the game

The poems and movies tell you that it’ll all just click and fall into place as soon as you feel those butterflies.  Your best friend uncontrollably crying in your arms after another boy breaks her heart tells you otherwise.  It tells you that this game hurts, that there is no way to play without taking damage.  People will say and do nice things in the spur of the moment, little knowing how long it will haunt the person on the receiving end.  And yes, nice things can haunt you.  They torture you in those quiet moments before you fall asleep.  It gets worse because there are no answers to the countless questions you formulate in the darkness.  You can yearn for those moments but they are long gone. You can’t have them back. 

Don’t try to replicate them.  It won’t work.  Don’t let your imagination build new ones.  That will do nothing but lay the brick foundation of your new internal prison. 

Just get through it with the faith that the click is still to come.

cough cough cough

Gah!

I'm sick again! Curse you, weak immune system! *shakes angry fist*
Yeah, so, I've been basically bedridden for 3 days but it's all blurred together and feels like only half a day. It's very odd. I'm dizzy after standing up or walking around for short periods of time. My abdominals really hurt from coughing so much. I've had two proper meals in the last 72 hours because eating seems so repulsive right now. It's been fun.

I thought I'd quickly put something together while waiting for season 2 of Skins to download.

The ball was really fun last week! I was tipsy for most of the thing and then pretty drunk for the after party. Not my proudest night ever, but I was going to stay in the city anyway so it was very much a 'let's just go all out' mentality. I'm glad my friend and I let loose because we had a lot of fun. Maybe it's because I'm a bit older now, but I can understand why people find it so addictive to go out every weekend. I never really got my head around it when I was younger, or maybe I was just hanging out with the wrong people. If it weren't for the exhaustion the next day, I'd probably be out there more often because I really did have a fun time with the uni kids.

I never used to understand why my friend enjoyed the shallow compliments and caresses of men she had just met. I had always attributed it to her low self-esteem, which I still believe. One night we were travelling, and she suddenly turned to me and asked if we could go clubbing. I've never been a fan of it (it's really too loud, everyone is all sweaty, strangers touch me; it's just not a good environment) but I didn't want to disappoint her, so I agreed to go. She was really pleased and told me that she wanted to go out and have boys tell her that she was pretty. This was really puzzling to me, as I'd never really had such a desire. Sure, it's nice when someone tells you that you're cute or pretty, but surely she knows that these guys in clubs are only after one thing and they'll express a lot of compliments they don't mean to get it, right? I don't think getting compliments from men are that big of a deal. Because when you really think about it, what's so flattering about being told a bunch of lies? I don't understand.

However, I'm slowly coming to understand the physical side of things. Or maybe I've just been away from the game too long and couldn't remember what it felt like. If I'm honest with myself, the last guys I dated (who seem like an eternity ago anyway) were not the best choices, and my feelings for them were lukewarm at most.  But there's something almost addictive about being held in someone's arms. A feeling of calm and security. Maybe it felt that way because I was tipsy, or because I've been attracted to the involved party for a while, but there's something about it I can't explain. I'm not the type to let men touch me unless they're good friends, but I suppose my partiality for this one made him an exception. It wasn't quite the same as being hugged by a male friend. It felt different and I don't know how to put it into words. It felt safe, like if I could've melted into one with this person at that moment then I would have done so gladly. And it was a simple combination of my arms around his neck, his arms wrapped around my waist and our bodies close together, but something strangely felt right. Now I can sort of understand why my friend goes out every weekend looking for some stranger to take her home and hold her through the night. I think it's for that comfort of knowing there's this other person here with you, so closely entwined, in a moment where the world around you seems so irrelevant and obsolete.

And I'm thinking I'd prefer not to be rescued.

I feel like I owe the world an explanation.

And I'm procrastinating on doing this treatment planning case for tomorrow.

But I DO feel like I need to explain myself.


