How far does grey go?

A perfect shade of heather grey, I used to say.

But with the years, I begin to think there is no harmony between black and white. Differences in intentions and moral values do not blend. The line between "I did not know this would hurt you" and "I know this will hurt you, only if you find out" is stark.

Never in my drunkest of my drunkest selves nor the angriest of my angrist selves have I chosen to hurt someone. Alcohol's influence and the heat of the moment are the easiest scapegoats, you see.

I have left the me from 9 years ago behind; the me with who embraced compromise and forgiveness. Yet ironically, I feel feather light.

I don't eat cake.

Anxiety doesn't always appear as physical restlessness or endless worrying. Sometimes, it's just silent, brief moments of chaos in your head, except these moments come aplenty, at the most unexpected instances. It comes when you wear your brightest smile, and it comes with you are surrounded by people who love you and whom love you.

Anxiety feels like missed calls you die for someone to return. It feels like shouting for help through texting in a tone that's not your usual, in hope that anyone would notice the difference at all. Because you don't want to be mistaken for wanting the spotlight. All you needed was some attention.

I'm always looking for comfort from someone—someone who sees me eating cake and know that it isn't indulgence, and that something is amiss. What's wrong with cake, you say? You see, I don't eat cake.

Once you’ve tasted the rainbow, you can’t accept less than seven colours anymore.
Just like how I can’t afford to love someone that I have to second guess, because I never needed to with you.

Venus Retrograde mode

I know I keep going on about me going through a phase of changes and uncertainties in this time of the Venus retrograde (horoscope tings), but jokes aside, I feel like I’ve been lacking something in life for awhile now. By that, I don’t mean a boy attention or anything of that sort (okay fine, maybe partially), but I dislike stagnancy and I’ve been too comfortable and happy for too long now since my last tragic downfall. Not that I should be asking for trouble when trouble doesn’t find me, but yes, I’m that kinda person who needs trouble in life to get me going further. Weird? Maybe. Is anything going to hold me back from finding a source of discomfort? Absolutely not.

Things I hope to achieve as I attempt to revamp my outlook in life:

• Take people’s considerations about what I want to or should do with less weight, because frankly it’s time for you to make your own damn decisions, Sarah.
• Talk less, do more. I’m not getting any younger and I would very much like to get my shit together so I can be responsible for giving myself the life that I want.
•  Grow a little ambition, because I can’t keep aiming for the sky when everyone’s aiming for the galaxies.
• Write more, because I forgot how therapeutic it used to be in helping me get my thoughts sorted out.

Ok, now back to actually getting my shit together.

I don't have to be perfect, so what?

Things about myself that I wish were okay:

I love wearing T-shirts, sweatshirts and sneakers, and I don't have the most feminine taste in music.
I swear quite casually and frankly I don't see any wrong in it.
I hate being mainstream, and even more so when I'm being pressured to be.
I feel uncomfortable being dependent, not because I'm stubborn, but because I think knowing I can do things on my own is core to my personal growth.
I'm uninterested in the economy and politics, but I'll be happy to read about less educational fun facts like the invention of colours.
I resist more when being pushed - don't try me.
I get defensive when I feel exposed, and I take awhile to admit it when I'm in the wrong.
I'm easily satisfied, and also easily dissatisfied, and this can change in a split second.
I don't like to give in if you expect me to, but I will if you don't.
I don't think before I talk, and I am therefore more straightforward than I should be.
I have a great deal of patience, but I also have one hell of a temper if you push it, and I make sure I show it.
I need to hear "sorry" or "thank you", or I'll hold a grudge.
I'm a sucker for my gold stars and need my efforts acknowledged all the time.

This is me. Is that okay?

When you love someone

"Sometimes moms and dads fall out of love

Sometimes two homes are better than one

Some things you can't tell your sister 'cause she's still too young

Yeah, you'll understand

When you love someone"

Maybe all these while I was hoping you'd turn things around for me. I envied you, for I preferred something that's broken than breaking. Some days all's good, some days I feel like giving up. Everyday is like biting into a fortune cookie - you never know what you're going to get, and you just hope for the best. My emotions have become so erratic it's bad.

Days like this I want you here to tell me what to do, because I realised how much I've grown to trust only you. Now that you're not here, I don't (want to) share anything with anyone anymore. Where are you?

Is there more I can do than to let time heal?

