Catch me there!
empty shells. empty souls.
sometimes i want to shake them. where is your passion, where is your dream.
but im afraid they'll look at me and ask me the same.
That the demands of the world, the restrictions, the conditions in my life would keep me in my place. That I would never explore the world and myself in it as I've always imagined.
I am afraid that if I do not have the courage now to break free of societal conventions and responsibilities, it will be progressively harder to do so. And I will forever remain where I am. Bitterly. Angrily. Cowardly.
I am afraid that my life wouldn't be the life I wanted. but a life I chose. And I'm not sure if that's any better.
again. the ghost of you walked beside me.
stuck. fucking living in a memory.
It's hard to write a post about something like contentment because it is not driven by this strong emotion that needs to be put into words in order to be understood.
Life is okay.
And I'm okay with that.
"Calling your name in the midnight hour,
Reaching for you from the endless dream,
So many miles between us now,
But you are always here with me."
Here With Me - Susie Soh
How do you let go when you have nothing else to hold on to? How do you jump without falling? How do you cry without breaking?
I have written so many letters to you. As many as the stars could read.
I've said so much to you, and at the same time, it's not enough, never enough.
So here I am once again writing. And I have no idea what to I say to you that I haven't already, and what to say to you when I can't say what I want.
I've never been brave. Never brave enough like you.
You can love again and again, wholeheartedly and with reckless abandon. I can't.
You told me I've never told the whole truth to you before.
I'll tell you that I've never told the whole truth even to myself, ever.
But now it's too late.
I think the hardest part is realizing, deep in some small part of me, that you might be better off without me. Whilst I'm on my hands and knees scrambling to pick up the broken pieces of myself, trying to fit everything together again.
I have written so many letters to you. As many as the stars could read.
I've said so much to you, and at the same time, it's not enough, never enough.
So here I am once again writing. And I have no idea what to I say to you that I haven't already, and what to say to you when I can't say what I want.
I've never been brave. Never brave enough like you.
You can love again and again, wholeheartedly and with reckless abandon. I can't.
You told me I've never told the whole truth to you before.
I'll tell you that I've never told the whole truth even to myself, ever.
But now it's too late.
I think the hardest part is realizing, deep in some small part of me, that you might be better off without me. Whilst I'm on my hands and knees scrambling to pick up the broken pieces of myself, trying to fit everything together again.
Sometimes, some relationships are worth fighting for.
But.
Maybe just not ours.
I feel sorry for those who take their own lives, who feel like they have nothing left to live for.
But I feel even more sorry for those they left behind, who are realizing what nothing really feels like.
My Life and Times
Let me tell you of this guy I use to know. He was this chubby, acne filled thing, that had long arms and generated an insane amount of humour that we didn't know was a product of genuine wit or just plain lack of intellect (I steadfastly claim the first).Life is the vile viper that breaks us all into something more.
Wednesday, August 19, 2015He was also my seatmate. My partner in crime. The younger brother I never really had but was reluctantly blessed to be given anyway.
He's the person I spent most of my school days not studying with. The person who caused me a great deal of pain, because it actually really really hurts to stop yourself from laughing hysterically and rather idiotically in a quiet classroom.
He's the reason I had so many death stares from my teacher, who went through a lot of trouble in keeping us separated. But who was one to deal with magnetic forces?
But one day she couldn't stand us anymore and she did just that. We were thrown to opposite corners of the classroom. He wrote me a note, which he sent to me in the most conspicuous of ways. It read:
Dear Karlyn
My sun of my day
The moon of my night
Although my eyes are blinded with love
My mouth speak the truth
Has the cunning vile viper torn us far apart?
NAY! Never from my heart.
- Shakespear. Sn.
That note incidentally caused us a great deal more trouble. Because my teacher read it. But even she couldn't do anything more than sigh exasperatingly at us, throw her hands up in the air and walk away muttering "vile viper indeed."
I swear I saw a hint of a smile as she sat down.
It made him a legend. We were friends through and through. He told me his problems with a girl. And I told him my problems with life (yes ever the dramatic one).
