along the cobbled sidewalks of life

Wednesday, January 30, 2013

a month of this new year has passed. come to think of it, it has really been fast! already I find myself 1/12 of the way through to the year, and yet it still feels like the year had just started.

the same feeling can be extended to school. already this is week 3; assignments are due pretty soon, midterms are just a blink away and lectures are going into full throttle (with regards to content). what this all means is that school is no longer in the introductory-week-1 phase and here I am still struggling to get out of it. it really feels like this semester started just a few days ago.

I guess I have to do something about that.

once again I have reached the point where my brain begins to cease normal functioning and holding cogent thoughts and writing coherently becomes a chore. the kind of chore that never gets accomplished haha (ironing the clothes anyone?) it is going to become excessively unreadable and random from this point forth. not that it hasn't been anyway.

tonight the moon looks slightly less round. looks like she has once again started her waning journey. with each passing night, she glows a little less. her shape shifts away from the perfect and beautiful round to one slightly strange. bit by bit she's chipped away by time. bit by bit she glides out of the night sky, hiding behind a curtain so thick even the clearest of night cannot reveal.

it is a little sad to see her begin this waning. the past couple of nights have been exceptionally beautiful. the full moon in all her quiet glory while the night sky, full of respect for such majesty, offers a clarity that brings out the beauty of it all. if only the night sky here would show the multitude of stars up above. but nevertheless it is still breathtaking for me.

I really have no clue what I'm writing. why this personification of the moon. why this rant about the night. it just feels right. while staying up doesn't.

starting to question again. the demons have resurfaced. getting very discouraged.
is there any point in continuing?

whimsical nonsense @ 2:21 AM

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Tuesday, January 01, 2013

so, this was meant to be a last post of 2012. it was to be one which recapped the year, littered with superficial reflections on the significant happenings. instead, my never-ceases-to-amaze ability to procrastinate combined with the immense power of the afternoon-nap-zzz-monster and here I am, typing a reflective post on the first day of this new 2013 year! since there is so much to cover, and so little brain to reflect, this post shall have to make do with more narrative, less analysis. not that it's necessarily a bad thing. the past year indeed has been one worth noting down.

may this coming year be as fulfilling as the last one had been!

as I take a cursory look back, I find twentytwelve neatly divided into three divisions. never before has there been such distinctive delineations to demarcate the different periods of the year. three hundred and sixty six days ago, I was a rather newly-minted specialist in the Singapore Armed Forces. I was in the midst of my unit induction programme, and still very much glowing with a pride that surged to its fullest on 16 december 2011. on one hand, I was readjusting to settle into a new life and routine. on the other hand, I already had one eye set on the impending end of my 24 months service. that kind of unique perspective made the following four months look very much more exciting than it otherwise would have been.

(really this should not be here but for a very poor excuse. may my future self reading this remember why this is here. and laugh at my childish ways haha)

indeed, it proved to be arguably one of the more memorable periods in those 24 months, and perhaps even beyond. even now, I can still recall those mornings of trudging to camp, all the while trying to wake both mind and body up in preparation for the morning exercise. I remember those days where my schedule read second-breakfast-nap-lunch-nap-go-home. it was really the kind of life I like haha! I'm pretty sure I'm not alone in that. yet strangely, it was mildly fulfilling. no not the eat-sleep-repeat life of a pig but that period in which such behaviour took place. I met people I was not accustomed to meeting, and had to interact with them as best as I could. I encountered doubts about self and ability, dismissed them or fought them, and somehow emerged unscathed. (those seeds of doubt retreated and found more fertile ground to be planted into further into the year. I can never get rid of these demons, that I cannot.) perhaps, one of the reasons those four months felt good was the recognition I got. it was something I wasn't accustomed to. still am not. not that I was actively chasing after such things but I suppose the place where I was just played to my strengths. the beliefs I have, the perspectives I hold, fell neatly into alignment with the culture there and I found myself comfortably assimilated and enjoying myself. the only (half) regret was that it was but for a short four months.

