irreversible

I became a student of my own depressed existence, trying to unthread its causes. What was the root of all this despair? Was it psychological (Mom and Dad’s fault)? Was it just temporal, a “bad time” in my life? (When the divorce ends, will the depression end with it?) Was it genetic? (Melancholy, called by many names, has run through my family for generations, along with its sad bride, Alcoholism.) Was it cultural? (Is this just the fallout of a post-feminist American career girl trying to find balance in an increasingly stressful and alienating urban world?) Was it astrological? (Am I so sad because I’m a thin-skinned Cancer whose major signs are all ruled by unstable Gemini?) Was it artistic? (Don’t creative people always suffer from depression because we’re so supersensitive and special?) Was it evolutionary? (Do I carry in me the residual panic that comes after millenia of my species’ attempting to survive a brutal world?) Was it karmic? (Are all these spasms of grief just the consequences of bad behaviour in previous lifetimes, the last obstacles before liberation?) Was it hormonal? Dietary? Philosophical? Seasonal? Environmental? Was I tapping into a universal yearning for God? Did I have a chemical imbalance? Or did I just need to get laid?

— Elizabeth Gilbert, Eat, Pray, Love

this was exactly me, aged 17.
(more…)

ive been contemplating getting tumblr because passing on quotes and photos somehow seems a gazillion times more meaningful than little me forcing words out of my mouth.

how i wish words could flow naturally out of me. is it because i grew up stubborn and secretive? if i could count the number of things i have been berated for, im sure that must top the chart. i learnt not to explain myself to people simply because it misleads them into believing they are entitled to know everything i do. all these useless excuses. any thinking person with an ounce of logic could tell you that maybe i just wasnt born to be a storyteller.

The most important things are the hardest things to say. They are the things you get ashamed of, because words diminish them — words shrink things that seemed limitless when they were in your head to no more than living size when they’re brought out. But it’s more than that, isn’t it? The most important things lie too close to wherever your secret heart is buried, like landmarks to a treasure your enemies would love to steal away. 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, or why you thought it was so important that you almost cried while you were saying it. That’s the worst, I think. When the secret stays locked within not for want of a teller but for want of an understanding ear.

- The Body, Stephen King

okay. i just need to get this out of my system.

what i had previously hoped to be the end to a perfectly delightful day turned out to be dreadful, after all. (is it just me or do you see a pattern happening here?)

i was very happily reading G. Pullum and minding my own business in campus when i was accosted by two japanese girls who planted themselves on both sides of me in a way that when i had to turn to face one i would be entirely blind to what the other was doing behind my back, literally. i point this out in particular because in the midst of the convo, i had a mini, but alarming, epiphany that people frequently mention their first impression of me as someone meek and compliant. and i immediately turned to pull my bag onto my lap to feel for my wallet.

paranoid, much?

the convo was as intellectually stimulating as say, watching my toenails grow. perhaps i should show a bit more appreciation for their ability to be most unsettingly effusive (eeeeEEE??!!! rEEaaLLYyY??!!! woOWWWW!!!!!!) in responding to every comment i made. it made me feel like some sort of exotic zoo exhibit going on public display for the first time in history.

asking “are your exams over” to start the convo was definitely intrusive. is it just me or is that a question normally directed to a close friend and not a stranger you are seeing for the first time. have i been cooped up in my own world for so long that the basic manners taught to me to inquire if the stranger is available or even interested to talk to you have been obliterated? a simple “excuse me, may i talk to you for a moment?” would have sufficed.

the only logical explanation i can come up with for this situation is that their fascination with foreign specimens have overruled their common sense, as usual.
omg looky look, its a…. Foreigner!! and she’s Alone and Defenceless! rubs hands in glee. i cant wait to find out if she really can breathe through her hair and spouts words from her nose..

i was so dazed and perturbed by the overall encounter that i knew had to vent my frustration on the first familiar face or i wouldnt be able to think straight for the rest of the day. of which the unfortunate victim was b j (to whom im inclined to dedicate a public acknowledgment for lending his ears THANK YOU B J)

i confess i have an incredibly short fuse when i am interrupted while reading (they didnt even let me finish the chapter!) and also an extremely cynical/paranoid nerve in me that forbids me from believing that people are talking to me merely because they are interested in making my acquaintance. it hasnt happened yet, in my experience.

in any case, i vow never to read a book written in the alphabet (which will set off any Foreigner radar) in a public area ever again, save for the library.

not in mood for prolix prose.

current disposition: weary.

hates waking up early.
hates injections.
hates glaring sun in eyes.

loved and lost beloved scrunchy (r.i.p)

your absence has gone through me
like thread through a needle
everything i do is stitched with its color
-ws mervin

16 strenuous days more to liberty.
51 agonizing days more to flight.

near breakdown.

fear of disappointment.
fear of incomprehension.

insecurities.
inferiorities.
inabilities.

if all else fails, retreat is in place.

i didnt realise

it was only too easy to stop

fantasizing over someone.

you just need to find something abt him that you know you cannot live with if you were to marry him

something

that would destroy your perfect impression of him

so it’s back to

believing that i cannot love anyone else except…

i cannot find anyone else that is perfect in his imperfect ways.