Life has its high and low points. The high times are sweet to taste and warm to touch.  They say that every moment can be enjoyed if you choose to see it that way.

But sometimes the world around you crumbles. You wake up one day and you realise that everything is in the wrong place.  The trigger is unknown, but it just hits you.

At the relatively tender age of 24, I'd like to think that I've lived through a wide spectrum of emotions.  For the most part, I stay high because life is too short to stay grounded for anything beyond a moment. But when I have my low points, they are well and truly low.  The past 10 days have been the lowest I've felt in a long time. I'll liken it to trudging through an abyss with weights strapped to your limbs.

My limbs feel borrowed. My thoughts are fuzzy. My eyelids are fighting a losing battle against gravity.  Talking feels like a cheap trick to mask how sunken I feel, so I just stop.  I can't bring myself to smile because it all feels like a lie.  Any form of escapism is a welcome relief from my own thoughts.

I don't want to talk to anyone, because I don't have the energy to put up a facade. I'm exhausted from nothing.  My chest feels like it wants to sink through the floor.  It's hard to tell whether my heart or my thoughts feel heavier.

I can't have a still moment, or else the tears overwhelm. My hands won't stop shaking.

Sleep is my only friend, because in its company everything goes dark, quiet and blank.

I wake up every day feeling disappointed that everything didn't just end.

I miss people who are gone. I miss Anh Huy. I wish I knew what you were going through. I wish you had said something. How did you bear getting me through my dark times, when you suffering through your own?  I miss you a lot. I wish you were still around.

But sometimes something small will happen. Andrew McMahon has saved me more times than I can remember. A friend that I hadn't spoken to for the longest time randomly sent me a link to Andrew's new song. I had no idea he was about to release any new work. But hearing his voice calmed my nerves.  His songs have always felt like a soothing warm embrace.  I guess I've just missed his music.  Thank you, Andy, for holding my hand through tough times since 2006.

I still don't feel okay. But I know I will at some point.  Please forgive me for pushing you and everyone else away. You didn't do anything wrong.  No one did.  


I'll come back soon, I promise.

It's just that I need to find the light in this abyss on my own.

once a writer

Hi all!

Gosh, it really has been a while since I sat down and really tried to write something down. Use of ‘tried’ simply shows that the words don’t flow as effortlessly as they used do. And this really fracking breaks my heart. But hey, maybe it’ll just come back some day? So I apologise in advance for the horrific syntax that follows…

I haven’t written or ranted in so long that I have so much I want to say! I’m kind of excited about it!

_________________________________________________

Okay. So I just wrote about a page and hated it so much that I deleted it all.

And now this sudden fear is rushing through me. Why can’t I do this anymore…? Why is it so hard?  How can something I love so much be slipping away from me?

I had a chat with my brother not too long ago about how he will soon finally step into his dream career.  He told me that since he was very young, he was always fascinated by doctors and how they could use their knowledge of medicine to help those around them.  I told him that I never felt that way about doctors or any health professional.  He has always had a natural interest in people and science that I lacked, even though I’m currently in my 6^th year of science-based university education.  So he asked me if I ever felt in awe of a profession.  I initially said no, but a few minutes later I reflected on how much I love the effect of words on paper.  That someone far, far away that I’ve never met can make me feel emotions of great depth just by stringing the right words together for me to read.  Without any sound or image but some ink on a page, it can make me feel something.  Isn’t that amazing?  I told my brother this, and he looked at me sadly, saying that my dream career would probably be as a writer.  I couldn't disagree.  If I could choose any career, I’d choose to be a writer.  There’s just something magical in the idea that maybe the words I string together can affect people out there too. 

So, it’s not like I haven’t always known this. It’s all I wanted to do during high school.  I could read and write all day and not feel tired, not even for a minute.  I remember the look of despair on my year 12 literature teacher’s face when I said I was aiming to get into a science degree.  Wide eyed with shock, she asked: ‘But why?’  I tried to casually shrug it off, said something about it leading to a more stable career, but I was crumbling inside.  Maybe I should’ve known then that it would never really feel right.

