Baggage

She stares ahead of her, eyes bobbing from left to right then to left again, at the crowd milling about before her. Her bag lies nearby, but she makes no move to assert her claim over it.

"You should keep an eye on that, you know," I murmur. Hopefully it does not come out as too bossy for her tastes.

She is momentarily taken by surprise. She pulls it closer to her side; whether out of following my advice or out of suspicion as to what I could possibly be up to, it is difficult to tell.

"Fascinating, isn't it?" I ask.

"You think so?" she says, hesitant.

"Isn't it?" I repeat myself. "Here we are, in possibly one of the best sites to observe the general public as they are. Everyone has his or her luggage - some have more than the other - and they have a place to go. Except, perhaps..." I nod in one direction, where a young child stands, lost, glancing around her, looking as if she's going to burst into tears any moment now, "...those who are still uncertain of their path in life, still dependent on other people."

My companion looks relieved when the little girl rejoins her parents, and the trio disappear from view, joining the crowd.

"Where are you heading?" I ask conversationally.

She glances at her ticket. "I don't know for sure."

"No?"

She holds the item up for my benefit. Aside from certain details as the time and place to board, it is as good as empty.

"That doesn't look right," I remark, raising an eyebrow.

"It doesn't," she agrees monotonously.

After the pause, I hazard a question, "But you know where you want to go to, don't you?"

She scrunches her face, her forehead now wrinkling in cogitation. "Yes." She meets my eyes, her grip on the ticket tightening. "Very much so."

"Great. You know what to do, then."

She nods.

"And what it takes to get there."

"Quite so."

"There will be necessary sacrifices along the way. Naturally."

"Naturally," she echoes. She however uncaps her pen and begins jotting something down on her ticket. With that done, she pockets it away. She then unzips her bag, and begins taking out several things, one by one. Noticing my enquiring gaze, she explains simply, "There are things that we should just leave behind us, aren't there?"

"Yes. But they might come back to you, somehow. Some do that, you know. Kind of like...nightmares."

"They might, but for now, they're not needed." She pauses. "Or, rather, I don't need them. I know it for a fact. If they ever come back, I'll just rinse and repeat." When I get to my feet, she makes it her point to ask, "You're leaving already?"

"Yes."

"But you--" From the way she eyes my empty hands, it is enough a hint as to what she is getting at. "You already have everything you need?" she asks tentatively. And - if I may say so myself - doubtfully.

I manage a small smile. "Yes." Taking the first few steps away from her, I motion a wave. "I'll see you when you get there."

It takes her a couple of moments to reply, and I am already some distance from her. But from the determination in her voice as she yells out "It's a promise!", I probably have nothing much to worry about.

---

Work of fiction (c) ad. Lucidus, 2010.

Current Music: Everything is Alright - Motion City Soundtrack

Even When All Seems Lost...

Even when the nights seem darkest,
even when everything else fails,
even when doubt consumes all...

Image from here; Poster generated from Keepcalm-O-Matic

Current Music: Made for You - OneRepublic

Hopefully Not Just Hot Air...

Dear God, I apologise for being such an ingrate, but my headache, myalgia and lethargy are conspiring against me, that I soon find myself thinking about everything and then nothing then everything again, all in rapid succession, and I cannot keep up.
Perhaps the issue of global warming is one to reckon with. Here is a list as to how global warming is evil. Really evil. Seriously evil.

1. The heat enrages people.
2. Following the point above, people are more aggressive on the road, behind the wheels. Passengers are not exempt from this influence.
3. As a consequence of Point (2), accidents might happen. God Forbid! (Excuse me while I dedicate a moment of silence to Miyavi...)
4. The sun is too glaring, it blinds people - with rage, or while driving.
5. Point (3) also applies to Point (4).
6. My thermoregulatory centre cannot adjust to the extreme temperatures. One moment I'm in the library/OT shivering like whoa, and the next I'm right under the hot, unforgiving ball of fire we call the sun, struggling with a throbbing headache that signifies an imminent migraine, and perspiring to the extent that I fear getting dehydrated. My water bottle tries to help, but at times it fails too...
7. Sleep. Then again, we sleep in whatever weather - be it hot or cold. Human nature? Inherent laziness? The need to dream? Hmph.
8. The craving for something cold - which is oftentimes sweet as well. Specifically, ice cream. More specifically, Cornetto (I blame Simon Pegg and Edgar Wright for this...). Needless to say, my pancreas is not happy.
9. In relation to (8), I'm annoyed for having no fridge. Guhh.
10. Too hot, too uncomfortable, cannot study. *headdesk*

Current Music: That Don't Impress Me Much - Shania Twain

This is, like, y'know, cool and stuff...

*cough* ...well, at least it is, by my standards, being a stickler for words and linguistics and the related. And I'm starting to be intrigued by this typography thing...ahh, the wonders of graphics and technology.




