今天，又重新领悟到“学如逆水行舟，不进则退”的含义。想当年高三的时候，知识好浅薄，对科学，对凡事都认识不多。高三，我毫无压力地阅读，增广见闻。现在我的确比以前更有智慧了，但虽然如此，感觉上我其实没变得聪明哪里去；突然也觉得自己不够聪明，根本就还是一个井底之蛙。世上好多事情，好多知识我仍没掌握到。突然觉得自己很不足，也很渺小。在哈佛大学，剑桥，牛津大学的人多的很，个个都才华横溢，聪明绝顶。和这些杰出人才相比，我根本就好普通，好平凡；我难以想象能就读其中这三所学校的那一天。那一天，我真的好渴望。但想了想，也决定提前做个‘自我安慰’-毕竟，我也不是什么特别优秀人才，IQ相信不是单位数但也不可以肯定是超级高的那种人。我深怕自己已经到了极限了，再渴望攀高也只能达到这个程度。。。那是多么可怕的念头呀。。。 

For the most part of my life at RJC, I might have been contented with finishing things up, completing work, lessons, tutorials with a gusto so I may return home. Whilst my friends had lamented the uncomfortable thought of the last term at RJC, I had never batted an eyelid. Having switched schools and classes so frequently since young, staying has never been an issue for me, for I am merely a traveler; I pack my bags and go.

Farewell assembly in RGS was but an event to me; I left dry-eyed, there was nothing upsetting about singing batch songs, and nothing very miserable when nearly the entire school moved up with you to JC. The people I would miss I had already dealt with sufficiently, biting back tears as I chatted with them for the last few times in my life. I was blessed with the opportunity to see my physics teacher at a particular event last year; so maybe that really was close to the last time we would ever meet. My physics teacher had been someone I relate my RGS life to – she was what I loved most about my RGS education, and naturally too, she meant so much to me.

Today, I had my last lesson with my general paper tutor. Quite frankly, I knew I was never her favorite student, nor her most gifted, or most memorable. How could I be- when I hardly spoke in her classes, never raising pertinent issues that enlightened or shocked? I was neither the most knowledgeable, nor the most eloquent and I was quite sure that if I disappeared it would have made little difference. I was very much a sponge I think, absorbing what was there all around and ruminating only on my own. She would have hated that if she knew, but there was little I could do to voice anything; it just wasn’t something I would do out of habit, I add weakly. She was to me, a good tutor, a responsible, principled and a compelling one. I admired her for her gusto, her feisty spirit and her sense of style, but for most part, she was just a tutor too, like many others who would have taught me things, but would be people I leave behind as I pack and go…

I would not say that her last lesson was so inspiring that she has moved up the ranks, occupying the top notch position in my heart. She is still the person she was to me, and I would not have known her a little more. I was only glad that today’s lesson was like thin varnish over the mosaic of memories she has left me, a finishing touch, the moment before the painter drops his paintbrush heaving a sigh of completeness. Today, she sang us a song.  

Perhaps it was her voice, or the words, or the way the air kept still as she sang. For whatever reason, I could only cry, liberally too, at whatever she was singing- despite having averted my gaze from the screen containing the lyrics. It was her voice perhaps, at once fragile and strong – or the odd sense of familiarity, the feeling of having reached home base, having done all things, emotional baggage dropped. It was a moment of release for me, after the short but horrid period of emotional upheavals, coupled with expectations and worries. I could only do what was embarrassing, to weep soundlessly, hoping that she wouldn’t for a moment stop the song because of what she saw.  

She never did. She persisted with singing, her voice rising when she hit the chorus. How hard I cried then. It wasn’t to do with neither the song, nor her I suspect, but a mish mash of several factors all at once, and relief too, at being able to unload for a moment, if only for a moment – and what a lightness of being!  

Nothing has since changed. I am neither her favorite, nor her mine. Yet, today is a day I will write to remember, for it is like a rare bead, teardrop shaped and turquoise – a pebble, a stone, in my garden of memories.

I should have said, at that point of time, that I could run to you knowing that everything will be alright eventually. There is no one else who will come close earthing me – with you, I am only a heap of neutral colors, warm, genial, cool and high, above all things. I never have to find this comfort somewhere else.  

