07 August 2008
9:45 PM
They don't teach you how to get tough #
Millions of years of evolution, creation, and they don't say a word about how to, when everything starts turning against the tide, overcome it.
I end today a little bruised, acknowledging that I'm no smarter than the fool I was before. No, it's not like the air has never been vacuumed from lungs before. It is not the first time the sky seems to have fallen and no one noticed.
It started, as these things do start, with such a nasty surprise. 15 seconds of suspicion, 10 seconds of intense speculation. I didn't believe the worst is yet to be, but there it was.
And there I was. It was over before it even begun, and that may be the most cruel part of the story.
So never mind, I suck it up, grab my bag and head off for the London fellowship. I said Jesus had to hold the fort, because I felt I was going to give up my front soon. Turn your eyes upon Jesus, and the things that pass will go strangely dim in the light of His grace.
It is exciting, as it rightly should be, because it would have been the first time for most of us freshers. Such things always carry such anticipation, anything better than whatever began to reside within.
The MRT train was crowded, but no one should mind because at least there was a Me spot available.
I end up at yishun, and I realize I've gone the wrong way. Don't you think Sembawang and Serangoon sound similar? No? So it was just me, traveling along the whole Red Line until it was too late to turn back.
Jun Li said it was okay because God looks at the heart. It didn't feel okay, because it was just another thing that went wrong. One would ask, in times like these, how many things must go wrong before it becomes too much.
I continue the whole journey, and end up at Jurong East, which is alright because it's my childhood place. It was where I grew, housing comforts and secret shops and lovely Time Away. I tell myself that I need to cheer up, and decide to get lovely fresh waffles. Then I realize my favourite heartland bakery has been converted into a bargain store; the waffles kx and I used to relish is gone.
But never mind. There is a new stall just a few blocks down; another one of those commercial bakery molded after the commercial success that is BreadTalk. I don't complain, I have waffles after all.
The waffles are flat-tasting damp sponges. Like pandan biscuit gone soft all over. They don't taste like waffles should taste; I think I know how waffles should taste.
Is it ok to start getting angry at the world now? But not yet; people die everywhere else, from disease, hunger, grief. A few bad things happen today; it is nothing I can't take.
Right?
I go to the library, the best place to be. I hang around reading Oprah: What your hair tells about YOU. I am not impressed, because I didn't set out to be impressed, so I take the bus home.
At the bus-stop (the correct one), I wait, resigned. Halfway, the sky wept. Diagonally.
But water is good moisture, isn't it.
Isn't it.
I ask the questions because I don't know the answers.
I'm home, mum has left French beans and potato for me, even though I've eaten. I don't say a word, because it's not very nice to be mean when no one gave me cause.
So I sit here, and try at overcoming this. I sit here to recollect, and think What Went So Wrong;
I kept thinking, maybe a greater thing will happen to me.
It wasn't only tears and rain.
So I don't mind me. I don't mind today; I don't mind the overall dismay.
No, nothing has happened, but everything's done.
it was only just me, over and over again;
