make my friends feel weirded out, because they probably will if they realise how much I feel for them. How much I wish we were closer. I don't want to seem like that kind of weird or clingy person either, someone they might find annoying more than a friend they'd like to go out with too.

I'm trying to make myself feel less and be content. It will probably be something I'll come to regret in the near future, when I look around and realise I don't know who to go to at all.

I'm thankful for my capacity to love and hurt - it is, after all, what fuels all my writing, and what helps me realise I'm never strong enough. It makes me feel human. Everyone has a curiosity about the human condition, about the full range of emotional experiences. But I don't know. I'm just really tired of yearning and dreaming and getting disappointed.

Feb 8, 2013

an embrace too short to say:

Oh, it's all over. It's done.

There's so much going on in my head right now, I don't know if I'm happy or regretful. Maybe I could have done more. I hope they feel nothing less than what I did a year ago. I don't know, sis. What an experience.

It's done. I did it. They're an awesome bunch and I'm proud of them. I'm proud of Orientation 2013. There's just so much going on in my head. I'm exhausted, and it's all done, full circle, and you're here again, sis, we're back where it all began. What a journey. I'm overwhelmed by a sea of emotions, the whole range.

You did great, buddy. You've grown so much. I'm so proud of you.

--

Your OG kid makes a comment about how they can manage on their own because they're pretty comfortable with each other already; they mix with one another pretty well. And I see your face light up like you've just struck gold. Pride. You did it. You did it. You did it.

It's finally over, pal, it's official.

You're a big boy now; it seems like just yesterday we first met: you the wide-eyed enthusiastic junior who thought we could be classmates, me the senior in disguise laughing at and touched by your innocent sincerity. It has been a whole year, man. A whole year - you getting furious upon finding out my real identity, you first joining Chinese Orchestra, almost-joining Council, your first term exam, Christina Perri and Chuck Palahniuk, your bimbz comment at Marche (thinking the ornamental fountain was for washing our hands). And then you grew up a little - your concert solo with that erhu, a smattering of love. I watched you grow in leaps, yet only in a small chapter of your teenage life.

Mercury '12! (karen the crasher sticks out like a sore thumb DUDE YOU LOOKED SO YOUNG)
And this is another chapter. The most exhilarating four days of your JC life. Full circle. From the wonderstruck freshie to the one leading the kids. I've been looking forward to this day, too, ever since your own Orientation ended.

I can't believe you're J2 now. You're still that excited newbie to me. It's all over now, and I'm so proud of the guy you've become. Through it all, I'm so glad to have been there with you, if only through Whatsapp and  our random dinners. And our lists of songs and books and stories to share. coolboi95 versus hotgal93. Fat kid versus small-eyed shortie. Ruockstar. The right way and the ruo wei.



 

  Full circle, boy.
Mzonka: Aster '11, Mythos: Mercury '12, Voda: Calypso '13!

Feb 3, 2013

To the people I wish I was a better friend to

Six different meet-new-people events and too many new friends made. There's only so much you can take, and it's great to meet new people once in a while, but after you hit the fifty mark within a month all you want is for things to slow down. I divide my time between all these groups of new people and out of my thirty most recent Whatsapp chats (excluding PRians because I texted them about a CNY gathering - I do hope they can make it because I do miss them), less than a third belong to people I've known for more than 8 months.

There are some friendships you really want to spend more time on, but you're burnt out.

If I had more time, or if I were better at saying no to things that I don't really want to go for, or if all these new events were more spread out, I'd really want to spend my time expanding on some of my friendships. Right now I feel like I've given myself to everybody, yet am precious to nobody. If I were to go through some emotional crisis now, I would probably feel extremely alone. Who to call? Who to spend an afternoon hearing me cry it out? Who to trust with the worst of myself?

There are some people I resolved to get to know better, and never got around to it. Because I've been feeling so exhausted, I've been pushing people away. I don't even want to talk to anyone if I don't need to anymore, because my time is being taken up by other people whom I feel obliged to spend my effort on right now. And then I realise what a mistake I'm making, because if I put effort into these people whom I'm pushing away, the friendships could be amazing.

This is to the new people I've met whom I really wanted to get to know better, but never got around to developing the friendships because I've been feeling so stretched and tired recently. Tutku Bektas, Julia Versel, Belinda Lei, Feimei Zeng, Shrabya, and quite a number of the other amazing people I met at EYW. Shermaine, Gloria, Leo Fu and Samuel Tee from NUS VCF. EYW friends: I really hope to keep in contact with you guys on Facebook, and we'll be amazing friends in Yale-NUS, hopefully. VCF friends: Talking to you face-to-face is amazing, and I hope we'll get more of those opportunities soon.