;

I could be messy-haired, my head of curls bounding across my back, or heaped high above my head, or simply in loose disarray. Some days it is even unkempt, and I am unbothered and so are you. However the way I permute arrangements of my skirt, blouse, anything – I would still be me, unchanging. Playing chameleon with you has never been my best trade it seems. Anyone else, it would have worked. So thank you really, for keeping me safe and for bringing me hours of ease, relieved of expectations or pressure to impress.  

;

Thank you for being a friend, for being only occasionally on my mind, and for making the best of each time you do appear in my head. I don’t think of you often, honestly, but each time I do, I am filled with genuine gratitude and happiness that you could always be found on the map of my mind, like a lighthouse perhaps, or a petrol kiosk. I’d miss you out but my fingers could always trace the lines back to you. It feels like you’re a point of rest, a point of recollection and re-navigation. Other people only drain me eventually, but you, you could only restore me. 

;

I sometimes wonder idly, how far fate is going to take us. And then all at once, it doesn’t matter anymore how far, it only matters that I’ve met you. It doesn’t matter how long I will stay in contact with you, whether or not I remember you, or as a matter of fact, whether you think of me. You would always be someone I cherish, for always making me smile. 

I don’t want to be standing next to you every single minute of my life, nor do I want to be on your mind all the time. I don’t want you to take up permanent residence in my mind as well. I will think of other people, other things as I have done and will do. Despite all that, I love you. I treasure you – you come closer to love than anyone I am with, or am doing things with.

When I wake, my arm stretches out on the sofa and reaches for the phone. Often times there isn’t new news, and most times it’s a question about an assignment, or homework. I taste something like iron on my tongue. It must be from my lip. Somehow I don’t feel like I have rested at all, my head is slightly light but I am all awake. No time has passed, I was, and am. In this wakeful consciousness, I am nevertheless drained and dry – like I’ve been tumbling with the rest of laundry in the washing machine, round and round and round. I feel purged, rested; but that was not restful sleep. No time had passed.

I am starting to forget what I have been waiting for. Sometimes replies take so long to come; someone’s busy, someone’s sick, someone forgot the phone, I don’t know anymore. Most times, out of the need comes my ingenuity, problem solved, mystery unraveled, riddle cleared. One gantry at a time, I think I’m good at that. I could pray for this self sufficiency, it would be handy.

Please, help me, please.

The feeling of having to wait either brings about a sense of urgency and expectation or a sinking sensation. In the first, we wait anxiously for the arrival of that which we enjoy, which we wish for, which we want. It is the feeling of exhilaration and anticipation – knowing paradoxically, with certainty of the uncertainty. Such uncertainty does not scare us, for we have long predicted its occurrence – and so, it is, really, not an unexpected uncertainty at all. The latter would be something we have a particular dislike for. Like a bitter aftertaste, it lingers after its arrival and slowly saturates the entire being. I hate being disappointed, we all do. Disappointment tastes like warm tangerine peels, slightly acrid yet bland all at once. My tongue numbed, my mind reels and recoils, and I can think of possibly nothing at all.

In my two years at college, waiting has never been more real to me. I wish I were wiser then, that I realized earlier how much beauty there was in the rays of the setting sun, and how comfortable it would feel to stroll agreeably to my destination. I wish I could see that then, instead of languishing at a more remote corner of the canteen, watching it drain to emptiness, engaging in the dreary tedious process of waiting. Looking back, I cannot help but wonder what could have been – if I had been elsewhere immersed in Morrison and Boyd, would things have changed… today? Might I have reversed certain outcomes, made better decisions? Fool. We are only 18 once, 17 once – oh the things we do when we are young!

I look back now with some fondness at my younger days – was it really me then? The same person who wanted something she never thought she would get? Right now, more than a year has lapsed, and the feeling, the wish, has faded. I received something better in return, one which I might not have thought was remotely possible but is, now, eventually. I no longer do the waiting, for that at least; such that when I receive an unexpected sms, or greeting, I am unexpectedly thrilled, delighted. Once more, I could have been 17, yet that child no longer exists – she is but a shadow of myself, a layer of epidermis (I feel like a tree), a memory I keep alive.

