you are online, the mobile chat function on my phone deciphers.

online - such a world of possibilities, of words not said and of thoughts transcending the seemingly endless and non-existent space of hope.

***

i am lying, almost spread eagle on the bed. i think of the corpse pose that i've found myself in during my yoga lessons. the air-conditioning does not hum. i wonder if we have we forgotten to place the keycard into the slot near the door. the ceiling seems newly painted in a fresh coat of white. cornices. i haven't noticed cornices in hotel rooms before. a clink - you've removed your watch and placed it on the table. your belt is next. there is something sensual about watching your side profile as you remove your belt. i cannot see myself reflected in the mirror. I can however, see the artwork placed above the bed - something that looks like a carpet with an intricate design, framed up. your coat is next, folded and tossed loosely on the back of the chair. for the first time i notice that it is grey. why grey and not black? your cuff links, then you tug at your shirt and walk towards the bed. you sit on the side of the bed and tug off your socks one by one. then i feel the weight of you next to me. my hand brushes against the cool sheet as it searches for yours while i look up towards the ceiling. at last i find your palm and i lay mine flat against yours. it feels cool against mine. i rub my thumb against yours to find the calloused part that i remember, but i fail. can callouses disappear without a trace in a year? i wonder.

so i found you, i ventured.

yes, he says.

ever the man of little words. i think as i raise myself up and gaze at him.

fear erodes me, bit by bit.

i feel myself crumbling, bit by bit.

typing this out, i don't know if i'll be jinxed.

lying in bed at night, i fear the inevitable.

i'm not quite there as a bear with a sore head,

but fear takes my hand and guides me towards being

prickly and in despair.

i feel like i can't imagine life beyond.

i feel like i shouldn't be thinking this way.

the jitters get hold of me.

and i imagine -

being tongue-tied,

glibberish,

feeling defeated once more.

i don't want that.

i fear that even more than loss itself.

i want to believe in myself once more.

the morning of the day he died, i woke to the sound of rumbling thunder.

it was a cool morning and there were clear skies. for a moment, i doubted if i had actually heard that. i remember that i woke feeling more refreshed than i had felt in weeks. i stretched and decided to go out for a jog. i changed and tied my hair up in a ponytail while looking at myself in the mirror. i scrutinised my features - it had been so long that i had really looked at myself, as opposed to the occasional glance to check my make-up. i looked paler than i remembered myself to be. my eyebrows needed tweezing. my complexion was sallow. fine lines were beginning to creep around my eyes. yes, i was ageing.

i shook myself out of my temporary reverie and went to the door to put on my running shoes. a tag containing a microchip which i'd attached to my shoes for a marathon last year was still tied to my laces. even my shoes looked tired and grey. i hadn't been running for so long, most days were spent visiting him, going to the office and lying in bed before ten, but not actually sleeping. grief is a funny thing. it takes a grasp on your life such that you cannot muster any interest in doing anything else other than brooding on what makes you sad.

it was a beautiful morning, really. i can't say the birds were chirping, because i don't remember that, but i remember a burst of joy as i started running. i remember thinking that it was a wonderful start to a day. traffic was heavy and i had to stop and wait for cars when i jogged across a few streets. at one point, ahead of me, i saw two elderly people and a cherubic-looking toddler. he couldn't have been more than three and was tottering ahead of the two, presumably his grandparents. i smile at him and catch his eye and he looks at me in wonderment. he yells a "Hello!" at me. i smile and wave at him in return, and i jog on.

i reached the path along a canal where i used to jog. it looked the same. i gazed up at the skies and i saw swirls of white in the infinite blue. the swirls reminded me of how i used to paint as a child. i would have watercolours and a cup of water to soak my brushes in when i wanted to use the same brush to paint a different colour. i would immerse the brush slowly in the water and watch as swirls of paint diffused into the water. yes, that was what the swirls of white in the skies reminded me of that morning. it's strange to think back now and have all those thoughts come back to me in all clarity. yet in all, it's been a few months since that day.

