worn me down to my knees

i wonder if it is possible to plunge into a midlife crisis far before the midline of any life; a rift in the self due to some major anagnorisis occuring far ahead of schedule because of forcefully accelerated thought?

by choice for swifter learning and greater understanding, or increased value per unit time, essentially greater knowledge gained in one lifetime; by cost, brutally but necessarily a shorter psychological lifespan left to discover what remains.

when a catastrophic event occurs in a person's life, only one thing can push him over the cusp of sanity--his own thoughts. a sorry interpretation of the latest world from behind the eyes holds a power so fearful it mires even those among the most footed of minds. ironically a rationalisation of brain chemistry in depression owns a leash so reliable it can rescue even the most spineless of them. by fire be burned; by fire be purged.

if i figure the lesson of my disaster to be that my own mind is both my poison and my elixir then i must soon find the fulcrum in the scale of intuition and ignorance, lest i slide irreversibly in either direction--wherein both cases i suffer in the very same pit of a life crisis, dug and fired by my own spade and flame.

i listen to susan boyle's 'how great thou art' on loop at half speed for the past hour and i wonder if that road i walked away from so many years ago still lies paved. the one i have been on for the past two years is, but i no longer see what i love seeing far behind nor up ahead and it worries me deeply that this path is but an orbit of a star i could any time suspect to have been dead since the beginning. i respectfully refrain from digging further.

suppose i drop everything dear, forsake my clothing and forget my gold. suppose i get on a camel's back and try to ride through the eye of a needle... is that what i need to do in order to uncloud this aberration in my life's trajectory? or would i simply then be fulfilling your parable because i would fail miserably?

two thousand and nine, in the year of your day; one opens and one closes and i am still an unaimed turret, so in these last days i ask that you help me grind my lens back into focus, so that i may find that balance. so that i may find that fulcrum, to ground me in the one that is about to open, and from this may i also be a fulcrum to those around me for all the days in the one about to open, two thousand and ten, in the year of your day.

ps 14 jan 2010 i dropped half of everything and created a space in my heart.

cogito, ergo amo

Love Part Quatre

i tried thinking about it a month ago but could only come up with what i felt then was suffice to conclude those thoughts. either i subconsciously misled myself into a cheap and convenient ending or i simply arrived at a suspect deduction put forth with insufficient proof of depth. i am loath to admit either but i would much rather be a bad persuader than a delusional psychopath. forty five minutes on the bus and another two hours alone in my head, james-san. i think, therefore i love. let me now produce the workings of a thought...

and tell you about the hypothetical:

someone who tries to smile when they are sad and dares to frown when they are happy, looking good either way, looking good even without trying, someone who has empathy, someone who lives upon structure and sees the merit of law, someone who respects ethics and practices morality, someone who will fight tooth and nail for those values, someone who will fight tooth and nail for their friends' dignities. someone neither driven nor aimless, nor filial nor rebellious. someone who isnt lazy, someone who speaks without thinking, someone who gives but refuses to take, someone who is generous with their heart, someone who loves everyone and still has more of it to love every animal. someone who is reliable, and predictable, someone who is hot because they are warm, someone who likes being liked, someone who isnt happy until everyone else is happy, someone who is sad when everyone else is sad, someone who doesnt steal anything but the hearts of the people around them,

someone who has all that i do not have. but then you already arrived at this conclusion 10 years ago when your teacher asked you this question. what does this mean? it means you are smarter than m it means your primary school is better than my primary school...

such is not the end to this intellectual escapade; i believe there are many who can tick all the boxes, but rare is that someone who is not only everything that i am not, but also who knows that, and above that accepts me in spite of, despite of and because of knowing who i am not--therefore truly knowing who i am; therefore truly accepting who i am.

ergo the right one for me is the one for whom i am right. QED.