Yet, while that episode has long been resolved, I have never properly exited the waiting game. I wait for buses, taxies, peak hour trains, classes, breaks, dinner, calls, emails, messages, signs, sounds. Who, when, what am I waiting for? Perhaps a long lost friend to force a re-entry into my life, congratulatory messages, the little things that serve no other purpose than to spruce or make my life more convoluted. I think now perhaps I simply think too much. My mental faculties are rusty – think, think! Silly child, I chide myself.

--

Today when I saw Grace she remarked, casually, that I looked shabby. As she was about to leave, I agreed, I was feeling particularly distressed, and that I was just a little short of blowing up earlier in the day. Times like these, I wonder who I am keeping up the act for, who I am pretending to be, and why. School, back in the RG days, had always been rejuvenating for me. When I woke, I only recall smiling at the prospect of another lesson with Ms Tan, an interesting discussion on virtual reality with Mr Ow, or an idle chat with Ms Kum. Those days, I have never felt more alive – precocious and blithe as I pranced down the corridors, belt swinging by the side of my pinafore. I fashioned a belt-hairband once, encircled it around my head and pretended to be king. That was, I remember, quite a treat, for only one of my pinafores had a detachable belt. Behind butcher sheets, I would secretly butcher my deskmate. The photos on facebook can only bear testament to this clandestine and non public act, which to my horror, was captured by a camera nearby. Oh, the days of frivolity and mindless endeavors.

This, to me, is school – a place where I would sow the seeds of mirth and merriment, one I would also reap the most brilliant of memories. I miss Ms Ning dearly, with whom I would chat after school near the staffroom. Then, we talked about physics, about conceptual lesson plans, her life, mine. Electricity was a breeze, we laughed, her, me. Despite a few unhappy incidents in school, RG is, was, will be one of the best experiences I have ever had. No where else could my imagination grow, no where else too I was so motivated to learn, for assuredly, there was a sense of safety, kindness, warmth.

Looking back at that, I realized how old I am right now. I haven’t particularly succeeded in keeping to the growing up track; for in more ways than one, I’ve aged so much it scares me that I was lost a particular glow I possessed in my more youthful days. Could I have been more guileless then, happier? It now saddens me how much I have changed, how much time has lapsed and how much of myself I have lost. I need to re-navigate, in this time of turbulence and emotional insurgence. It distresses me how lackluster I am in school of late, and how much I am becoming just like another other – caught in soundless despair in a cyclical race.

I refuse to have my leg mired, yet refusal is becoming more difficult nowadays as well. All around, people’s faces are blurring, becoming nondescript, revoltingly commonplace. Something in me resists, in me, a girl in purple and pink stockings asymmetrical on both legs resides. She wears a black and white striped shirt and the words “Sail away” are sewn on, in red. It’s something from Bossini, I remember now. What would she do now? What would I do?

I need you to take me away, to calm me down and tell me everything is okay. Tousle my hair, ruffle it a little, tell me how it catches the light, that it is streaked and brown and black all at once. I don’t swim, I would say, laughingly because I’ve told you this before. Then slowly, lie back on grass with me and soak in the sun. We’re atop a little hill, and there’s sun spilling all about, my skin is blue and white. Take me away please, calm my nerves, hush, hush. Kiss away my anger, a dull disappointment, bitterness. For once, perhaps, I could be everywhere and everything. I wouldn’t need to languish pitiably, nauseatingly like a worn out dress. For once perhaps, I might be more important than I ever was. You could do that, and I would be completely swept away. Then, I know it’s just the grass, soil, tree, light and you. My hand in yours, please, take me away.