then suddenly, it began to rain. before it rained, i had abandoned thoughts of paint and swirls and was looking across the water in the canal. i saw ripples, but it didn't register to me at first that it could be raining. then i felt tiny droplets of rain on my skin, which surprised me and then the rain got heavier. in a span of a few minutes, they started pelting hard against me, and i realised that i was the only one left jogging along that path. i didn't think of seeking refuge anywhere. the pelting of the raindrops surprised me and somehow spurred me to run even faster, and as i did, a strange thing happened - i suddenly felt alive. it didn't matter that i would be soaked, that it was now raining heavily, that i might slip and fall and get hurt, that i might jog into a puddle and see my shins matted with dirt. i was alive and i was happy and it was still a beautiful morning, never mind the rain. i began to laugh out loud as i ran and tasted the raindrops as i did. i felt free-er than i had in months. for that moment, i had abandoned all grief and sadness.

then as suddenly as the rain had begun, it stopped. i looked up in amazement, stunned that the shower had gone as quickly as it had arrived. the swirls in the skies were gone and the sky was a washed-out blue. the damp concrete was the sole testimony that it had rained. i couldn't even start to tell if my running shirt was damp with perspiration or rainwater. something had changed. everything looked the same, but something had changed. my burst of joy had evaporated. i took a deep breath. i felt something settle over me. it was a heaviness of things to come. i felt the weight of regret settle over me. and then i knew. everything was the same but he had gone. he was gone. it was so natural a thought that i couldn't put a finger on why i knew what i did.

and then i thought of the past - a friday night after a day of work and worry when i'd taken a train to town and walked to one of the massive bookstores. i wanted to run my fingers along the spines of books lined up neatly on the shelves. i wanted to tilt my head and read the titles of books at random. i wanted to pick out a book and turn to the ending and read the last paragraph of the book, any book, be it happy or sad. i especially liked endings that lead nowhere, that leaves you with a sense that life will go on despite the bouts of sadness and joy. on that day, i remember striding to the bookstore and stopping in my tracks as i see him at one of the shelves near the entrance, reaching for a book. i notice the white that tinges his sideburns. it seems so natural a thing that we should meet that i am hardly surprised. thinking back, i could have missed the train and decided to head home instead. or i could have been distracted by the numerous sales in the shops, just like any typical girl would be. but i wasn't.

i spy a bench in the distance and sit down. it is only then that the tears begin to fall. tears of sadness at us having so little time together. tears of regret at not being able to be by his side for more than three times a week. tears of gratitude at having had a year to spend together. tears of guilt for what we had that can never be shared.

at first sight, there was much to admire about him - much to emulate, even. his poise, his air of natural detachment, his silent and calm demeanor, which meant that little could ever faze him. the years have blurred my memory and for the life of me, i cannot think of any particular incident in which he exhibited such qualities, but i cannot, i cannot think of any. which is a shame. i can, however, pick out the exact moment i witnessed his vulnerability and let pity slip out of me unwittingly. it was a hot weekday afternoon, and we had just exited the building which we had a midday meeting in. we walked across the tiled ground, him with his coat already slung over the arm he was carrying his briefcase with. my court shoes clicked against the tiles and one tile must have been loose, for i heard a different click from what i was accustomed to hearing, so often did we go for meetings at that particular building. i must have stopped short, for he was walking quickly and stopped some distance ahead of me and turned back impatiently. at that moment, i saw him looking at something behind me and i turned to look at what had caught his attention. the building was next to a busy road, on which was travelling a yellow minibus. it must have been some sort of a school outing for they were all pointing excitedly at the hideous-looking structure of what was meant to be a bird along the street. they must have seen us turn to look at them too, for they suddenly all started waving at us. i didn't wave back at first, it must have been the heat and thought of work that was waiting to be done, and then i turned and looked at him, but there he was waving for all he was worth. strangely, it wasn't an expression of joy on his face, but a strangely grateful look at what chance had presented him with and an unwillingness to let go of the moment. he waved till they were out of sight, and then he waved some more.no, he wasn't being silly, he didn't want to let go of the moment lest drudgery emerge and swallow it whole. but it did, and we walked back in silence. that afternoon, i pitied how the years had taken so much out of him, that it left him an empty shell bereft of the promise of youth.

i do not remember how i walked home that day. i do not remember what else went through my mind. my guess is that i must have gone through the motions - of opening the door to my home, storing my shoes in the shoe cabinet, peeling off my socks and then sitting blankly on the sofa for a while. then i must have taken a shower and sat on the sofa, waiting for my hair to dry, perhaps. the next thing i knew, i woke and it was dark.

