You make your own

It has been a while... A long while actually since I last thought of posting on a public hemisphere again.

Today, I had da chance of going through some old pictures lying around in an old drawer; it's da kind of drawer that is da last place you'd think of opening to find any useful tools lying around.

It is a treasure box of memories. Stacks and stacks of old albums that has stood da test of time. Barely oxidizing, with minimum yellowing at da corners. Relishing good old times not of my own. So many pretty pictures, though hardly any of them had me in it. I guess I've come to realise, or had already realised long ago that people aint' gonna make da memories for me. I just ain't that lucky kid with eager family waiting to snap a picture of, and if you are that kid... You go out there and make history.

Instead of saying “I don’t have time” try saying “it’s not a priority,” and see how that feels. Often, that’s a perfectly adequate explanation. I have time to iron my sheets, I just don’t want to. But other things are harder. Try it: “I’m not going to edit your résumé, sweetie, because it’s not a priority.” “I don’t go to the doctor because my health is not a priority.” If these phrases don’t sit well, that’s the point. Changing our language reminds us that time is a choice. If we don’t like how we’re spending an hour, we can choose differently.

Compassion hurts. When you feel connected to everything, you also feel responsible for everything. And you cannot turn away. Your destiny is bound with the destinies of others. You must either learn to carry the universe or be crushed by it. You must grow strong enough to love the world, yet empty enough to sit down at the same table with its worst horrors.

Oscar Wilde said that if you know what you want to be, then you inevitably become it - that is your punishment, but if you never know, then you can be anything. There is a truth to that. We are not nouns, we are verbs. I am not a thing - an actor, a writer - I am a person who does things - I write, I act - and I never know what I am going to do next. I think you can be imprisoned if you think of yourself as a noun.There comes a time in your life when you focus solely on what you believe is right, regardless of what everybody else is doing. I'm a little uncertain right now, but that time might be the time of miracles.

See, I wanna know da first time you felt the weight of hate and if that day still trembles beneath your bones. Or why you thought it was so important that you almost cried while you were saying it.
And you may make revelations that cost you dearly only to have people look at you in a funny way, not understanding what you've said at all.
You wait for it,
and you wait for it.

Sunday

This is the only day you live.

You lie the whole morning

In a lotus shade of dreams

Unfolding that so many schedules

The busy week forbades.

If only you could get around the endless wall

And corridor of tomorrow's work, the dull grey stone

And Pavlov bell that daily regulate the bone!

If only you could hitch-hike round the world!

 

So you make the best use of this one-day parole,

Fancying the freedom of birds,

The beauty, the sheer ease in their flying.

And you think how even the newspapers

Have become increasingly dull

And full of half-truths

That will beguile the mind once it relaxes,

Relapses, into its habitual recesses.

 

You wish for some means of escape,

Of following the career of the flying birds

Away from those routine horizons

The cage-bar stairways.

You wish for more Sundays

And quiet, and freedom,

To sleep, a bit longer

The days you are really alive.

Gentle Man

I said I'd never be back but I....I....just can't help myself.....

I tread carefully around you, perhaps a little too well for such a klutz. I sneak a peek by da corridor hoping I catch you coming outta your room for a stretch, getting a little braver, I walked closer then stepped back and walk quickly back to my room. Always pushing da envelope but never quite breaking it. Sometimes I'd get a glimpse of you sitting on by with your bros, othertimes I can't help sitting on that same spot there thinking about how nice that would've been, and one time, I caught your tear mixed between those of your perspiration.

I'd like to believe we're both curious, but cautious and not quite rude or gutsy enough to pry. So we waltz across ballrooms of nothingness, artfully maneuvering through forbidden spaces, pulling in close then slipping appart as da music orchestrates. We never seem to let on enough to let anyone in, yet we long to be found within subjectively-obvious hints. There's something crazy in there isn't it?

Now that everybody's probably all moved out. I too try to move on. Though it seems this stubborn heart kept clinging on to this space, like a ghost lingering around with unfinished business. Maybe one day, I'll come back, even more grown-up, ready to excavate this room of stolen memories. Maybe I'll never be back, bade a proper goodbye, locked da bolt and never turning back, never wanting to reminiscent on da beautiful memories which breeds misery of having let you past by without letting you know that I cared. Or da kind of impression I left on you that weren't favourable or maybe I never crossed your mind at all, easily forgotten as da somebody who was nothing more than that wallflower in da peripheral. Or a brazen dreamer who worked up da nerve to adore you.

I only wanted to say, I'll never forget. I'll never forget how scared I were da day first I met you. I'll never forget how you saved me from an awkward beginning by taking da longer route though I'd have otherwise forced myself to climb up. As we talked, I'll never forget how your smile touched your eyes whenever I plucked up da courage to look at you. I'll never forget da surprising moment when I realised that I've gotten so used to you that blindfolded, and after a couple of switched hands, I was able to recognise da touch of your palms held out in front of me, daintily holding on to mine as you lead me to my 20th surprise. (With dainty being probably da least likely adjective to describe someone with a build like yours) However, I still find da contrast alluring.