(bet your teacher wouldnt have said you were wrong if youd just told her that instead. or maybe she wouldve slapped you. funny either way.)

love in contradiction

Love Part Trois

We cry with them, for them, but mostly because of them
they are endearing yet they irritate our skin
such they make life difficult; they also make it worth living

we accept them wanting to change them
the ones who dumbfound us, the ones who we find dumb
those we toil much to understand, but end up taking hand-in-hand

we toil for them, we bleed for them
bloodied knuckles brush sweat off brow
the ones we fight with, and the ones we fight for
but verily i say to you: this is really, simply amor.

we let them take everything, but more for we still sacrifice
the ones who take while never saying thank you
until its too late when they see your point of view

we stick together, moreso when opinions differ
us who speak the mind, never free from verbal blunder
but us who cherish, may no word rip asunder

we like them and then we really like them
yearning that they see us, and in us what we are for
admiring them through windows, while hiding behind the door

we want to stay till kingdom come, and secretly fear the day it ends
enchanted by fires of passion in havoc but plagued by thoughts of pessimists amok
happiness and relationships also happen to the cynic; its all part of the human dynamic

we want to remember them, we try to forget them
boy or girl who couldnt stay or he or she whom we pushed away
photographs we keep to this day rekindle the pain that we want to allay
but pain is there to help us grow; how much we can handle is another point, though

we hate the hurt but we keep dishing it out
crossing the stars, or worse, worrying our mothers
so come share us our shoulders; for none tonight cries under the covers

we adore them sometimes and sometimes we hate them
those who give us happiness, those who incite our anger
this poem grows me weary, so to rhyme this ill just say salamander

we see our friends, our parents, our children, our partners
they take so much yet we have more to give
if one has trouble comprehending, then one has very much more to live
but if they who read this and aloudly say
with great conviction, the word touché
then dear readers, this moment, on the twenty-sixth of december
the message of Yesterday, you need not me, to again deliver.

on christmas drunkenness and acting cute

group convo with sis and mum:

seriously jiang zhen de.

rules

so i met my mother at the station and we walked home

"greg, i got half day tomorrow you know, so how? what should we do?"

"christmas eve not public holiday meh?"

"noooooo la! half day lah. oh ya my boss gave me some wine." i carry the paper bag. it has two bottles of red. sui.

"aiyah why never think...should go and take tomorrow off whaaaaat..."

"you think i dunno ah? i want also cannot. they already announce to the whole office 'anybody who take half day off on the eve will be deducted as one full day,' heyuh what kind of rule is dat?!"

"suay.."

"SUAY SUAY KIO AH!"

oopszxz.

the three p's of paramour

Love Part Deux

"If loving you with all my heart's a crime, then I'm guilty."

when i heard this real mushy and corny song on the radio some 6 years ago, i thought to myself: wow, this is a real mushy and corny song! but today i kind of see the lyric differently. recently i was thinking about the meaning of love, and then this song popped in out of nowhere and gave me one of those eureka moments. the concept of love and crime suddenly appeared to me like similar concepts; i started to draw parallels between them...

law enforcement often describes the three contributory factors to an alleged criminal's guilt regarding an alleged crime: means, motive and opportunity. i started on the supposition that lasting love probably has symmetrical attributes vis-a-vis actual crime. i ended up with a whole bag of surprises:

means -> passion
if the means of a violent crime refer to weaponry, then the means of a true love between persons is the fire that burns between their hearts. say it in french: PAH-SEE-onh. oooh, so atas. it must be true! at the start of any relationship, this is known as sparks or chemistry; it appears spontaneously and seemingly crackles without effort, but after young love, this fire becomes the responsibility of both partners to maintain. if it lives long enough to mature, it does so beautifully, like a smouldering coal that bears no flame but is still pretty fucking hot if you know what a barbecue is like. hmm sambal stingray o wait i digress. if the fire of passion dies out, however, they have a problem. if one party is always having to provide more fuel than his/her counterpart, they have a problem. if one party is afraid of fire, they have a problem. call 995.

motive -> purpose
im certain that personality does not play a major role in loving relationships, insofar as to the ability of incompatible personalities to break bonds and actually cause relationship failure. what is relevant instead is willingness for compromise brought on by maturity of thought, which is a feature though more available to some kinds, is not exclusive to any personality type. when two lovers know and can agree on the shape of the path of their relationship, by extension, they also know its destination. obviously the journey is for two; it bodes well that the both of them know where they are going and how they wish to get there (the best buses obstensibly being trust & compromise). i would say then that the unions of such couples indeed have acknowledgeable purpose and are bound for longevity.