I wonder curiously what being a nomad must feel like, living off the land for a bit, waiting for the season to change, and then moving on to the next patch of area. What must it feel like – to never set up a permanent residence, and to be constantly, constantly, on the move? Call a nomad a nomad the way you would a spade. Resentfully, I call him a wanderer. Wistfully, I realize I am fundamentally no different; and so I must be an itinerant, traveler, too. My younger days saw me frequently switching classes, institutions – such that the longest I had ever been in a school was four years, and even in that short span of nearly half a decade, I had been in three classes. It must mesh well with my personality, this habit of traversing into new places. My attention span hardly outlasts a child when dragged into doing repetitive, dull work. Even working on a problem with a similar twist or underlying concept doesn’t bode well for my sanity; then I am only feverishly working towards a single goal, to complete and to move on. The need for such haste, such speed is hardly astonishing. I only need to be distracted from distraction, constantly. As a result of habitual change, the very nature of perpetual movement and new developments has been the only source of comfort to me. I enjoy the idea of self very much – the notion that the individual/ self will always be present for banter, argument, conversation. I need not wait for responses, replies – and apart from the fact that I hardly get surprised by the self, I always know the answers already – each time the speed only as dependent on impulse transmission, I know that.

The idea of having a best friend is romantic, but circumstantially an uphill, nearly impossible task. I am to you, as you are to me, dispensable – we all are; and such is the failed yet most accomplished thing humans have turned out to be, sentient beings perfectly capable to engaging in intense partnerships and are, at the same instance equipped with the same dexterity when leaping from one to another. If I cannot expect myself to stay put, why should I request this of someone else? I am merely selfish, it is not as if people were lampposts, bus stops, fire hydrants, so why is it then when I re-navigate, I have an adamant streak in me that wants all other things to stay put. Ceteris paribus, all else kept constant.

(I)

Passenger seat instills such a great sense of calm and power in me I am so easily set at peace. I am violently reminded of days past – the soft patter of rain on the back of the car, where I will be – legs sixty degrees apart, my head dangling at the edge of a seat. Two lanes of lights rush by, intermittent – half a second there and half a second before I see the next. Leopard spots. I am always amused to find myself breaking out in leopard spots; on my bare arms, knobbly knees. Sometimes I flail a little, thrash just enough to make the leopard spots move decimeters on my arm but not perceptible enough for my dad who will, predictably, have his eyes glued on traffic. In my mind, the same song always plays, when it rains and when I am driven home. And I will always be the way I am, enjoying moments where the blood gushes to my head – in my little land where there are just lights, the night, and my leopard spots.

(II)

You’re like a wild guess. Violently, you will dash into sight, green light blinking, white screen flashing. While I wonder who you might be, the answer is already there in the back of mind. It’s you, isn’t it? A feeling of reassurance and comfort immediately arises, I am almost never disappointed. It could be just about anything – a sighting, observation, an unleashed frustration, a slight of gossip. Whatever it is, a smile floats to my face. You’re good at doing that.


(III)

1. Smell

Strangely I can only think of Das Parfum now, I really have to get about reading that. On other things, offhand, I vaguely recall the scent of FZ's hostel detergent/ her jacket. It is a familiar scent, I cannot pinpoint the brand but it isn't very exotic, very household, earthy, neutral. I like the smell of fruits, mintdrops... and benzaldehyde. Oh, oh, I really do like benzaldehyde - a whiff of it sends me to second heaven, it is really good; especially so when it is stored in little canisters fitted to dispenser pumps in the CI lab. How I adore benzaldehyde. Toulene is tolerable, DCM slightly piquante - it irritates quite a bit, and is very distinct. Acetone reminds me of turpentine, very clean and clinical. Among other things, there is tetrachloromethane, ethanol, cyclohexane (which doesn't remind me of much). But oh! My first true love! Benzaldehyde! And since we're on this, I remember oil of wintergreen (methyl salicylate) which really isn't that appealing. Ack, don't like it. ISOAMYL ACETATE, that's not too bad :)

2. Friendship

There is something that is scribbled in my notebook nine years old, something about how friendship is the only ship that doesn't sink. Those quotes were so fetch in the past, heh. Oh and what about BFF? I took great lengths to decipher that, it was just all too mysterious for the nine-year-old me. But that aside, I am really thankful for a select few. 'Nuff said.

3. Hair

It is generally difficult to catch me having the same hair style for 2 days in a row, or for that matter, having the same hair pattern throughout one day. The reason I don't accessorize much is, according to Brina, that my hair IS my accessory. I wear it differently, each and everytime because of who I am; I cannot tolerate nondescript manners, mediocrity, averageness. I refuse to be the Man in the Bowler Hat, it's my way of differentiation, at least; in some way, I can retain some bit of spunk.