Yup, that's it I guess. I'll miss you, and everyone here, but there's always something seductive about pressing flowers in da next page, no? But if ever you remember, please stop and think of me too.

Babe if you see this, Hubie did it muaaaa

Where does a thought go when it's forgotten?

Finally I get to seat down and contemplate about my freshmen year in Ntu. Its been a ride, and i'm enjoying da waves...so far. Yes, there's definitely been those nights when you're up at 4am and felt like dying. Then again, if you were dying, I'd imagine it would have felt a hell lot worse. (pun untended) I am g r a t e f u l I chose to go there. An unusually tough year it had been with da changes I made mid-way in da semester... that which those who know, already knew soI shan't go on to elaborate.

For better or for worse? Obvious, to be better is a state I wanna be in, that being said,  I dont think I have da answer to right now. We'll have to keep going to find out. I like the arrangement kismet or fate or da Gods has been working to my favour of taking 2 courses at da same time. Its like buying your favourite boots in 2 different colors! What's not to love? Da freedom of not getting imprisoned in your body by a lack of words is empowering while da feeling of letting someone in on da exact thoughts you're having could sometimes be just enchanting.

Moving on, some things have changed... or so I think. I no longer crave to perform anymore. I'm still pondering if that's a good thing. Maybe I just need to take some time off. Away from all these glittery shenanigans and get down to basics again. Clear out da dusty mind, figure out a direction and probably work out some genius philosophy along da way if da machinery starts pumping up abit.

I've always, essentially, been waiting. Waiting to become something else, waiting to be that person I always thought I was on da verge of becoming, waiting for that life I thought I would have. In my head, I was always one step away. In junior high, I was biding my time until I could become the college version of myself. In college, the post-college 'adult' person was always looming in front of me, smarter, stronger, more organized. Anything further sounds like a nightmare. For twenty years, literally, I've waited to become da more desirable version of myself thinking that's when life will really, at last, begin.

And through all that waiting, here I am. Sure, I've kept myself busy with da insignificant. Doing what is required of me and doing things to re-assure myself that I'm alive and making some use out of the time I have. But it just felt like Time passing day by day and I am still here, waiting, for life to start.

I guess I am slow-thinking and full of made-up interior rules that act as brakes on my desires. What horrifies me most is da idea of being useless: well-educated, brilliantly promising, and fading out into an indifferent middle age. Acting up and going hard once in a while are all within measured, well-mannered frivolity. Calling me a 'spoilt brat' and moping on it ain't gonna make me change. Everyone tells you what to do and what's good for you its as if they don't want you to find your own answers, they want you to believe theirs. So here's to raising glasses for bottled tradition and surrendered thoughts- and let that be da end of it.

How many years can some people exist before they're allowed to be free? How many times can someone turn his head, pretending he couldn't see that somethings are meant to be?

up there, yonder night sky,

is a fairy's house hid high;

were your eyes

to find its prize,

you'd have a star to wish on by

 

 

 

 

 

Would you help me understand?

How does one tell? How can one tell between da way they're born to be from the one they've grown to become? Now let this not be read as some philosophical shenanigans or hokey pokey of any sort. I mean, is it even possible for that itself to be differentiated? Torn down da dotted line, shine da light of disgrace to reveal that which stems from deceit and the broken.

You can't simply tell someone whose lived like "this" to c h a n g e. Indeed, change is good, change is da only constant but its nothing less barbaric then to request da tangled to let go. You can tell a child pure and fluid to flow, but you can't make a broken soul transcend itself whilst its living off its cracks. Not unless, amnesia.

"Going back there to what things were before you know how to be afraid". -Cliche much?
But maybe its true, but maybe, its not about going anywhere because face it: you know no where. That life you're so desperate on going back for? That's just a new life with a wall around it. Perhaps the choice ain't about going back. The choice is about hiding. Curled up somewhere wishing for da sun. Or, going right to the heart of the thing that scares you.

And maybe, sometimes the best way to move into the mystery is all about taking those familiar steps, baby ones. Meditating upon even the most ordinary of things just so one can deal with something that is in no way ordinary. Always moving, always ending up somewhere for da night, somehow, with some view of some pretty skyline.

Yes, I try to be brave. I know you would have told me to and I try to be honest, not to live as if to disacknowledge your passing. I try... I try.. I try a little harder, I try to be a little bit stronger, I try to live a little better. But there are nights, such as this one, when it just gets, a little harder.

And now that I'm sitting here thinking it through, I've never cried so hard wanting you.

I'll keep you safe. You keep me wild

See her now, in complete disarm. See her in full view of her unmitigated weakness and see her in her vulnerability. Her tangled limbs , her clumsy disposition and her uneasy grace of shyness; are but only her salvaged understanding of beauty. Understand then the price she has to pay to resist becoming hardened. Understand the strength it has taken her to stay tender. Understand then the strength it takes her to not give up. Allow her unlikely star some room to twinkle.