Escape

One day in life you are going to realise that you can't choose with confidence what's to be done in the near future to render your life meaning. You don't even have instructions telling you what needs to be done (you could use imaginary guidance at this point but imaginary guidance is only good for reinforcing the good feeling of already having purpose and meaning, not for covering up). Or worse - you can't even do the list of stuff with clear instructions and established procedures in your pocket. At that moment, it's a matter of will power, to deceive yourself or otherwise, to have faith in the cause of your own actions, to believe that by doing so and so, you are one step closer to increasing the amount of "goodness" among mankind. If you believe, you are being strong and persevering, braving through the little bumps until the sun shines on your doorstep. If you don't believe, you call "trying and failing many times" a day, turn to get away from all these, allowing the unsuccessful to remain unsuccessful and spill over to the next day, the next next day..., leading a Fight Club type of existence.

I'm rather in the second type of mode right now. Eating an apple is my escape right now. Singing, and eventually ZK, would be later. But escapes are brief. A dinner is brief. A weekend is brief. Holidays are briefer and more undefined than ever. Such is graduate school life in my group in the University of Cloudless Glare and Artificial Greenery.

Perhaps there's faith out there without the need for willpower. Will I get there?

Sunday afternoon at Aerotek

I’m in ZK’s office, perhaps a little high on caffeine, but nonetheless also contented enough to attribute the euphoria to having done some work at last. The whole of yesterday was filled with a sense of dread that I’m sinking into the state of obsession associated with the existence of my entire being dependent on another’s mood, cruelty and mercy. Those life and times in Cornell when I had been most helpless and hopeless even though my torturer, in all practicality, were leading way more helpless and hopeless lives than I was (Si Young the depressed prince and mum the eye-crippled, foreign-land-stranded aging housewife). Every word ZK said had carried extra meaning. Every sliver of indifference was a hint of intentional cruelty; every word of kindness or praise I swallowed eagerly like how the desert elephants drank when they came upon a water hole. Perhaps I was too much in need of sleep so I lacked the usual strength to bite it back and remain unscathed (which shows I’m still defensive and reactive. I hope the reduction in quantity indicates the improvement of quality). Yes that was yesterday and today, at this moment, inhaling the familiar smell of office space, stationery and paper, carpeted floors and cushioned cubicle walls, listening to “Bedtime Beats”, I’m at peace and feeling confidence steadily seeping back. I could once again associate ZK with warmth, optimism, a shared sense of destiny and the wonderful feeling of “the kind of good that feels like fate”.