i got up and i felt groggy. i saw that it was eight. my thoughts were disjointed, he was gone. i spied my mobile on the coffee table not far away. picking it up, i saw there were two missed calls and one text message. they were from his wife. "he passed on this morning, funeral's on thursday." i didn't cry. throughout, the only tears i shed were when i was on the bench after the sudden downpour.

i switched on the television and poured myself a glass of red wine. the inane blabber on some variety talkshow that was being aired annoyed me to no end. the voices were too shrill , the topic too frivolous, the glare of the television hurt my eyes. i scanned through my collection of old movies and selected a french movie, amelie. it was screened in 2001 and was an instant hit with its whimsical feel. it was one of my favourite movies, but he never understood why. "what's the appeal to it with such a child-like character?" he'd ask. of course, he never understood that like a child, i looked up to him and yet tried to repress that side of me, lest he find me too childish and clingy. so i built a wall around myself and my emotions - i had to be this person that he found he wanted to love. i could not let slip any semblance of desire that we could ever spend the rest of our lives together. i had to fully respect how he had to spend most evenings with his family. i was the outsider, who had to be the sacrificing one. i could never allow myself to demand anything more of what he was willing to provide. i could never ever let him feel even once that i was a liability to his marriage and family. and so, the walls i built. looking back, i might have prided myself unnecessarily. i might have conditioned myself to be the person he wanted to have, but it never meant that i was indispensable for who i was. it could so easily have been someone else in my shoes, in other words, i was just the right person in the right time and place. but displace those thoughts i try, for i want only beautiful memories to last me for now.

so amelie, a show too whimsical for him, but for me a dream. i can't say it uncovered my longing to just drop everything and live simply as a waitress in a non-descript Parisan cafe and to indulge in nothing but the moment. i suppose you could say he was the only one holding me back from pursuing my silly dreams. or perhaps i just want to pin the blame on something else other than my own cowardice that sees me staying here even here despite how it's been a few months to that day, the day when i woke to the sound of rumbling thunder.

i've lost many friends along the way. take for example two days ago when i was at the train station. i saw two ex-colleagues of mine walking towards me. i don't think they'd seen me yet, but i just averted my eyes, stared ahead and kept walking so as not to draw any attention to myself. we didn't part on a bad note. in fact they even held a farewell party and contributed towards the food, cake and my farewell gift. i couldn't make out why i didn't want to acknowledge them. perhaps i was too tired to stop and talk to them and answer all those usual questions thrown at someone you haven't seen for a long time. i guess i just didn't want to talk. and so i avoided the moment. and because of my reticence in part, people gradually sensed that about me and they've stopped contacting me.

i do not mind the solace that surrounds me. i went to town today after a long hiatus of cooping myself at home and there were too many people for my liking. i found too often that i was searching the faces of passers-by and thinking inane thoughts about them - her fringe is too short. are they in love? he's a worried businessman. she's off to watch a movie perhaps. the bag she's carrying makes her one of the typical girls who love to splurge on brands. and then without knowing, i'd walked on and on and was standing outside a hotel. The Hotel.

The Hotel was one of those with countless doormen standing in its midst waiting to open the doors for anyone who wanted to enter the place. The Hotel was one of those places where you checked yourself before you entered . The Hotel was one of those places which made you feel conspicuous and conscious of that tiny snag in your satin dress. i do not want to remember now the cool sheets and how my body felt heavenly just sinking into those sheets.

i want to remember how his skin had turned paper-thin. the wrinkles on his skin had become like tiny ridges and i used to run my fingers on them in his last weeks. his lips were dry and parched most of the time and i would dampen them with a piece of wet cotton wool, then wipe them and pat on some Vaseline.

It was an air ticket bought on a whim with the knowledge that I still had six painful months to go before the end of the school year. So, to Hong Kong it was, a country i had felt safe to head to alone, given the knowledge that i could speak halting Cantonese and passable Mandarin. i had booked a cheap hostel in Kowloon, putting in the dates over and over again on a hostel booking website as i mulled over what would be my first solo trip abroad. Three days later, i was on the plane, a notebook on the tray table and my pen hovering atop the lined paper, confounded by my sudden lack of ability to put words on paper for the first time in a long while.