So I got into my science degree at the same university as my brothers before me.  Second year blues came right on cue.  I hated every second of every science class.  Anatomy, physiology and biochemistry.  The thought of them actually makes me feel sick inside.  In the latter half of the year, I decided to do only half a load of science as I needed to fulfill my breadth subject requirements anyway.  It was the best semester I ever had.  It wasn’t the grades that made it great (I have always been a very average student at university), but I actually enjoyed all my subjects.  I stepped away a bit from all the medicine-related science subjects and chose two that actually sounded interesting: biotechnology and pharmacology.  I surprisingly enjoyed them both, the former more so than the latter.  But what made the biggest difference were my breadth choices.  I chose ‘Media, Politics and Society’ and ‘Human Rights and Global Justice’.  I knew I wanted to explore political theory, as I had completed a political science subject during first year and really couldn’t get enough of it.  It was just a matter of which subject to choose.  MPS was really fascinating and we had a fabulous tutor who made everything even better.  Human Rights was amazing too, as I had a long standing interest in the topic from its heavy emphasis in my high school education.  Maybe it was here that I should’ve realized my long term ‘career’ goals may need some adjusting…

I trudged through undergrad (I’m sure you can scroll through my older posts about it) and now here I am.  A year and a bit short of becoming a health professional, and I am well and truly spent.  I have no motivation left.  It took me long enough, but I had an epiphany quite recently: I really don’t like what I’m doing.  There’s no interest.  I hate that I have to force myself to learn the content, and even then I’m only just passing my subjects.  I hate not doing well and not getting good results, but I just can’t bring myself to work for it.  And I can’t suddenly quit either.

I spoke to my brother about this the other day.  He just looked at me and said that he always wondered why I decided to jump into health science when it was so obviously not the right fit for me.  Why did you never say anything?

Maybe I should’ve realized when writing practice exam essays for literature for hours at a time was fun.  Or when a teacher decided last minute that I wasn’t allowed to use half the references I had prepared, but I ended up with a mark of 38/40 anyway.  Or when the grades of my arts subjects eclipsed those of my science ones, even though I hardly studied for them.  Or when I read the Dorian Grey for the first time and almost started crying on the first page because Oscar Wilde’s writing is just perfection.

Or maybe it’s when I have those days where I just miss writing so much that I wonder how I ever managed to walk away from it to begin with.

Sometimes you can't keep up the facade.
There are days when the mask shows its cracks,
And all the little things creep up to the surface.

Every dark emotion,
Every shadow,
Swallows you whole.

The despair is exhausting,
But also sickeningly soothing,
And cathartic.

You want to scream and cry and hurt,
Your muscles feel spent with grief,
And your head throbs with disappointment.

There is nothing to do but let it all out.
Let it out.
Everything.

But sometimes that's not enough.
The hurt doesn't stop.
You know you're doing it to yourself,
But it's overwhelming.

You've held it in too long,
There's too much.
The water won't stop flowing.
The blood won't stop pumping.

It's everything the world doesn't see,
Everything that is hidden behind the mask,
Hiding under the smiles and laughter.

It's every bad thought and negative moment,
It's every time you felt the grasp of failure on your neck,
Of desperation and loneliness holding you underwater.

You helplessly curl up in defeat,
Clutching at your hair and biting your lip,
Praying for release.

Are you there?

sucks when they still haunt your dreams.

so far down the track...

... yet i don't think i've moved at all.

it's hard to believe that people you haven't spoken to or seen in months can still mean this much to you. i'm not quite sure what i'm still hung up on, but for some reason i'm still there.

last time must've been bad, but this feels pretty damn horrible.

i think that, once again, i've fallen for something non-existant. they're not even real.

once again, i've foolishly fallen for a figment of my own imagination.