opportunity -> proximity
if the opportunity for theft is simply money on a table with no prospective witnesses in the vicinity, then proximity is that magic factor that makes a relationship either real enjoyable or plain shitty and headed for the dumps. long distance relationships rarely survive--they might if the passion and purpose are concrete, but they usually crumble otherwise. it seems like petty reasoning, but this is extremely real. people break up all the time because they couldnt keep the fire alive across thousands of miles and fully-booked schedules. any relationship forged in the convenience of close proximity (school/office romance) should be built with sturdy foundations of the other two legs. if circumstances in life were to somehow change as they always do, and that third leg called proximity was yanked out from below a relationship, well then, youre screwed. c'est la vie. the sad thing is that you wouldn't even be that sad when this inevitably happens because, it doesnt feel like there's much left to be lost at that point...

means, motive, opportunity. the trifecta of crime guilt. passion, purpose, proximity. the three p's of paramour. they function like a three-legged coffee table. a good table is balanced on all three legs. i realise this can be rather cold to read and appreciate, but i am who i am; i see faults and fiery aftermath before most people can just see the hairline cracks so this is my two cents. some would say that it is quite rewarding to always have a table around; the same some who use it till it breaks and then just go and get a new one (which reminds me i need to go to ikea one of these days). and then theres some who would rather drink coffee off the floor waiting for the right one to come along and build a good lasting table with.

pretty depressing shit. let me summarise in a joke that will not make you laugh: a good coffee table is balanced on all three legs. a three-legged coffee table with one short leg is perfectly fine once you know which leg to stuff a magazine under. a two-legged coffee table stands fine, but i wouldnt put too many cups of coffee on it. a one-legged coffee table is just ridiculous while a four-legged coffee table is just you trying to be funny with me. a zero-legged coffee table is actually a disk that i am about to throw in your face!!!!!

double standards

i am walking home the other day on the usual route by the huge monsoon drain. the ground is wet from an earlier shower. from a distance i notice a crow on the railing up ahead. i remember thinking how pestilent crows are. such vermin. they are pretty noisy too.

i start to draw close upon that crow, and i can tell it knew too. i can tell with each mounting step of mine that the crow begins to think harder and harder on whether it should stay on that railing or fly away. i am getting real close by now, like, less than five metres. the crow lowers its perch, as if to say "come any closer and i will spring off at any moment." and that really intrigued me. for some reason it feels that i might not come close to it after all but instead step away, giving it space, and thus the privilege of staying its comfortable spot on the railing. however it must know that the chance of that happening is extremely low, considering humans like to walk in straight lines. crows are clever--it must have known this. this crow has the audacity to assume otherwise--that i would somehow defer to its personal space. outrageous! i am human, and i walk in straight lines. you know i am coming. you know my path will inevitably lead me to cut into your space, and yet you hope i mightn't. your defiance is respectable. but you look at me from the corner of your eye, judging me, assessing me, still trying to appraise the level of my threat to your security. compare your stature with mine; the weight of your arrogance is most impressive. but i am most unimpressed.

you are entitled to your right to life, but somehow i despise your want for the right to privacy. you are but a raven. you are harrassment, scavenger of the ground, carrier of death...; what is your justification for want of more than your survival?

then again, i am but a man. i am discrimination, destroyer of the earth, agent of murder, vessel of untruth, child of apathy, lover of gold...; what is my justification for want of more than survival?

el capitan judged the iceberg;

why didnt the chicken make it across the road?

you reach the curb and you do not cross. have you not heard of road-crossings? you never told me you had.

i apologise,

i probably just never asked. now you tell me you have crossed a road before, such as this, but just not quite? i cannot tell if you lie; you never answer directly. you fear the traffic, don't you? grow a pair, you only live once. then again, we also only die once.

i apologise twice.

