Re-realisation

Today I (re-)realised that

- I'm glad I'm studying a subject that is concerned not merely with the body, but with the soul human spirit (Ed.: I guess this term is more politically correct) So take that, you job interviewers and relatives and people who go Oh. at my chosen major! This shall henceforth be my answer to whoever asks me again why I do lit!
- Time spent with friends is never time wasted, because it keeps you anchored to who you are, as opposed to merely what you do.
- I love my N.Structures groupmates! :) :) :)
- If I'd watched Be With Me alone I'll weep buckets. It's not the words... it's the silence that tears at you.
- Children's lit tells me more about the world and about people than anyone would ever expect. Why do we invariably turn into the angsty moronic realistic adults that we swore we wouldn't be?
- My sense of self varies with the people I am with. (To Miss C.Tan if she happens to read this-- WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN? COME ONLINE LAR!)



- I've been giving myself too long an extended break after the tests. I MUST begin an essay soon. Like asap.

Random pet peeve surfaced in the midst of writing, so I thought I would blog it anyhow. I refer to no specific incident, because this has nagged at me for years, because this would keep happening, darnit. And if you think this applies to you then it does, so take it anyway you want it.

I am sure God made people to be worthy creatures-- people who are great friends with character and talent and warmth and other finer little details that makes everyone so very unique... and thus infinitely lovable and of value to every friend of his.

I don't understand why people, self-centred creatures that we are, ironically become blind to the best qualities in ourselves, and subsequently condition ourselves to believe that we are less, and poorer, and worse than we truly are.

And hence become deeply miserable.

Strange, that we should be the ones causing our own downfall. Is it so hard to love yourself a little more?

Heart aches
when I sense
that wealth of pent-up sadness that lies underneath what seemed so
pretty
and polished
and noisy
and happening

and alive.




Alive?





I think once upon a time the feeling would have been called bereft. Would that be an apt word, that of loss? But how do you understand loss when you don't understand what it is that you have lost? Is it a realisation that you've never had it in the first place, that it has only existed in your idealistic imagination all this while?

*shudder*

I hadn't thought of what I was saying when the words tumbled out in keyboard-taps. And now that subconscious thoughts are crytalised into words, staring back at me, I almost fear that...

No.

But you do understand that this is gonna apply to more than one person, you, who are reading this piece, and wondering. How I wish ever so often that I had the right words or means of comfort to offer, or to be able to cast spells that makes one "magically happy", a virtual (unreal!) service that Facebook had ingeniously offered.

I do remember an awful awful stretch of ---ness (for lack of a better word), then. But you all!

I don't know how to make things better, or what to say, even, but if it helps in any way, I'm here.

And things do fall into place. Or we, adaptable human beings that we are, will ourselves fall into place, in time. And I suppose this would be sufficient, at least for now, at least until the next time around.

Every you

What do you spend so much time on the computer for??

Catching up, I guess. On MSN, on the many many blogs I drop by randomly. Even if I don't always say hello to you online. Even if we don't meet very much in person. Even if, perhaps, I don't even say two words to you in an entire week or month. You are still a friend that I do treasure, that my life would have been oddly empty without, in one way or another. *nods* Every one of you, in every little way. Every presence and absence. Every word and silence.

Strange how technology parts us, and pulls us together, and parts us, and pulls us together... "Us" for you and me, "you" for every friend whose eyes lay upon this little reflection.

How singular, the word "you", and yet how so very universal. As with "I", who is unique to every one, every "you" figures in a deeply special way to me.

I guess I am just really, really thankful and oh, so very blessed, for such friends and family that I have. And beyond the nonsense everyday trivialities this is perhaps what matters most. You and you and you, all. =)

Wise words

Antony Green looked round until everyone was quiet again. "Most of you seem to favour punishment," he said. "But you realise it won't be punishment, do you?"

Everyone was puzzled at this. The way we all looked made Antony Green grin. "As far as this lady herself is concerned," he explained, "she was in the right all along -- all her life. Nothing is going to make her see she was wrong. And the only point of punishment is to make someone see the error of their ways. If they don't see it, then what you are doing to them is vengeance, not punishment. Right? I daresay a lot of you want vengeance. But if you do take revenge, that makes you as bad as this Mrs Laker herself. I want to stop the wrong in Cranbury. So I am not going to take revenge..."

Black Maria, by Diana Wynne Jones

And who says you cannot learn, too, from children's books? Woven so subtly within the pages are values--such simple values!-- that even adults cannot understand, sometimes.