The trip to the Dragon Hostel was a smooth one. I'd bought my ticket for bus A21 without much trouble at the airport. By the time the bus was passing through the Kowloon area, it was almost eight and the flashing billboards hurt my eyes. From where I was seated on the top-deck of the bus, I spied shoppers overflowing from the shopping malls,

electricity. jolt. recognition. silence.

handshake, surprise.

nothing at first. silent.

soft, lined, leathery, shaven.

trimmed, neat, wry.

silent.

that i dwadle and dream and hope and then get them dashed and remain planted to my fate as i hate and rave and rant and die an angry child.

i'm glad that for once, my parents took me seriously. that there was slight shock registered on their faces and that my mother gaped in astonishment as she mouthed the words - one year.

so as i willow and wilt in this town day-by-day, reason for my existence ebbing away, the life in me reducing to nothingness, waking up at one at night, hourly intervals, never a good nights' sleep.

i so want to go away. where?

i don't think i was a difficult child, which surprises me when i have to deal with difficult children. i was never the model student either, rather, i was one of the forgettable ones, one of those seated in the corner, hair neatly tied, poised with a pencil, ready to jot down whatever i had to. i don't remember my biology teacher ever calling upon me to answer a question - she probably didn't even know my name, and so i faded, amidst the banter.

the more i talk to others, the less i seem to become, and the lesser i listen to the self.

i was back to the pill today, just fourteen months after i weaned off them. a year ago i was happier, unsure of where i stood, liberated by changed and determined to make the most of it.

and so the new year is upon us all.
the previous entry in this blog was about me receeding - the more work i did, the less i felt i had become.
what do i miss about 2009? sure i miss waking up at nine and the paltry marking which was a breeze compared to what i did in 2008. i miss teaching a group of overly-enthusiastic pupils who sapped my energy, particulary for the four hours i saw them for on fridays.
now it's back to the grind and it seems like nothing had changed except for the faces i see before me in the classroom.
ironically or otherwise, i've been assigned the same level and class alphabet as the first bunch of primary five pupils i taught back in 2006. there's even a sibling of a pupil from that 2006 batch, as if irony chose to mock further at me.
until today, i'm still not used to writing 2010. not that i have to, since i've already conveniently pasted 2010 on the top right hand corner of my whiteboard - since lazy ole' me doesn't want the trouble or inconvenience of writing it on a daily basis.

but i digress.

i miss:

trudging in the cold, alone.
waking up, alone and without a care in the world.
manila days - days of being heady in love.
days of waltzing into a bookstore.
days of watching the lights in orchard in all merriment.

it is time to sleep.

i feel myself receeding in this cubicle. the more i work, the less i am, the less i have become. in giving myself to work - to colleagues, to children, to marking, to the endless setting of papers, i have lost myself -my desire to live life as i have always believed. i am giving up on living life as i have dreamed, in the pursuit of comfort and conventions. in eating lunch with mundane colleagues who inspire me to kill myself lest my life turns into something which resembles their lives. it takes all i have not to cry out in despair.
every day is a fresh day, a fresh day is supposed to bring new promise into life. a fresh day is supposed to make you feel revived just by thinking about the excitement that the day beckons. or am i just to naive to expect any more from life rather than just a comfy bed, family to return home to at the end of the day and a job that manages to pay the bills.
sometimes, i wish i were just like everyone else. or do i? i still adore my weird personality, my individuality.
every morning i wake up and i wonder if i should go to work early. the drive is no longer there, yet, a sense of responsbility still keeps me going ahead of others to finish up my work. every morning, the nice colleagues greet me, but it's all i can do but to tell them that i would rather be anywhere but here.