4. Open-minded
It is merely interesting that Gabby should refer to me as open-minded when another friend of mine recently accused me of being egoistical, narcisstic and staunchly opinionated. I am amused, I am merely all of that - self centred to a reasonable extent, self absorbed and judgemental. How open-minded I am really depends; choice after all, is power.

5. Hugs

When you did, I had a feeling it was going to be the last, and it was. I don't regret having let you go. I am thankful enough, really, that you loved me once. 

I think, I would be perfectly fine at the crossroads near Hill Street. A navigational hazard, I could find my way around, crossing streets at whim, and out of certain virtuosity would dash a small street, green man blinking. The idea of self-mediated exploration is charming; then, I traverse the queerest of boutiques, shops, a moon-river pub, a funny little eatery. I like the way the glass twinkles occasionally in the sunlight, and the way things seem hazy, dream-like, inside. Purpose keeps me out of those places (I need to be somewhere else, probably) but imagination gently leads me in. Inside, I wonder how it must feel, to be enclosed in the cool conditioned air (I couldn’t resist this), sipping away at a Shirley Temple laced with lime? Blueberry pies? I would find an old chandelier of sorts hanging precariously above. I like the idea of old, antediluvian, archaic, arcane. With age, I associate a kind of richness, maturity, comfort, peace – I like those things, calm, culture. On particular days, the streets are pleasantly empty and civilization an occasional find. I don’t think about people in cars, because there are cars, but people in cars can’t quite count because they can’t really be seen.

Oh what an unaccustomed quiet! Bon vivant, c’est vrai!

For that, I am glad for other occupations such that I may avert another 3 hour activity which might just have had withered me dry, clothes and the remains of a flesh hanging limply, a tornado ravaged sight. I was jesting, merely, Dorothy in the land of munchkins. Of course I cannot possibly fathom what had been part of the discourse and so I would hesitate in making a normative judgment of possible outcomes. But I am nonetheless, awfully glad that something else had kept me hopelessly away. I recognize this as a long-ago habit, possibly forgotten for a while but resurgent now, nonetheless. At nine, a certain obsession with looking scholarly and professor-like drove me on endless afternoons to consuming digests. I engaged in voracious reading, a habit well fed by a strong mental image that necessarily fueled great satisfaction. Below, children played at the hopscotch area (could I see that from my window? Or was this a figment of my imagination?) When the bell rang, I was perceptibly thrilled, a mission accomplished. 

At eighteen, other considerations promptly eradicated the need to appear owl-eyed. Yet, the old habit resurfaces. It is the art of absconding. Nine years later, I find myself in a computer lab; and I am once more nine in a school library of mine. Some things are harder to change – standing cross-legged before a shelf, book propped in front. There is a feeling of old ecstasy – a secret hideaway? A secret garden? (I enjoyed that book thoroughly, it was so fetch)

Last night, I idly recalled a morning more than half a year ago. Morning – the shops hadn’t yet opened, and I had woken up feeling slightly groggy, yet not altogether unawake. I remember it being an uncomfortable wakefulness, as if I had slumbered with my hair tucked in moisture such that when I rose, it was slightly clingy, damp. Or perhaps not, which was which? I am getting befuddled, which happened? Was anyone locked in because the apartment gate could not open? This I remember though, keeping to the left, Watson’s on my right. I waved, and upon realizing that the greeting was un-seeable I slid soundlessly forward (the ground I recall, was very, very smooth). So what could it have been that I had seen – that which had motivated me to drift, like a waif almost, silently past? There was a protruding cube on top of which a Chinese character (?) was mounted.

Time present and time past
are both perhaps present in time future
and time future contained in time past

Which? What? I remember something strangely Victorian about the attire, white with black. There was something I couldn’t bear to interrupt, to bring to a halt, to breach and so I proceeded. So there I was, still and unmoving – petulant the way I was, rooted to my spot. And for the first time, I was a phase – transition perhaps, existing no more than a second between the previous and the next. I turn to the chocolate sprinkled bun I have and started work on it.

Coffee Bean? Starbucks? Which was which? 7.40am. Maybe.