Reflections II

Decided to split the previous entry to a part two, so that it wouldn't feel like I'm cramming too many thoughts into a single space. Makes it a lil more digestable, methinks :)

I guess the talk struck a chord because of the sheer familiarity of it. A lot of what Prof G spoke about reminded me of my grandpa. If my dad were a lecturer I could almost imagine him saying almost the same things. Narrated to my mum the contents of the talk and got, as I'd expected, the are-these-not-exactly-what-I've-been-telling-you-all-these-while? look. And she's right :) Which is what makes me so infinitely grateful for my parents, for every moment that we sit down and talk, for all the real-life stories and experiences repeated time and again to stress the importance of a person's relationship with her parents, her siblings, and later on her spouse and her kids.

It would not be the first time I was shown the painful results of incompatibility. Nor the immense impact the relationship of parents have upon their children. Nor the hollowness of a grown-up child who could not tell right from wrong, could not... love a sibling the way we could, nor the ease at which discord may be sown, and acts of destruction that continue between family members...

And all through that my parents have been fiercely protective, standing by each other, deeply determined to raise a family that is complete and untainted by insidious negativity, to teach their kids to understand how important each member of the family means to another... With real-life examples acting themselves out before your eyes and dramatic family stories you wouldn't fail to see the reason why.

How important it is to marry only the person you love-- the kind of love that will bring you both a long, long way, for the rest of your lives. It's a step that is to determine both your lives and the lives of your children. The sheer enormity of it... and it cannot be anything less, either.

Which is why valentine's day came and went without the semi-wistful longing this time around, I think, when the enormity of the big picture sets in... the thought of getting attached to dispel loneliness is more than just a silly thought now... it's... woah, the horror... a decision that may only but have dire consequences.

Something to think about eh... may return to refine the entry a little, but as it is I really must go conk out already. Till the next entry~

PS. Happy Total Defence Day!

Reflections

Today started out decidedly bad. Woke up with a migraine and was feeling super tired and nauseous for the entire morning, for goodness knows what reason. Which meant that the three hour nineteenth-century seminar was, for the first (and I certainly hope the last!) time, a pain to get through... I didn't want to keep raising my head up to read off the slides or stare up at Prof G because I didn't want to excerbate either the headache or the nausea, but keeping my eyes lowered and head still for extended periods of time makes me drowsy. And for some odd reason I was disgustingly tired, so that my note-taking fury deteriorated into.. well, valiant attempts. Let's not get into that.

But that's not the point. Seminar, laden with rich information as always, was different today because of the digression that came right after. Prof G had already ended class for the day, and told us we were free to go as we wish, but that he had something to share with us. And share he did, for that brief ten minutes... His dad had just passed away last week, and there were lots of thoughts that occupied his mind over the past days-- thoughts that got him to decide to bring forward his usual end-of-term talk.

So he begun by asking us to figure out what kind of a life we really want to live--not career, he said, but the spiritual and emotional aspect of our lives. His dad was an immensely active person, he told us, but had a stroke that cost him his control over his own movements... which also took away a large part of his life, and essentailly his will to live. Which sparked the question of what is it exactly that we would want to live for, ultimately...

It's a very crude presentation, this sketchy summary, but I'm trying to sort out and recall, still. He did share a lot more, about his parents, whom he felt were never really compatible, or understood each other enough, right from the start... And he spoke of the impact an incompatible marriage would have upon the lives of two people, and subsequently their child(ren)... (so if we want counselling with regards to looking for a life partner we could go and see him as well, he added, and a ripple of light laughter coursed through the silent class.)

In all seriousness, though, it made a lot of sense. That these are things we need to think about, more so than just the pursuit for wealth. (If he were just concerned with that he'd have gone study law and live off big bucks he'd have sapped from lots of people--but what was the purpose in such an existence?) Which was why he taught, and why this particular course, he said, teaching about the levelling of society with the increasing fluidity of capital, of spirituality and morality of a developing (degenerating?) nineteenth-century Victorian society in which we are heirs to, of the exploding of the delusions of an increasingly unstable middle class and of machines and humanity and of... oh, a lot of things.

It matters, I think, that we know, that we understand, certain ways in which society works, that we draw from these and comprehend certain sets of values...

It's difficult trying to paraphrase or to explain what he says, but as a lit student you do understand, I think. What your teachers have imparted to you through literary works is much much more than literary analysis. It's an understanding... of people, of relationships, of values. And then from there you learn to weave your own story, suturing little things you've learnt here and there into your quiltwork of understanding.

But I digress. He was saying he would usually talk about these at the end of a semester, but the funeral over the weekend had got him to think about so many many things, that he thought he would bring this sharing session to us a lot earlier in the term.

And it mattered, I think, out of the blue as it was. It touched me to know that he was genuinely concerned for us and our future-- not just the future of brilliant NUS students with potential high-flying careers, but as individuals who need to find a proper anchor within their selves. And it moved me that he shared his personal stories to remind us not to be so caught up with pursuing all these material stuff in life that we lose track of ourselves.

It mattered, because I guess we all need a reminder, sometimes.