Because this wait just feels longer than ever.

Other than losing you, I face my other demons everyday and I wish and I wish and I wish that you would just be here to help me make things a little easier. When he shouts at her and she cries, when she tries to do something silly, when he tries to intimidate me with his self-pity, and when nobody wants to just listen it out, I try so hard to push away the urge of saying something nasty, because you always taught me to react slowly, but now you're not here to remind me of that.

But when the sun shines on my face and the pond glistens in the far, when I hear the beautiful sound of leaves shuffling in the trees, and when I pick up a dried flower from the ground, I try so hard to push away the urge of sharing my joy with you too, because you always taught me to enjoy the littlest things in life, and now I have to do so without you.

Y'know, I feel that people have to jump into something crazy at one point of their life to wake themselves the fuck up. Today, I'm thinking the time has come for me. So, let me do crazy, and let me open my eyes wide. Because if I could've loved so fiercely, I can let it all go fiercely too.

I look for you everyday

I look for you everyday.
I look for you in the cracks of the concrete ground.
I look for you in the threads of my cotton blouse.
I look for you in the hopeful thoughts within my head.
And I look for you when you're not there.

Without you

I just wanna say how apt this song is?!

You said that we would always be
Without you I feel lost at sea
Through the darkness you'd hide with me
Like the wind we'd be wild and free

You
Said you'd follow me anywhere
But your eyes
Tell me you won't be there

I got to learn how to love without you
I got to carry my cross without you
Stuck in the middle and I'm just about to
Figure it out without you
And I'm done sitting home without you
Fuck I'm going out without you
I'm going to tear this city down without you
I'm going Bonnie and Clyde without you

Now I'm running away my dear
From myself and the truth I fear
My heart is beating I can't see clear
How I'm wishing that you were here

You
Said you'd follow me anywhere
But your eyes
Tell me you won't be there

I got to learn how to love without you
I got to carry my cross without you
Stuck in the middle and I'm just about to
Figure it out without you
And I'm done sitting home without you
Fuck I'm going out without you
I'm going to tear this city down without you
I'm going Bonnie and Clyde without you

Monday, I am in love. But it's Thursday now.

Today, you have left for a brighter path and you'll be physically gone for a (subjectively) short while. I thought my worst heartbreak came from a lying jerk, but it turns out that the truth from someone I've loved so dearly can be so much worse. I thought that your honesty would give me a satisfactory closure, yet it just broke me more than anything had before. But, a closure is still a closure, and I hope you find what you're looking for, and I hope you fulfil your promises to God. 

I can't bring myself to hate you, nor detest you or blame you, and I think I never will. But I only half-want you to know that, because I want you to know that you're so beautiful but you are so very broken. Perhaps we all are.

For now, I need to be restored from being crushed, and you need to be restored from crushing others. May we find ourselves in good hands; may we keep marching on.

"Maybe we'll meet again, when we're slightly older and our minds less hectic, and I'll be right for you and you'll be right for me. But right now I am chaos to your thoughts and you are poison to my heart."

.

I'm still black, and you're still white, and maybe heather grey isn't such a happy colour after all.

Fate fell short this time, smile fades in the summer

Fate fell short this summer -

I wholeheartedly looked forward to my first 9-6 pre-adulthood quest, but the tables turned on me. I've officially faced my first adult woe of not being entirely agreeable with the most authoritative being in the office, which unfortunately also happened to be my direct head... I think it's also one of the rarer occasions in my life where painful static sparks would fly while rubbing shoulders with another being. I don't usually let it happen, and it's an awful feeling. Then again, this has taught me a whole deal on my patience threshold. (Nts: Should probably start some yoga lol)

And I've learnt a lot about walls this summer. I once knew someone who was always so open to trust anyone - something uncommon in this society. I thought that social walls were always there to start with, then it starts crumbling down as you get to know someone more. He said, "It's different for me. I don't have walls to start with. I let people come to me, then I start building them up over time if things don't go well." Curious, I thought. A few years down, I realised that I was the same. A lot of shit has happened over the past few months. Things are a tad more complicated now (not that it never was), and I'm sorry things had to happen this way.

Not my best summer, but Singapore will always have my best human beings :')

My babies, my popo, my fam.

    

My anchor (and driver).