What might have been is an abstraction
Remaining a perpetual possibility
Only in the world of speculation 

In that place, I am always searching for venues, for places, always lost, never found. Which outlet? Which corner of the tower? Where? Opposite CHIJMES – there? Where? I am mildly aggrieved when I cannot recall properly, these things are fading; they are no longer thunderous, loud, demanding. I think, this is what it must feel like to have come from the past – like quiet footsteps fading out in the hall of memory, down the passage we did not take, towards a door we haven’t opened. The rose-garden. What might have been and what has been invariably points to one end – which is always the present.

--

One day, perhaps, it is you I will find – resting on your side (I dislike lying for its double entendre), a book in hand. We’re on a jetty, a little dock. You know a little poetry, architecture, design, fashion but choose roguishly to delve in the sciences instead. You would be someone I know to be well-read, cultured, yet tenderly raw, instinctive all at the same time. I could argue with you about the weather, metrological states; not knowing why Rome couldn’t be built in a day. And then you could gently whistle, quietly chuckle – telling me about the weather, transition states, and why the Leaning Tower of Pisa leans that way. 

This I will remember:

Donning a pair of sunglasses each, Vuitton nothing less, and without a care for anything else. You candidly remark that there isn’t pressure to make a purchase since we neither have the capacity or willpower to do so. I am only amused at what we’re doing; it is exhilarating for me because it feels like play-acting, the stretching of imagination to become who we are not, even if temporarily so. I am beginning to understand the modus operandi of Rebecca Bloomwood in Confessions of a Shopaholic. Childish perhaps, but that also comes with an odd sense of power – that everything is just within reach, is up for trying.

We giggled our way out, girlishly.

Amidst Milan Kundera, Nicholas Sparks, Jhumpa Lahiri, Bronte, there was only the coolness of light chatter, nothing too overwhelming; merely, the sensation of dew on a leaf, invigorating and guileless. I’m thankful for the lack of need to summon a smile, for when it arrives, it comes. I seem to have a particular distaste for all things overly bright and gaudy (apologies to James Herriot) so I am glad, immensely so, for the way you take to earthy colors, unsophisticated but indelible nonetheless.

The excursion to ECP was expectedly exciting (hehe, alliteration’s always amusing!). It was just as well that deciding was convenient, fuss-free. The ride was…interesting I say, in the most neutral of tones. It was amusing the way you squealed, panicking at slopes and laughing with such delirium when you cruised down one. You’re so mad I hardly think you’re a year older. Crazy child, excitable thing, the clueless-about-brakes girl, my friend. The Squeezing of Brakes Tutorial part I should commence someday I prognosticate. I merely fear the safety of a harmless cat, some critter.

I don’t suppose not being able to espy the sunset leaves much to be desired. Having absolutely nothing to do at Bedok Jetty was soothing enough; only the “plop-plop” sound of waves hitting the stile as you would say, animatedly. I’m unaware of how much time must have lapsed, and how many moments were steeped in hilarity. An airplane in the sky, a speck in the sky.

The Bougainvillea Garden, Safra, long stretches of land with the accompaniment of trees, a sailing centre, resorts. Were you trying to land up in Changi as I gravely suspect you were? Such resolve! Perhaps one day we shall make it to Changi Airport, ha ha ha. Thinking back, perhaps it was just as well that we didn’t journey further than Area H wherein the tyre in my bike gave way to a puncture. Trust you to quip that perhaps, if we had gone further, the puncture might not have occurred. Such resolve!

Well I hope it wasn’t a beautiful let down for you, that we might have traveled so far only to forsake a somewhat close destination. Every single moment- wheeling the bike along, traipsing past relatively unexplored areas, watching the cars rush by, catching a glimpse of civilization in the form of flats, bougainvilleas- every single one of them, will make it all worthwhile. Strangely, then I was thinking about training with you – the entire process of us working through mechanisms, probing, discovering, learning. Every single lesson will make this all worthwhile. The future in another time, another time.

And so tonight, I only hope you will be watching out for the sun at 7.08-7.10pm. There is something mysterious and romantic about watching the sun, to me at least, that in whatever place whatever time, in our various time zones, we will be watching the same sun; in our different times surely, but the same sun nonetheless.