I lay lazily on the floor while the sun shine against my face, the warmth caressing my face. The cold in my heart lapping up the delicious warmth of my skin.
I read underneath the sun, as though the warmth of the sun can cushion any impact that the stories are going to throw in my direction.
I touched my skin, finger tracing the little freckles that graced my skin over the years as I frolicked under the sun with no sunblock. They feel like any other part of my skin, except they tell the tales of the sun.
I remember the sun at 3p.m., giving me countless of burns while we ran around the courts. I remember the beauty of the sun at 6 p.m., blazing the earth to orange.
I remember the sun rises, the sea water refracting the light. The cold splashes of the sea water tickling our feet, while we waited for the embrace of the sun.
The way it felt like home when I see the sun lighting up the corners of the house. I felt embraced when I return home to see light in all corners. The warmth of the sun, always signify the possibility of happiness to me. That no matter how grey the skies are, the warmth from the sun will return once more, and happiness can be again.
So when I am sad, I seek the sun. I find corners with sunlight and lay there, taking in the warmth.
I take in the warmth and remind myself, perhaps, it isn’t so bad after all.
I used to think that clouds are like cotton candies in the skies, and had the ridiculous thought that if I ever took the plane, I can just open the windows and taste the clouds.
It was when I grew up when I realised (after a certain documentary) that it is the perfect recipe for an air disaster. Imagine this little tyrant trying to break the window pane of an aircraft under the pretext of tasting the clouds.
The only thing that made clouds different from cotton candy, in my young mind, was that cloud gets angry then gives us rain! Cotton candy is always happy and disappear if there’s water. I quote my younger sassier self, “Pretty, sweet but also useless kinda cloud.”
I like clouds. They are like our imagination, it can be anything you wish for it to be.
They are like human, charged with emotions. Sometimes, sweet and naive. Sometimes, dark and murderous. Sometimes cheeky, other times nonchalant.
Sometimes, they even disappear without a trace, leaving the blue sky oddly lonely.
I find myself lying on the floor often, looking at the skies, staring at the clouds, willing it to speak to me. Silence, engulfed me, then spat me out, whole.
The wind howling, the skies grey, the clouds dark.
That day, a cute birdy flew into the balcony of our home. At first it circled around happily, chirping happily. It started shrieking when it realized that it doesn’t know the way out. Its friend heard the cry and was circling outside of our balcony, largely concerned, but doesn’t know how to help the trapped bird.
I hastily took some photos before approaching the bird, worried that the alarmed bird might smash against the window and hurt itself. After several minutes of gesturing towards the window, and whispering “over here! over here!” It finally decided to heed the advice and flew out of the window.
It was finally free, and it flew off, partner in tow.
I waved bye bye, and hope that it will learn from this nasty experience and not get trapped again.
I googled, it was a sunbird.
xxx
Went to have dinner, and auntie at the restaurant was alarmed that I was there alone.
“小妹妹，做么你一个人吃饭？“
“这样没有人会抢我的食物。“
Auntie chuckled and took my order.
“我不要虾、还有octopus”
“aiyo, 不可以挑食。“
“aiya过敏嘛，不是挑食，可以吃我也想吃！”
“噢，原来这样啊！“
Auntie quickly went to kitchen and yelled out my order. When she came back with this huge bowl of mentaiko chirashi, she wiggled her eyebrows at me.
“我想，你会喜欢的。“
I didn’t quite understand her words, until I started eating, and discovered that the bowl was made up of 70 percent fresh cut sashimi and maybe 30 percent rice. That day, I couldn’t finish the entire bowl, and this was the first for me.
Thank you auntie, for feeding me well.
xxx
Out exploring, and the skies are pretty. Clouds looked really fluffy, just like the freshly spun cotton candy.
蓝天白云 – perfect recipe for a scorching afternoon.
I was really thirsty and had to duck into a random shop to get myself a chilled bottle of mineral water. Ever since the mineral bottles have gone for the more green look, the bottle caps have became thinner, and I forever struggle with opening them.
After trying for a good 5 minutes, I admit defeat and went back into the shop to ask for help from the cashier auntie.
“aiyo girl ah, 年纪轻轻就没有力！“
She wet her palm with the damp washcloth on the table and twisted the cap open.
“谢谢你，不然我就渴死了。“
She reminded me of my mom, both of them are of similar age as well.
“Girl ah, 你很夸张勒！“
“救命恩人勒！“
Both of us had a good laugh while the other customers watched with amusement.
Thank you auntie, for helping me with a seemingly small task.
Ask and you shall receive.
xxx
While I was standing underneath the sign, I felt that it is a sign that I should slow down and enjoy the moment.