When I graduated from school, I didn't look back. Mostly because there were other people in school I was leaving that I would waste no second glances on. Also because I realized that he and I, were the kind of friends who were great friends just because we had to see each other everyday, five times a week. But nothing more than that. Convenient friends.
More than hi bye friends, less than best friends forever.
So I didn't see him for the next, five years or so.
And when I did.
It was because his dad had just passed away.
I was 22. He was 18.
It's too early, too tragic to be happening now. But then again, isn't it always.
Watching him and his family, struggle so hard just to manage the few words they needed to say to pay respect to the greatest man in their life, watching them having to display such raw grief in front of so many people, watching him having to grow up several years in the space of a few hours...these are the moments that break us into something more.
Near the end, as I went to see him to express my condolences, he saw me first. And before I could speak, he reached out to me. And grabbed onto me.
When he hugged me, it was the clutching of a still small boy with big dreams.
It was my same friend. That chubby boy who never made me stop laughing. And got me into trouble over and over.
And at the same time, it wasn't. Taller, older, wiser. Not so shy. Not so chubby. Not so him.
But more broken. Broken into beautiful.
Cos that's what life is. It's the shittiest moments and the funniest moments and the moments that we wished we could revisit and the times we wish we could remember to forget.
Cos everything is broken into beautiful. You and I, our past and our present and all the space between all that we are and all that we want to be.
It's walking around lost and blind and not giving a shit about it at the same time.
Because it's simply too exhausting to bring yourself to care. It's too exhausting to bring yourself to think about the ramifications of not caring.
Because that's acknowledging that there is no greater purpose, which means you will walk the remainder of your days on this earth not caring that you're going in no particular direction, with no particular point.
At least drowning was certain. A sure thing.
So this black grappling fight with nothing. It scares me. Or it should. At the very least, the idea of it scares me.
Which is probably why I'd rather dwell in my memories, painful as they are than to think about... well everything else.
Because at least in my past, I didn't believe that everything I did was for naught.
There was so much noise. And lights. It was all blinding me. But I fought on pushing through the crowd trying to get ahead. Trying to get away. I hear our friends calling me, and as hard as I denied it, I only wanted to hear yours. But if you did call for me, it all got lost. Just like you and me once upon a time. Lost in all the noise and the too bright hopes and dreams.
I pushed on ahead. To get away from you, and everyone, as much as all the memories. Suddenly someone pushed me and I stumbled. When I looked up, I saw the shock of black hair and the glasses and those sad brown eyes and I was transported back to times when I knew them like the cities we traced promising we would go together one day.
"I'm so sorry miss are you okay?"
And I smile at the stranger I did not know with the hair and the glasses and eyes that I knew too well. I wiped my tears and smiled reassuringly at him and walked on.
I wonder how time has made fools of us. We're so busy waiting for the right time to come or for the hurt to pass that we forget about the "nows." You sit there waiting for it to get better whilst time erodes you of all your feelings, your empathy, your hope, your love. And you're empty. Movies, dramas, books convinces you that there IS life in you, even if its life you're living vicariously.
Empty empty empty.
I wonder if you're waiting too. Waiting and thinking of me. Wondering who chases away the bad dreams I have now. Wondering if I still had silly dreams of growing up to be a rockstar wanting to achieve world peace. Wondering if I outgrew the too short haircuts I always ALWAYS seem to get. Wondering if I was lying in bed waiting and thinking about you too.
And I hear music around me, familiar and suffocating at the same time as I remember all the time after when I played it on repeat to forget you. Forget me. Forget that you let go. Let go of me.
Abruptly the music is cut off. There is a scream. I am jolted back to the presence. There is a stampede. And suddenly there are people running and yelling. I panic. The fear is so tangible I feel it circling my throat, pressing in.
I yell your name. Please. Oh God. I don't even know why. I frantically yell your name as I'm being pushed by the crowd. And as I look behind me I suddenly see you pushing your way to me, yelling my name too. Your arm's outreached, fighting to get to me. And in that too bright crowd with everybody pushing me further away, I look back to you, and reach for you once again. And again and again. Knowing that once I get back to you, I'll be safe again. That you'll keep me safe.