At such a time, i wonder if anyone knows where i am.

the underside of my thighs are frigid with cold, pressed against the partially rusted steel chairs. my fingers are losing the colour of their vitality and i will soon no longer be able to feel them. if tears rolled down my cheeks now, they would freeze just above my cheekbones and i imagine that anyone looking at me like that would think of a comic figure with frozen bits of ice on his cheeks.

lifting myself off the steel chair, i begin to walk. perhaps it is time to end the quandry of solitude, if only for a while.

i walk to my small log cabin. my toes feel pinched in my grey boots, my fingers are frozen in my gloves. to get the key out of my coat pocket, i would need to pull off my gloves, which make my hands so oversized they cannot fit into my coat pocket. i pull off the glove and then accidentally drop it on the snow-covered ground. bending down to pick it up, i see something else on the ground. it is a heart-shaped key ring. it isn't covered by snow, so i presume that it hasn't been there for long.

i open the door to my log cabin and enter the cabin. The place is, as i have left it. Sparse and smelling of varnish, with a carpet in front of the fireplace. there is an armchair and a low small table beside the carpet. a picture of a cottage in the countryside is the only thing close to any from of a decoration in the cabin. the bed is just across the fireplace. shutting the door, i ease myself into the armchair and start to take off my boots when there is a knock on the door.

there wasn't a peephole for me to see who is at the door. cautiously, i opened the door. i am a little alarmed to see a little girl, of about six, standing in the cold outside. i studied her for a moment. Her hair was in a neat bob, her eyes questioning, her cheeks red. She wasn't carrying anything with her, and certainly did not appear dangerous. she didn't look surprised to see me, neither did she seem frightened. Before i could say anything, she asked politely, "Could I come in?"

"Are you with your mother?" i ask, stepping out of the cabin to look around. but there was no one around her. Afraid that she would catch a chill, i hustled her inside and then shut the door behind us.

After entering the house, the girl's child-like demeanour seems to undergo a slight transformation. she faces the fireplace, her arms akimbo and her back facing me. "Do you like children?" she asks. I am stumped by her question. Why would anyone knock on my log cabin in winter, enter it and then ask me such a question? But i answer it anyway. Part of me wants to see where this all is going and the other part of me wants to know who she is. The other part of me feels as though i'm in a surreal state.

"Well, i don't think i'm a motherly person and i used to like children, but not anymore," i tell her.
She laughs without turning around, an action that seems contrary to her age.
"Why?" she says after her bout of laughter.
"Look, why have you come here?" i feel confused, as though she were the adult and i the child.
She laughs again and turns around. I study her again as she does so. She has full lips and eyes without the wide-eyed look of a child. There is a hole in the palm of her mitten, a tiny scar above her left eyebrow.
There was something about her that reminded me of someone i used to know, i was certain of that. i searched my memory for any clue that could provide me with a hint as to who she reminded me of. Then slowly, a faint memory crept into my mind.

It was a weekday morning, not unlike any other. I had just taken my breakfast with my cousins. It wasn't what i would consider a daily occurance. My cousins had a hardware businesss which they had taken over from their father, so they would take orders for goods like plastic and foil and then deliver the goods to their customers. One of their customers lived near me, so some mornings, they would call me and ask if i wanted to have breakfast with them and then they would offer to give me a lift to work. It was a pretty nice arrangement, and we always had a pleasant time starting the day together. My cousins and i were pretty close, especially since i had no siblings. So after breakfast, we crossed the road to where my cousin's car was parked and began the short drive to my workplace. It was a rather humid morning and i can remember some sweat dripping down neck as i asked my cousin about the decorative item in his car.
"Tommy, why's that cat not moving his arm?" I asked to bursts of laughter.
"Oh that, we got that from a friend. It's supposed to be solar-powered but stopped working after a day," his brother, Raymond chuckled.
Just then, Raymond's wife, who was also in the car with us, pointed at a middle-aged woman who was crossing the road some distance away from us. The cars coming from the opposite direction honked at her and she appeared to be startled, as she stopped for a while before crossing the road and pausing in the central road divider.
"I wonder if she wants to cross the road," Tommy remarked as he watched her. The woman had also appeared to be watching us coming towards her.
Tommy brought the car to a rather abrupt stop, making Raymond's wife cry out in annoyance as she was trying to get something from her bag and the slight impact had caused her things to spill out on the car seat.
"Well, I guess she's stopping for us then," Tommy said as he accelerated. What happened next will forever be imprinted in my mind. The woman dashed across the road just as he accelerated. i watched, too shocked for words, as we knocked into the woman with a sickening thud. her arms flailed, and for a split second, i saw her mouth agape in shock. for a moment, i thought she might just fall back onto the ground with little injury, but she she slammed onto the windscreen and i watched in horror as tiny cracks appeared where her head was. i probably would have let out a shrill scream at this moment, i couldn't even be sure if it was raymond's wife or i who had screamed. her body perched on the hood of the car at an awkward angle, i can hardly be sure if she was alive.