The warm breeze, the hustling crowd, the stream of cars.
“What are you looking at?”
“Nothing, the sky is really blue today.”
“Yeah, now that you mention it, it is really blue.”
“Don’t you think that this is an interesting place?” I uttered a random sentence back to the stranger.
“Why so?”
“The mix of grey of the urban at the further back, and the burst of colors along the shop houses. The old and the new playing together to give life to this place.”
“Hmmm, you are right!” He lifts up his camera and started clicking away.
“Thank you for seeing joy in the ordinary.” He smiles and walks away.
Thank you for the conversation too, random man on the street.
xxx
This Wednesday saw the birth of unrest, and my anxiety bubbled.
I don’t know what to make of the news, and I grapple with reality each morning I open my eyes.
I did what I do best, I block out my feelings and continue my day.
As I sit and type this, the complex feelings just found its way out of the barricade.
I was shopping around the store, when I heard a familiar tune. I mouthed every single word of the lyrics accurately, down to the adlibs.
I wasn’t interested in what the store has to offer, entirely distracted by the playlist that the employee had put up. Song after song, I “sang” along, and time and time again, I stunned myself by knowing the lyrics, without even knowing the title of the song. (I may have walked a good 20 rounds around the small store and scrutinized every single piece of article of clothing before leaving.)
We often say that time erodes memories, and fade experiences.
But time and time again, it is proven wrong.
As soon as the familiarity hits, no matter how much time we have between us, it all rushes back.
I remember fondly the Sunday mornings where brother and I would sit infront of the telly to watch MTV’s Top 20 countdown, singing along to every single song, rapping to every single profanity of Eminem’s drops. We cheer when the songs we like are in the top 3, felt sad when the familiar tunes dropped out of the top 20.
Gone are the Sundays where we spent time together. Grown up and married, I hardly see the brother at home anymore, much less the luxury of sitting down together to watch a programme.
A tinge of regret rushes back when I thought of the times that I thought that time is infinite, and we would all never grow up.
Things might be really tough right now, where everyday becomes a challenge, your mind always in a frenzy.
Your mental complains get more and more frequent, to the point where you’re tired of listening to your own complaints. The complaints are like the unnecessary reruns on telly, unrelenting.
The more you listen to the hum of the complaints, the more dishearten you feel. Like you’re struggling against the current, trying to inch towards an imaginary island that you can no longer envision.
It must have been really tiring, haven’t it?
But remember, you’re never alone. You’re well loved. This period might suck, but it will not be sucky forever.
If you don’t learn to let go, you will never learn to float in the sea. If you don’t let go, eventually the amount of exhaustion will drown you.
Perhaps there’s no light at the end of the tunnel, the burst of runs may turn out to be futile…but atleast I tried. Hurt as I may, I can proudly say that I’ve really tried.
Meanwhile, just keep swimming, just keep trying.
Perhaps one day, I’ll see you at the end of the road.
Thoughts a lil disjointed, mood a lil erratic, but otherwise I am still very much me.
Many things have been happening, and I am still struggling to internalize and digest all the events and emotions. Emotions is a scary creature, on days it washes all over, slooshing through my every vein. On other days, it seemed almost foreign, like a barely visible fog that wafts in and out of my vision.
偶尔清晰，偶尔模糊
I recall reading a book about a boy who has the ability to transfer injuries. He started transferring all sorts of injuries from others to himself, because he’d rather that he suffer alone in this world. One day, he met a girl, who had little will to live. He started to wonder if he can transfer mental pain as well, instead of physical pain and wounds. He held her hand, and transferred her pain to himself.
What happened next was beyond his expectations, the amount of pain was far more excruciating than any physical wounds he had experienced. The visceral pain engulfed him inside out.
I don’t remember what happened in the end, but I remembered the paragraphs where he met the girl very well, and the imageries of him transferring the pain, collapsing and crumpling from the pain from the words.
I wondered if in the end he recovered from it all, that beautiful soul who sacrificed himself for others. He could have easily used his ability to transfer pain to another individual, but he chose not to.
I guess, we are truly the sum of our choices.
We chose to become us, amidst the many different choices and circumstances that we are subjected to.
It seems like I have caught on the habit of asking myself – what am I doing this for? As though there should be a purpose for everything that I do.
Not everything has a purpose.
I took the photo because I feel like it, I didn’t even rotate the picture so you can see things the way I saw.
Perhaps, it is a reminder that, there is no purpose in many things in life. We are merely giving ourselves griefs by wanting to have a perfectly driven life.
That’s perfect bullshit really.
I have no purpose for doing things that I feel like, and I am okay with it.
Hiam 