Monthly Archives: August 2007

Still Human

Crank it. Loud, and maybe you’ll under­stand how I feel.

I’ve been in such a slump the last week. Maybe I’m over-worked, over-tired, and over-stressed. Things haven’t been going my way.

It’s filled me with such frus­tra­tion, sad­ness, and anger.

Now I’m left to face the ugly world alone, and all I can think is to nev­er put your trust in some­one. Never be depen­dent, nev­er expect any­thing from any­one because you’ll only get hurt.

Pick your­self up, cause no one’s going to help you.

I try to ratio­nal­ize every­thing and fol­low the Tao, but I can’t. Everything is so over­whelm­ing.

As much as I’ve learned, as much wis­dom as I’ve gained, as far as I’ve come, I’m still human.

A Trip to Zone Closer to Perfection

On a whim, I went to Zone after work. I’ve been in a dec­o­rat­ing mood late­ly. I spent about an hour in there, just gath­er­ing design ideas with what they had.

Thumbnail: Potpourri plate

Thumbnail: Potpourri plate closeup

I picked up a pin­cush­ion plate and some pot­pour­ri for my cof­fee table, replac­ing the glass bowl I had before, and lined it up with the edge of the chaise lounge.

Decorating my house has always been impor­tant to me, but I’ve nev­er rushed into it. Part of the rea­son why it’s so emp­ty right now is because I want to put up my own pic­tures, and I nev­er had enough with which I was sat­is­fied to fill the walls. I don’t want pho­tos of mem­o­ries — what I have at work — I want pic­tures that set a cer­tain mood. Another thing that makes it hard is that I’ve nev­er liked non-func­tion­ing dec­o­ra­tions; can­dles you’d nev­er burn, baubles that don’t do any­thing, knick-knacks that clut­ter shelves don’t make sense to me.

Part of me wants to go out and buy every­thing at once and be set­tled, but anoth­er part of me nev­er wants to fin­ish.

Otherwise, I’d lose the thrill of the hunt, and the plea­sure of adding anoth­er thing that’s just right to the right place.

Long to Belong

Among the shots and the rounds, the friends and the fun, I found a grad­u­a­tion pho­to framed on his shelf, a can­did shot of the Class of ’05.

Every one of my “clique” was among the faces. There were oth­ers as well, peo­ple I knew from class, even though I nev­er talked to them. How dif­fer­ent they all looked — all prim and prop­er in aca­d­e­m­ic regalia — yet famil­iar.

I was the only one not in co-op, and grad­u­at­ed a year before every­one else. My con­vo­ca­tion was insignif­i­cant. I only went because my par­ents want­ed to see me make that walk that stage, a return on their invest­ment. I don’t know who the dean of my fac­ul­ty was, or who hand­ed me my diplo­ma. I was just anoth­er num­ber in a prof­i­teer­ing insti­tu­tion. It meant noth­ing.

But see­ing that pho­to struck a chord in me.

It made me real­ize how I’ve nev­er real­ly fit in. How I nev­er belonged to a group. For some rea­son, I still long for that, or, per­haps, to have had that at one point in my life. Last time it was ele­men­tary and high-school. This time it was uni­ver­si­ty. I don’t know why. I have my own group of friends now. Not a clique, because they don’t hang out with each oth­er, but a mot­ley crew I’ve built through the years.

I know it does­n’t make sense. There’s a rea­son I was nev­er tru­ly a part of any group.

The log­i­cal side of me under­stands that it isn’t sig­nif­i­cant. That it does­n’t, and should­n’t mat­ter. That noth­ing is more bor­ing and pedes­tri­an than fit­ting in.

But anoth­er part of me feels like I missed out on some­thing.

And I don’t know if I’ll ever let that go.

L'esprit de mes reve

Coming up with the right thing to say when it’s too late. The French have a term for it: l’e­spir­it de l’escalier. Staircase wit. When you’re leav­ing a par­ty, going down the stairs, per­haps play­ing over an inci­dent in your head, and you think of that per­fect riposte.

Staircase wit isn’t lim­it­ed to insults and wit­ty retorts though. It can be any moment when you can’t think of any­thing to say, only to reach an epiphany soon after.

Sometimes, when I’m feel­ing shy or anti-social or just plain flus­tered, the entire day is filled with such moments.

I always end up say­ing what I want in my dreams, but it’s nev­er as sat­is­fy­ing. This is how I know that life isn’t a dream.

Otherwise, I’d be more wit­ty.