throwing open the door, i saw a birthmark on brown flesh. looking closer, i saw tufts of black hair emerging from under the worn orange quilt, a leg being stretched out from under the covers, a slender one. i was captivated. i realised with some surprise that i was not disgusted, rather, i was looking for a scene to unfold before me with some sort of morbid fascination. they didn't know i had thrown open the doors to my own bedroom, otherwise their movements would have quickened, their mouths opening in a wide O, the eyes becoming huge pools of surprise and would the words, i can explain would visit his mind.
i feel the doorknob delicately with my fingers for want of something to do. my fingers trace the curve of the knob as i watch their bodies move under the covers in a somewhat slow and swift movement. then she lets out a tiny gasp of pleasure and i see their bodies stop moving.
he emerges from under the covers, fingers around the shaft of his manhood, and is halfway across the room to the basin when he sees me.

***
i am tired. i no longer want to scold. i want to leave people alone. i don't want to tell people what to do, nor hang a silly smile on my face everyday as though everything is fine and dandy as i waste my life away.
i am tired, and i should sleep.

just the picture of snow makes me take a deep breath, imagining sharp cold air entering my nostrils and attacking my lungs. i can so imagine myself trudging down cobblestone paths, hands tucked into pockets and catching a snowflake in my tongue.
the cold doesn't make me think of gloomy days, contrary to what everyone thinks.
i loved nothing better than waking up in the morning in that tiny hotel room of mine with the desire to do nothing but to wait for the day to unravel.

and with the advent of time, what have i learned?
I've learned that money can buy momentary happiness and little else, and that sometime momentary happiness suffices, sometimes it does not.
I've learned that a life of drudgery does nothing but drain the soul and kill the spirit.
I've learned that happiness is mine to have, and my right alone.
I've learned that happiness is within grasp and just a matter of reaching for it.
I've learned that no mountain is too high or insurmountable, it's just a matter of whether you want to conquer it or not.
I've learned that words like "But what else can you do?" can be fed to the dogs. There is nothing I can't do if I set my mind and heart to it.
I've learned that it's only when you open yourself to the realm of endless possibilities that happiness has a chance to have a dance with you.
I've learned that in life, sometimes it's better to leap before you look and sometimes, to look before you leap.
I've learned that sometimes, when things go wrong, you just have to say, "Na Bey Ch** Bai!" and then move the f*** on.
I learned that everyone fucks up. If you fuck yourself over and over again over a single mistake, no one really gives a damn.
I will love myself for who I am.
I, the girl without the gift of the gab.
I, the girl who fucks up.
I, the girl with jiggly thighs!
I, the girl with acne scars.
I, the girl with a high-pitched voice.
I, the girl with too-small boobs.
I, the girl with a bad temper.
I, the girl who talks too loudly sometimes.
I, the girl who cries over nothing.

I am me, and I shall myself love.

reminiscence, indeed

and while travelling to london has kept me from going back to school, this unexpected extension of the holidays for me hasn't really seen me rejoicing. sure, i've escaped calling 32 sets of parents and all the mayhem that must have erupted in the staff room today, but life meanders on, as usual.

london was a beautiful experience. what will i always take to be london to me as the walk in the freezing cold to meiji shrine is japan to me?
as i've always thought, the cold romanticizes everything.
i stayed a few streets away from the marble arch tube station and what i will always remember of the mornings are - slinking out of my hotel, out of the warmth and into the cold - shoes clapping onto concrete, hands seeking warmth in the pockets of my jeans. hunched shoulders and the walking on. and everyone else does the same. women togged in scarves, knee-length boots - fair skin which barely looks a hint of being sunkissed. and men in coats, hats, striding, striding.
the tube - ever so typical a form of transport across the city.

but i digress.
beautiful london aside, today is a day i'd like to remember. for it marks the end of 8 long years that i've meandered on. i'd like to think that life could continue moving on and me being happy in this cocoon of a life, but i think not. life changes, people change and things do change.
and while in the past i'd thought myself to be lucky to find a job which paid me simply for a fulfiling way to while away my time each day, i think the contrary now.