There was a painful jolt to my right as someone stumbled into me and in an instant I was wide awake. I took in my dark surroundings, my fan lazily swinging above me, the unsteady beat of my heart, my arm still desperately reached out.
I put my arm back down.
I breathe in. And breathe out.
And breathe in. And breathe out.
I close my eyes breathing deeply the smell of you in my thoughts. And slowly fell back into a space or a time where I was relieved from feeling that aching pain in my chest, at least, at least, for a while.
I dreamed of you last night. After so long. After so much has passed. I thought I've let go. After so long. After so much. But I dreamed of you last night and instead of moving on I was looking back and reaching out for you again. But if I had to remember one thing. Just one thing. It was that the whole time I was looking back at you, you were looking at me too, your hands outreached, fighting the time that mocks us, to get back to me once again.
"Everything flows" said Heraclitus. "Everything is in constant flux and movement, nothing is abiding. Therefore we cannot step twice into the same river. When I step into the river a second time, neither I nor the river are the same."
With each passing second, I'm changed. It may not be obvious now, but once, I start collecting the seconds, and the minutes and the hours, the thinking and the life experience starts to tabulate too.
I'm struggling with a strong emotion that I'm unfamiliar with. Regret.
Don't get me wrong. I do sometimes wish with all my heart that I can take back what I just said or did. But in the same instance, I believe that there is no point of regret. Remorse, yes. Remorse for the wrong that you've done. But regret - the carrying of your remorse - is just a waste of energy.
Because what's done is done. You can't change it anymore by holding on to it. Learn, live and move on. And after all, its all that has happened that has made you into the person who you are now.
This regret. Has been gnawing in me for a while. But now. I just wish so much, that I did things differently. That things turned out differently. That I reacted differently.
But there's no point to this regret. So I tuck in a box and move on to my next mistake.
Edit: I wrote this in August, 2011. Still holds true now in 2014.
But there's no point to this regret. So I tuck in a box and move on to my next mistake.
Edit: I wrote this in August, 2011. Still holds true now in 2014.
How much money do I have in my bank account. How much money do you need to have to matter. Can a single boy and a girl just be friends. Is there really such thing as a soul mate. Where's mine.
And if we're not asking things that only hurts us, we ask things that are pointless.
Who made us. Why did He. What is the point of this life. What if there are aliens. What if I never let go. Would I be happier if I had chosen a different series of paths. What happens if I end up alone.
And then there are questions that has neither a point nor answer.
Why do we try so hard in this life. What are the things that defines us. Where would I be if I was born from another family. Would I still be me.
And it is these thoughts that I've made sure are never louder than the books I read or the people I talk to or the shows I watch. So I ask myself one last question. One that I don't want to hear. One that has no point. No answer.
What then, will become of me.
Falling in love is easy.
You fall in love with the way someone calls your name, like its the most natural thing in the world. With the way they look at you, like they're seeing you for the first time over and over again. And even the way their hands move, as though molded, to just fit yours.
It could be anyone really. That stranger you meet in a crowded place. That one person you can never let go of. That friend that you've never seen as anything but just a friend.
If all you do is take time to notice the subtle things about people, you realize that beauty still exist in the world; by the slow smile of someone deep in thought, the gentleness by which someone touch another, and even the lies we tell each other knowing that that is what helps us live through yet another day.
Falling in love is easy.
So let yourself.
We don't waste no precious time,
Making up for teenage crime."
- Adrian Lux (Teenage Crime)
I don't know how to say that these are the best years of our lives with the impact that it deserves.
Because we're old enough to know what's wrong, and young enough to do it anyway.
Because our bodies are physically strong enough to put up with what our minds are not strong enough to resist.
Because who remembers the nights that we got plenty of sleep?
One day, we'll grow up. One day, mortgages, rents, bills, insurance, responsibilities as heavy as the world will rest on our shoulders. One day, we will look back on these days.
But for now have time to dream the wrong things and pick another dream too big for our hearts.
These are the best years of our lives.
And the hurt haunts me and attacks at random moments of the day.
And it renders me a complete wreck of tears and silent, agonizing grief.
Leaving is hard.
But being left is harder.