My favourite people :-)

(Well I would have totally included another pic of the boys but problem is we never ever have pictures tgt)

(Hajar's non-halal cake LOL)

My friends #1.

My friends #2.

("More boobs, more likes")

My colleagues. To Kahina, my French daredevil. To Cyndi, my admirable young professional. To Ian, the one who knows everything. To Jiawei, the cock-talker. To auntie, the motherly janitor.

And a lot of girl fun :-)

Some have sad tales to tell.
Others keep them
safe
and
sound
and
forever

muted.

As true as the sunrise

  

  

     

  

Corn Exchange / Salford Quays, April 2016

One day, wherever I stand and whomever I stand with, I will look back and know that I've fulfilled the greatest yearning in my life, and that is, to have held something true.

I am the mountain, I am the sea, you can't take that away from me

Formby Beach / 1 April 2016

I ventured on a spontaneous day trip out with Leti to the cold, lifeless beach of Formby on April fools. It would have been an otherwise pleasant jaunt if it wasn't for the weather that dampened things - both literally and figuratively. We shivered vigorously throughout lunch while having our onigiri picnic amongst the trees in the wild. Guess the joke's on us? I had fun being a joke :-)

I'm worried I won't see your face light up again

Barely into the start of my second semester and I have been complaining like a little wimp about the pile of work I have. Sometimes, I tend to forget about people around me who work even harder.

A stroke can do many things to a patient, like taking away one's movement or one's neurological capabilities; a few months ago, she lost some of the latter. You see, the thing about aphasia is that the inflicted person reminds you of the brackish water at the bottom of a weeks-old vase of flowers; one week of mental and physical discomfort in the ward is enough to shatter someone's core. She was a very independent and self-sufficient woman, and I saw all of that crumble down. She hated herself, and that hatred was the very thing that could snap the tripwire to a second attack, and every night I sleep with fear that she will never free herself of herself. At times, I felt guilty of having fun because how could I be having it easy when there she was struggling to keep awake from the drowsiness of pills? Even texting her was a heartache because this time I knew that "typing..." didn't mean that she was slow at typing, but that she couldn't find the words to use or that she forgot how to spell. I tried to play her favourite game more often, because perhaps she'd find it easier to move some candies around than to type or speak -- less thinking, less stress. I sent her many 'lives', waiting for her to send me one back. "I don't know how to play already, very tiring," she said. She was about to give up, and so did I.

Today, she gleefully announced to us that she went for acupuncture treatment for the first time and even by bus alone. Today, she sent me a 'life', requesting one back, and this is when I know that I'm not the only one working hard in school.

The leaves will change

I was having a rather casual yet ironically heartfelt conversation with a friend the other day. She told me she didn't understand why her friends back home couldn't understand her anymore. Conversations with them are difficult to keep up with because there's simply nothing in common to be interested in anymore. The funny thing is I agreed every part of it. On certain days, I question if it was "right" to come here in the first place. It is a pitiful thing, that leaves change with the season, yet it is so necessary for the biology of the earth. You see, I learn this thing in school called the set point theory. It assumes the stability of one's subjective well-being, meaning to say people can't do any worse or any better within a certain range because human beings self-regulate to achieve eventual equilibrium. I am suppressing every thought in my head to reach that line, yet lingering in the depths of summer when the wind picks up doesn't feel "right", and striding along as the earth rotates doesn't feel "right".

-

I didn't expect so many things to happen all at once. And I hate how I am forced to prioritise when all are as worrisome and as important to me. I feel myself tearing apart. A few more days and I have to be back a few thousand miles away, and it is not fun. It is not fun all the time just because I "get to study overseas" and I wish people would stop saying that. It is not fun because I am so far away. And it is not fun because I can't do anything when proximity is such a bitch.

27/11

I think the scariest part was knowing it was coming but not knowing when. And sometimes I feel that life finds the thrill in toying around with me; because a week ago you started learning how to eat on your own again. A week ago, you still knew who I was and you could speak a little. A week ago I was browsing for plane tickets to head back home in February because you'd love it if I was back for chinese new year. A week ago, I told myself I'd call "tomorrow" because "you'd still be there". Then it happened so quickly and unexpectedly, yet still, I didn't feel much - or at least not as much as I thought I would. Because for once, this felt right, even if it's in all the wrong ways. Because maybe, just maybe, everyone will be happier this way - even you. Iwmy.