isn't it lovely to think of life in all its possibilities?

i haven't dreamed of flying for a while

by taichi yamada.

i miss japanese literature - the quaint sentences, descriptive nuances, all painting a city of lost souls, of quiet efficacy on the surface and wanton loves on the inside.

and sunday night before we embark on yet another week. i'm not feeling the dread that used to envelope me on sundays last year. neither am i feeling the flighty joy of embarking on yet another week of challenges. life is and will be as it will be. sundays a year ago - bright skies and hot afternoons. how the thought of work would pass a damper on my soul and how my tired self sought sleep in the afternoons. and of how the street lights would already be bright by the time i woke up. and along with that, a sense of losing grip on time, on life itself, and perhaps, on myself.

but i digress, as always i do.

i don't want tomorrow to come because it will mean that the magical weekend has come to a close. that magical weekend where i felt alive. am i?

of you.

for want of words, we stare at the menu. nuances, i see how light bounces off the plastic surface. what used to be a pristine white, now lightly smudged with matted oil prints. - per 100grams, per serving - my mind searches for what can be said, words to fill up the empty spaces between, but i come up with nothing. i summon enough courage to look at you, you whose eyes are search your menu as well. i stare at the tinted glass windows and wonder if the skies are really grey. i look around me and spy - executives clinking their wine glasses, red wine on a Monday afternoon, giggly girls in a corner, a waitress with bad skin balancing empty bowls on a tray. the words - this moment is your life - come to mind. oh that the posterity of each moment could be captured, blended into immaculate perfection in mind's eye. i look at the clean plates in front of me, chopsticks and spoon placed equidistant from the plates and wonder what good it would be trying to grasp fleeting moments of being tongue-tied?

i sit on the cold, hard seats. on a night like this, the night sky could only be pitch-black. no clouds would deign to traipse across the sky for this very night. your form trudges out of the gate, just as i have envisioned, and you sit beside me without a word. my head tilts to the right where it rests on the soft of your neck. your neck is softer than i imagined, your shoulders slightly sloping. no words need transpire.

the empty feeling on the train - i took a seat in the middle, flanked by empty seats. ahead i watch the lifeless view of the black of the tunnels flash across the windows, my form staring back at me without emotion. of course i could stare at myself forever and wonder if it were really me. and i was to cross my bridge of dreams again, but inertia let loose of me and drew me to the bright lights of the city.

how do i condense tonight into words? it is impossible. swinging my arms, delirium.

i felt completely nothing when i saw you, and this aroused apathy for myself. for what joy would there to be had in life if nothing could possibly stir me?
i felt nothing.

but wait. wasn't it the most natural thing in the world? to whiz into a bookstore on a lonely night and to see you there, flipping through a book that i would expect you to? and didn't it seem - it wasn't serendipty, it wasn't chance, nor luck. it was just something that would have had happened. something that didn't warrant rejoicing because i knew when i left that i would see you again.

i told you that i was so tired of being tired. and rested my head on your shoulders again.

i try and try to remember the exact moment that i set eyes on you.

can you have a sandwich? i'll have my puff and we'll look at each other with glimmers in our eyes and we'll go up to the stone benches and eat in silence. people-watch.

that i forgot to put on my two rings on the first day. habit tugged me towards running back and getting the rings, while the heady prospect of a new year beckoning reeled me towards heedlessly moving forward and getting used to not running my thumb absentmindedly over the grooves of the ring.

dependency saw me searching for my pill-box for ages, not believing that it wasn't in my black slouch bag. indecision seeing me sprawled in a fetal position, wondering if i was going to get palpitations and hallucinations all night long.

empty, empty again, amidst the camera flashes.
that a picture speaks a thousand words is a sham.
it can tell of a thousand lies.

stop eating lollipops. they're bad for you.
i want to see a blade cut through air and drops of blood appear as though air were my flesh.

and i do not know why i keep losing my pill box.