so, those four months ended. it marked the end of my unit life, but it also heralded the much anticipated end of full time national service! never before had one date been thought about so often within a two year period. this post isn't quite the appropriate place to launch into a reflection on my army experience, but it would feel somehow unusual to not mention anything at all. so yes, it was an incredible journey of twenty four months. it was long, and it felt even longer, but I'm glad for it and on hindsight, definitely wouldn't change a thing. I probably grew more during this period than any other in my life thus far. come 18 april 2012, that phase of my life (and the first period of 2012) came to an end, signalling the beginning of the next period.

slacking, that was the order of the day. or literally the days that follow until university/school begins again. after careful consideration, the decision was made not to work and instead just enjoy the free time that presented itself in this transition phase between national service and further education. as such, I embarked on a rather carefree and somewhat lackadaisical lifestyle. I tried to read. that didn't quite turn out as well as I had hoped, but I did finish a book which significantly changed and influenced my perspective thereafter. I need to revisit that one day. may that one day be soon! (but knowing myself, procrastination means that day will never come lol)

(AHAHAHA I got distracted by watching two taylor swift videos. gosh)

alright back to the great slacking period. just to quickly summarise what occurred. I met up with friends, painted my room, went Ipoh on a mission trip, went to China with relatives and saw my ah gong's home village, went for Arts Camp and O week. yeah that's about right. anything in between was mostly staying at home or going out. I was just trying to enjoy the time I had left before school started, as well as trying to be mentally prepared for what was to come.

however, I must admit that I wasn't quite ready. the sudden change in lifestyle caught me somewhat off guard. I experienced a culture shock of sorts. it had been ages since I had to be on top of so many things at once and I found myself struggling and floundering a little trying to be ahead of things. I did adapt somewhat after a while, and well the sem is over and I don't really want to think much about it haha! suffice to say it had been quite a blast with the education (at least I think I'm getting an education), new friends, and track. here's hoping the next semester will be as good, if not better!

the last months of army. the great slacking. school.
that just about sums up last year. the three great divisions.

it can be said that despite the divisions, I was still a constant.
it is here that I beg to differ, and instead posit that in all three, I was quite a different person.

it is a bit too much for me to think about the ways in which I was different. my ability to express myself fail me. if there was any greatest takeaway from it all though, it would be to never stop learning. that is what I kept telling myself and in retrospect, I came out for the better.

don't stop thinking. don't stop reflecting.
it can be as trivial and shallow as wishing you had said this or done that a few moments ago.
it need not be uncovering a groundbreaking truth or unearthing some new perspective with which to analyse the world.
just don't stop thinking. and learning from those thoughts.

work on the weaknesses. recognise the strengths. and know who you are.
strive to know who you have been, who you are, and who you will be. for self is ever changing and never constant.

however, there is something that remains the same. all this while, I have been looking back with a very secular view of things. in some way, that sums up the last year as well. there is this struggle between the secular/world view and the Christian view. both when I was very much lost in army and when a little less after that, this struggle always raised itself. this was especially so when I started school and became exposed to all these intellectual and academic schools of thoughts, as well as ways of thinking. it is so easy to reject Christianity, and religion as a whole, when one goes through all of that. it seems there isn't much space for religious practices in the academic world save for being the subject matter of studies.

this struggle has flowed over into this year.
well, not that I expected it not to. the boundary between 2012 and 2013 is as arbitrary as it gets. moreover such struggles do not really disappear entirely. ah well.

my brain is shutting down. I have devolved into a stream of consciousness ages ago and it does not augur well for this post. I felt like I have said most of what I wanted to about 2012. it is enough. memories will be triggered upon reading what have been mentioned here, for the keywords have been strewn all over. and for me, that is enough. keeping the memories.

it is very much premature to say it, but 2012 will definitely be a year to remember amidst the past few and future years.

whimsical nonsense @ 11:08 PM

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