This is to the friends I've neglected, and I'm really sorry. Hsieh Wen, You Zhuan, Jacey, Jonathan Hee, and especially Derrick Chin, Wei Liang and the Exco, I miss you guys. And Pauline Renata, I miss you so much. Al Lim, Yao Hui, Daryl Tan (YNC) and Dylan Ho, I should be keeping in touch with you over Whatsapp a lot more than I'm doing right now, and I'm really sorry.

This is to someone I see quite often, and whom I'd like to get to know better, but I don't really know how. Kevin, you're the only one in this category because you get all awkward and maybe you're feeling a bit creeped out now HAHA, but we have four more years and I really hope we become closer friends, so I can really be your little sister.

And this is to the people who still stay in contact, whether very frequently or once a month, to make sure we remain close. Jackie, thanks so much for everything, even if only in the span of half a year. Sumay, this is such a precious friendship that we must always guard with all our heart; it must never grow distant. Rachel and Teressa, P6 classmates and we're still going strong. And my Malaysian cousins - you know I love you, thanks so much for all the love.

Lastly, this is to the friendships that were once amazing, but have faded so much since that our conversations have become awkward and stupid. I don't want to name them, and I don't know how I feel about them.

To all: I will try to be a better friend, and I'm sorry I've neglected the friendships. I don't know how many of you will see this, but give me some time, and I really hope I'll have the strength to develop the friendships again.




I honestly think I'm on the brink of going mental

The past couple of months have been hard. Emotionally, it's been okay. No periods of incredible joy or depression. But mentally I'm drained. Wrung dry. Since December, I have literally talked to about a hundred new people in six different events, four of which lasted 4-5 days. Every single day I see people I've known for less than a year. They're amazing, of course, but because I've been stretched and cut up and given to everyone else, I've lost contact with the precious ones whom I've known for longer. I've lost a lot of precious friendships. Some aren't totally lost, but they're too far gone to ever be fully redeemed again.

I'm swamped. An introvert needs her time alone, and I've had too many interactions with too many people that come and go. I need a friendship that tells me I'm worth something very significant, and I've lost the precious ones. I don't know who I am, why I'm doing what I'm doing, what I'm doing it for, I don't want to think anymore. Sometimes I think about the stuff I'm doing and it becomes a raging mess and I suddenly just want to run away, run away from my plans and thoughts. It was a little bit like those couple of months I was kind of hinging on depression, where I'd be sitting around and my mind would wander and step into a pit and suddenly I'd be screaming and running and my entire being gets sucked into a whirlpool. I don't really know how to describe it, but suddenly I don't know the meaning of anything I'm doing anymore and I'm giving my all to everything for nothing. To nothing. Right now, it's like I'm treading slowly on my mind's forest floor, and sometimes my foot hovers over one of those pits, and I hear my own screams and cries and I run. I'm so afraid.

I'm doing far more than I can handle, and Bible school starts soon - more new people again - and that will spill over into university- even more new people again - and then that's four years of a heck of a roller coaster ride. That means that once I start Bible school prep in two weeks' time, there'll be no rest.

I need rest very badly right now, but I can't bear to stop work at the office any earlier. I keep saying what I need is a break. I'm not sure if that's what I truly need. I really want a break from everything that's going on in my life, a break from my mind. Sometimes I sit around and think about the things that are coming up and all the people I've talked to and how I'm too mentally exhausted to catch up with any one of them, even though I really want to. I'm trying to grasp at every bit of free time I have while tuition kids ask me for tuition and friends want to meet up and events are going on and I really don't think this is how I should be doing things.

Maybe I'll stop work earlier. Spend a week sleeping in a little bit, going to nice quiet places to read, listening to music in the middle of a field, realigning myself with peace.


-

On a side note, sometimes I get this strong desire to live life on the edge. On the edge of what exactly, I'm not sure. Not on the edge of "sin", nothing like going to crazy parties and getting drunk and going crazy in that way. Not on the edge of danger either, like running across the expressway at peak hour or sneaking into a building at night. Not seeking the adrenaline rush like doing a bungee jump or race-cycling down a hill.

Something more along the lines of sitting in the middle of a deserted road at two in the morning, listening to Westlife and Britney and Avril and singing my heart out with a friend who doesn't care. Jumping onto ledges. Standing on tables. Sitting on railings. Driving a tractor. Going on a three-day-long road trip with a bunch of crazy friends and singing crazy songs. Avoiding anywhere with air-conditioning and fluorescent lighting. Lying and reading and dancing and jumping on the rooftop of a house all day.


On the edge of insanity, maybe.