lessons to be learnt everyday

you see, in life we like to categorise ourselves into two extremes- yourself and everyone else. but most of the time we are really living on the edge of the more selfless and correct extreme, and we never enter it. such a precarious act.

 imagine! losing one’s self! losing your character! all your steadfast beliefs and the very essence of your dark being!

sometimes i think that i don’t let go of bad memories because i have let them define who i am. i like that i have something unhappy about me that makes me just a tad different. maybe i’m really a sunshine gal but i really want to be angsty instead.

so instead of having a distinct character, i have none. i don’t even realise what i want to be. unfortunately, it’s also showing in my photos.

when wayne finally remembered my name he decided to give me a pep talk too. and it sucks to receive criticism, always will, but it sucks more to realise that my tenacity for it has never really been tested and that sucks.

and that i am really still hard at work in the “self” side of the world, trying to perfect everything, not knowing if this is what i want but yeap that should work. i think caring about destitute people is part of me, but it’s really just caring about myself.

i’m not lying when i say that it always comes back to you.

on the 7th day of the new year,

seven is a pretty number (:

so it seems that in i have lived quite a bit and learnt a great deal, but there’s always so much more to look forward to. just read in new york times that regret plays an important role in our psychological developments.

so here’s seven (not in order of merit):

1. missing my final theory driving test
2. misplacing my lawrence durrell book (and not bothering to find it)
3. betraying a nice guy’s trust
4. not replying dave’s apology e-mail
5. totalling savings of less than a hundred bucks
6. discarding my aim of the beloved leather Coach bag
7. pissing my mother off

so you see that i lead a very pleasant life, though my last regret tends to be sporadic. also, some things you regret doing but really requires that you leave it alone.

as they say, my dear, forgive and forget.

persuasion.

“We each begin, probably, with a little bias towards our own sex; and upon that bias build every circumstance in favour of it which has occurred within our own circle; many of which circumstances (perhaps those very cases which strike us the most) may be precisely such as cannot be brought forward without betraying a confidence, or  in some respect, saying what should not be said.”

if anyone were to surmise jane austen’s idea of a most endearing obstacle in life, it would be that ilovemyniceauntiefriendbutireallywishhshehadpissedoffthenandletmefallinlovealready.

i couldn’t believe how she had written a book just out of social situations e.g. showing off “my handsome drawing room”, but really, we are still living 18th century style. we still do gossip about the smallest hint of a something like weight gain and some people really do fret about how they can best receive praise for an excellent taste in china.

and all the time we are persuading the people we care for against their best intuition (depite the well intent, true), but these days people do not have time for tea and your most elegant comeback.

of dreams and aspirations

you know how you grow up thinking that you are good at something, and everybody tells you so and pushes you up to the sky, but one rainy day you realise that people just do not need you for what they acknowledge you are good at, and your heart plunges like raindrops crashing down on the cold, despicable cement of disappointment?

sadly, i can’t seem to tell myself that i’m the best at anything. i am not the fastest walker or runner, the biggest eater or the most enthusiastic spender. i really thought that i was at least good at that, the one thing that i could do with my eyes closed and pen poised, but now it seems that the things i write about just do not matter to people who should care, and that as much these matters are pertinent to the real world i’m the one who has been delusional thinking that anyone would want to know what a hard time ex-offenders have when it doesn’t make a good cover.

now i know why i’m the first to want to get this published- other publications already knew that stories like that don’t sell. people just don’t want to read about normal people. i think the New York Times has influenced me too much, and people just do not want to read about injustices and follow-ups without a sensational picture. i just really don’t think i can be a journalist anymore if i were to stay here. if anything, i can’t be a documentary film maker or a current affairs photographer if i stay here.

right now, i am just extremely dejected by the realism of all these things and i feel like i’ve come to a halt in the middle of nowhere. i thought i knew where i was going but now, i’m not so sure.