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Now playing: The Classic Crime - Sing
via FoxyTunes

P/s: ...I miss Miyavi so bad. *sigh*

Soredemo Jinsei wa Tsuzuketeiru

Even so, life goes on.

There are no words that could describe it. Everything felt like a dream. Even the aftermath felt surreal. But the physical pain and emotional uneasiness are anything but fake.

It was blurry - a blur of grey ("smoke, dear God, there's smoke coming out..."), red ("...I'm bleeding...") and white ("So that's how my airbags look like..."). And the fact that my companions were apparently well, and that I was still able to collect my senses. And then there were people...lots of people...and there was a swirl of emotions - all sorts of them, one after another and at other times, all at the same time - that seem to congest my chest...

What could have been, what should have been - they can be sensitive business.

But yeah, at the end of the day, what God has decreed will eventually happen, despite what measure we've taken to prevent it. Why? Only He Knows.

And only He will repay those who has helped to ease our hardships yesterday. God Bless.

Heartfelt gratitude to those who texted me with your wishes and concern. Apologies for giving people something extra to worry about.

Thank God that things didn't get any worse.

...Well, whaddaya know...There's still some optimism in me after all. Hmm.

P/s: I realise now that I prefer the term "accident" rather than my own mother tongue's "kemalangan". The latter has the root word of "unfortunate", which indirectly blames your luck, or what God has decided for you. The term "accident", on the other hand, denotes something unexpected, something that's not desirable. So there.

Soredemo Chikyuu wa Mawatteiru

Even so, the Earth continues to spin. Title is based on the Shaft anime, Soredemo Machi wa Mawatteiru.

Everybody's watches, even though they may differ by up to ten minutes or more despite being in the same time zone, generally run in the same speed. One second on your watch should be of the same duration on mine.

Nonetheless this doesn't mean that our brains work at the same speed. Brains and physicals...basically everything else.

We each face different things in life. No matter how we find ourselves in the same situation, your perspective differ from mine. Experiences may be the same, but what we get from it, how it eventually shapes up, could mean a world of differences.

Time brings changes. Changes that could be good to some or to most, but damaging to the rest.

Sometimes we forget that we are adults. Sometimes the situations we find ourselves in revert us back to our former selves. Former ugly selves, ones that we thought we had vanquished aeons ago.

Regardless, I respect how people have their own demons - inner or outer demons - to face and to conquer. So I make it my business to not trouble people beyond what is necessary. Which probably makes me a tad dysfunctional, but what else is new?

I've long given up expectations, which explains why I tend to approach things with little to no enthusiasm, except in very select cases. This method has served me well...until things became worse than what I had anticipated.

I wanted to blame my lack of foresight, but I can't. Because there's no way of doing it without instigating a whole new load of angst, one which I'd probably could never handle for the life of me.

Playing hide and seek doesn't seem to work. It always finds me, most of the time at the most undesirable moment and company. While I'm busy juggling with life's challenges and all this emotional baggage, people move on and tend to assume that I'd be all right with _everything_ they decide on - even when their verdict affects me enormously.

I'm sick of hiding behind pleasantries when there is no justification for it. My rights need to be fought for, and nobody else is going to do it for me. It's probably not in their job description anyway.

It's a futile battle, but I can't go down without a fight. A civilised fight, at least to the best of my capabilities. If there is no space for a win-win situation, then so be it. But no way am I going to be satisfied with loss, because I've been compromising enough for far too long.

The game is on.

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Now playing: Carolina Liar - Show Me What I'm Looking For
via FoxyTunes

Broken

“God allows us to experience the low points of life in order to teach us lessons we could not learn in any other way. The way we learn those lessons is not to deny the feelings but to find the meanings underlying them.” ~ Stanley Lindquist

I used to be naive. Too naive for my own good.

The world, through my eyes, is too cruel. My rose-tinted glasses had shattered in its wake, and the shards pierce deep and painfully into my soles. Each step becomes more painful than the one before.

The knowledge doesn't make the journey any less painful. Despite the preparation, there will always be something - a weak point that will be the downfall of everything else. Like cotton candy torn to bits by a machine-gun gone amok. Or a small hole that will eventually be ripped open, wider and wider, that soon an entire forest of elephants could go through the opening.

I don't like being the target. A punching bag for hits of all sorts. When you have no artillery at your disposal for your defense - or, heck, even a brick wall - then all you can do is stand still, as still as whatever left of your dignity allows you, and take it all in your stride.

They say what doesn't kill you makes you stronger. But this...this is poisoning slowly, that by the time the damage is beyond repair, I'd probably be in a vegetative state, or, simply put, have long snapped.


God Forbid though.

...That is all. For now.

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Now playing: Lifehouse - Halfway Gone
via FoxyTunes