hmm, but really? you died before and yet you still live. i've got you now. you have no reply have you? you have heard of road-crossings. of this one in fact, and no other chicken lived to tell the joke did it? i chuckle. you like statistics, you just hate being part of it. you like telling stories, you just hate being one of them. i get it. you tell me you aren't a chicken. so you are a peking duck? but those still get cooked just the same, they are just burnt twice as crispy. are you still sure you are a duck? oh, ducks can just fly across the road? now you have my attention.

so do it.

oh, you can't fly, can you. i chortle. you can waddle just like the rest of those peckers. stop pushing? how else can i get get you to cross? pull? how about i just hold your hand and cross with you? you don't want my help? oh, right, because you dont need it do you? i snigger. apparently there must be some otherworldly force beyond your control that stifled your relentless efforts! duck? typical chicken, morelike.

but then you nod, and point towards the other side of the road at the black-and-yellow post. it is a stoplight, and it is red. oh..it has been that way all this time i was mocking you hasn't it?

i apologise thrice.

green tea

this is how it goes: you get blocked nose, then it gets runny, and that runniness goes down your throat wiping out entire protective layers in your nasal passages, leading to inflammation and discomfort that quickly degrades into dry coughing and smelly farts. ok maybe the farts are caused by something else. so anyway, no idea why or how green tea works like an expectorant for me but that would be good right now because i neeeeed it.

9 cups already. strangely addictive stuff. super bitter; why do i like it? ill have to start adding salt soon.

more or less the same!

there are the simple observers, and there are the patrick janes and dr houses--the obsessive analysers who just find it amusing to go that extra step and tell everyone what they see behind the wall of words and quanta of quirks. and other people just cant stand it when it is explained to them what kind of person they are, based upon inspection of their words, actions and choices.

they just cant! like my friend christopher who had on more than one occasion told me to "shut the fuck up, greg!" whenever i sieved out and showed to him the viscera of his subconscious. and it always occurred to me right there then that 1) i was right, 2) he knew i was right, 3) he didnt like the truth, and 4) he didnt like that i knew it before he did. actually thinking about it now there's probably 5) he prolly just wanted me to shut the fuck up. whatever. HA.

back to the point, which was...uh. see la i forgot. somebody on msn interrupted me with a shocking yes/no question(haha you know who you are!) that imo should by no means be left unanswered (the people must be educated!), unless of course the answer is yes and for some reason one's closet is locked from the inside.

back to the point on human personality, i think all of man may be filtered down four channels. and i know it's not exactly in line with my view on mentalities as written in the glass, but i am a man of contradiction, so sue me. wait dont im not. oh what i did it again, fuck me! whatever la huh, sometimes its just out of sport that people like to classify things to make stuff neater. and it feels good to do it--just dont get out of hand and let these personal constructs become anything more than a source of amusement. so without further ado, ladies and gentlemen, yours truly breaks down mankind into four quarters:

1. "less is more."  » minimalism.
2. "this is just right for me." » boring.
3. "more is more." » interesting.
4. "more is still not enough." » very interesting.

if you were smart, you wouldnt have allowed yourself to be classified in such a demeaning way (see, i didnt contradict myself after all). but then again, if you were smart you would be out there making millions instead of slacking around the computer. speaking of millions: now since we live in a world of the post-industrial age, the undeniable presence of capitalism, globalisation, industrialism and other fantastic words like that requires that i tell you now: whatever group you placed yourself in, you are actually in the group below it. im sorry if you are disappointed. dont be sad, your mother still loves you. if you however, originally placed yourself in '4' then you are either extremely honest or extremely special.

oops there i go again analysing people. sorry!

aphasia

needle, i light this table. it i mucho mucho hey. i red the arrow they lips. they lips. lo i brain i strength wasp hotel rainbows like-twins they. plus i tin singular benedictum they pinks me aboutness. gluteus dense below innermost i makeshift cogito id is blind hope.

i hold shake mucho scarlet rightrightright to bleed.

gluteus i pink they mucho. id est torture--they notemént this shake.

torture. i know it well.

ps 14 feb 2010
h v d g

ps  17 aug 2010
STOP TRYING TO DECIPHER IT

ps 14 feb 2011
happy valentine's day g!!