i placed you in the corner today, like a shirt which i love but no longer wish to wear, something only taken out in remembrance of breezy, hazy, lazy days. days which spell a lingering scent of perfume that never disintegrates.
my life as a placid calm pacific blue, my mind - elsewhere, wandering, wondering, wanderlust.
when can i be mine?
goodbye, the melancholic one, you were never mine. the other me belongs to merry-making, a seemingly downward spiral of life, a life of lust for life itself. a craze to drink from the fevour of life, amidst all the merry-making.
goodbye, life of mine.

the thin layer of oil floating above the red liquid always disgusted me, but i drank it anyway. some mornings i woke to see strong sunlight inching its way past the thin slit of glass between the pane and the dusty green curtains and watched speckles of dust do a jig in the empty space above me. i would watch the dust settle slowly and then twist my fingers around the ends of the green curtains and watch as more dust congregated for yet another dance. and while the sunlight seared burning bright images upon my eyes, i opened them till they hurt and i could do so no more. only then would i allow myself to inch towards the wine glass - toppling it down on many an occassion, due to the fact that it was little more than a bright grey triangle after all that sun-gazing - lapping up whatever was left in the glass. at times, i would just manage to slip a drop onto my tongue and i would slide my tongue along the roof of my mouth, savouring that little drop of bitterness before getting up to face a little of the day.
i clean my teeth but i do not bother to wash my face, the days hardly see me going anywhere. i run my fingers through my hair and give up before running them through the ends completely.
i often look into the fridge and see cartons of apple juice, bottles of ketchup and flour. eggs are a rarity. the other day i boiled eggs on a pan before deciding to add some flour into the paltry mess. i end up with a mess of runny eggs and flour pan-fried till it forms an almost brown crisp. what was intended roughly to be pancakes was just that. i dump ketchup and my eggs-flour mix into a bowl and use a fork to swirl the mix with the ketchup. taking a bite, it doesn't taste half bad. like a dried-up mixture of hash browns and rotten tomatoes.

***

that the night of would never end.
that the night could be dredged out at will, with every memory as clear and distinct as it had been the day after.
that drudgery would not erase what we had.

tokyo in december

what i will remember about tokyo is how insecure it made me at first - after all, how intelligent can you look as a dithering idiot reduced to pointing towards pictures to order food and then bowing to signify a thank you?

as the days went by, tokyo separated itself from taiwan and hongkong, where i had unconsciously classified it with. how the subway lines seem to be the only way of getting around, how small snack-shops sprout up at every unimaginable corner, how the bright lights of the city never fade and how the flashing billboards reflect a certain restlessness　that cannot be conveyed in words.

tokyo is a paradox. you have the cherubic schoolgirls who may one day be selling their used undies to salarymen, you have the innocent looking schoolboys who look like little men, dressed in their black jackets and slacks, who will grow up on a diet of porn and erotic manga. then the demure looking office-ladies who cross their legs when they sit and may moonlight by night. and the salarymen togged in well-cut suits who may pay for someone to piss on their faces. you have the land of the rising sun and the day that ends at five in december, looking set to continue this way till march. you have traditional shinto shrines like the meiji shrine and tall skyscrapers in shidome. you have the city that never sleeps, spied from a train on a private railway - men still in the offices at half past nine, people standing at the copier machines, and you have the drunkards along shinjuku and in the love hotels.

that said, when i initally thought there was nothing much to enjoy, the rising yen which renders the steals from japan not quite steals anymore, i found great enjoyment in navigating the railway lines - no biggie, really, the search for places on the various maps and as always, the journey is as fulfilling as what comes after. now, if only that could apply to life.

so today, i woke at 6, visited the Tsukiji Fish Market, had the freshest sushi ever from a stall that drew crowds, then headed down to the Meiji Jingu Shrine, walked a mile on a dirt-paved road, thanked god that i wore my trainers instead of my books, tourist-watched people being led around like sheep, wrote out a wish at the shrine, visited the imperial palace, the tokyo metropolitan government building and watched tokyo come alive in a fairytale land of billboards and bright lights in the night, and then went to Oedo Onsen where i sat in hot springs and watched naked girls sashay their way past me.

and so, just as well that my phone is a 2G type that cannot be used in japan. i want to feel free and uncontactable. though how ironical it is that i am in touch with the world through the world wide web.

i am happiest when there is no one to follow, literally or figuratively. that life could meander its way past me and see me just indulging in moments like these.