CCXIII - why not now

Today, for the briefest, shining instant, I realised that I was happy.

I don't think I could capture the moment again, or the essence of that spontaneous realisation. It seems almost childish now to try to picture the moment. Like a mutt grinning to itself, you know? A little goofy, a little simple. A moment of simple joy, of heedless gaiety. Followed by catching myself, and in a glimmer it slipped away from me. I don't even know if I could fully revisit the magnitude of that moment, the significance of being aware of something almost unattainable, yet dimly, unintuitively, within reach. To be happy, it doesn't seem that hard, but it's actually almost impossible, or maybe it's the illusion that you have to kind of jedi mind trick yourself. Why aren't I happy, after all, why Shouldn't I be happy, after all, and then it's down some kind of rabbit hole. It's a jedi mind trick all right. You have to buy it to believe it. Can you convince yourself that you're happy, or is the realisation ever true? It's such a vulgarly constructed paradox. It's completely, completely Sisyphean. Joy is leaving the apex and running after the stone, even if that seems utterly pitiful. Or is that happiness? Is happiness being able to spend time the way you want to? WHY CAN'T WE? Nothing's stopping us from that, but our own minds, and this world, and other people, and Things! That's why we're never "happy". It's so lame. But you can't run from the stone of scepticism in your belly that something is going to fuck up, not today, not tomorrow, but very soon, just around the corner. Going to come up and completely rain on your parade, you know? That's probably why. The more we live, the more time weighs upon us. It's enough to send shivers down your spine. Take that, present self.

CCXII - not even then

It came to me today, I realised that there was nowhere I could hide, nowhere I could shut off some vestige of myself, to console some inconsolable sliver of my soul, to say that somewhere it could be beautiful.

In no other universe would it have worked out, and that's the truth. I can't hide from that reality any more. In no other world would I hold your hand as we listen to liszt. You will never be mine. And still I love you.

Nice try, Ian. Oh, I guess it was. In any other universe I'd still have to. It is a funny thing it being so fatalistic and all. But at least I know, and that doesn't change anything. You make me glow deep, deep inside. That's all there is to it. I don't have to believe in the universe ultimately working itself good to know that I'd have tried in every other damn universe. Oh, I really guess it was.

CCXI - ever everland

Where have I gone? I find myself circling around and back to this a little lately. Where is that almost mystical, slightly deranged, quixotic questing, the bizarre zealotry, the fanatic puristic, single minded, insatiable self delusion for believing in what must surely be, while fending off the twin wolves of futility and dreadful purposelessness, alienation, no direction home, where has all that youthful madness gone? I don't know. I've lost it. I can barely get out of the house lately. Where's the old yearning, the wistfulness, the embracing of loneliness and fierce despair? I don't know. The lunacy, the silliness, the pride in being alone, grinning at the madness, the sadness, it's all gone. It's given up the ghost. I'm so boring. If I've given up all that old stuff, then I must have decided somewhere along the way: I guess I'd rather be boring. I guess I'd rather be ... Meter Man, than Peter Pan. Meter Man and the soft boys of ever everland. None of us a shadow. I'm sorry, Wendy Darling, Peter's taken his briefcase and gone off to work. 3rd street to the right, and straight on till evening. Best shut the window on the way out. You won't recognise him at first, but a little flicker in the browns of his eyes and I think you'll know it. A dim sort of grasping, and then nothing. A Mister Man, again.

CCX - go on, brother

But come ye back when summer's in the meadow,
Or when the valley's hushed and white with snow.
And I'll be here in sunshine or in shadow,
Oh Danny boy, oh Danny boy, I love you so.

CCIX - heart strings

I once used to keep a photo of this girl I loved with me. Of course, I didn't have her permission, or ask. But I kept it because, because why, because I believed I had the right to keep it. I believed I had the right to look at it every once in a while, to give in to the longing I had to be the object of her gaze, her wonderful, enchanting grin. For her to be mine, in a quiet, solitary moment which no one could take away from me. In a way, I needed it, I needed to possess, to hold, to own, I needed that moment to be mine. Just a god damn photo, but for some reason having it was more valuable than the cost, the shame of keeping something like that, and how silly it really was. Such idleness! And yet I can still remember her face, her grin, without closing my eyes. Every bit of it. So beautiful, she! And would that it tugs no longer at my heart strings.

It's a memory that hasn't resurfaced for so long. I've forgotten it until today. Just now I found a girl's photo that reminded me of that photo, not framed the same, but it brought up the memory, the thought of it, my desire, in just the same way. Oh god, to feel love again, so much longing; I'm not sure I believed it.

I tell myself all the time, to varying degrees of ironic chastisement, that hope springs eternal in the bosom of man. It's funny, and it helps me to laugh in my solitary moments, to get over being defeated. Hope springs eternal! Oh, lord, just a chance.

CCXIII - always, baby

If I had a baby sister, I wonder what she'd be like. Well, she probably wouldn't be very tall. I'm not even taller than my dad. She probably wouldn't be much taller than my older sister, and that's not very much to beat. My mum is not very tall. I suppose she'd look a lot like my older sister, have dark hair, dark eyes, fair skin. I need to give her a name. I'm thinking Hannah is a good name, I'm thinking that would be a name I'd put on my arm, in tall, elegant, sloping script. I think Hannah might work. My dad didn't have a name for her. I don't think my mum has a name for her. I think I have a right to give my baby sister a name, if anybody should, I do. I'd like to give her something unique too, a life, a backstory, a part of being alive for twenty something years. I'm thinking I'll make her a story. I'm thinking, this is my little sister we're talking about. I have a little sister and this is she.

Hi, Hannah. I'm your bigger brother. Maybe in the past I wouldn't be a good one, seeing as how I'm hopeless as a little brother to my elder sister (should that matter?). I'm your bigger brother, and I don't care what the other story is or are, I'm actually your bigger brother, and damn if I don't intend to be the biggest meanest one there is. Fuck, man, that's all there is to it. Hi, mei. I miss you. Hannah. I think it works. You're Hannah now, OK? You get it? You're my baby sister. Wow. Hannah Ho. You live, you get it? You are my baby sister. Hannah, bub ba pup ba doo bah. I just never realised it, that's all. I am an older brother, that is me, you. We -frantic finger gestures- are.

OK, not too tall. Well, probably not. I'm guessing you're sassy. I'm guessing you're a little confused, because you're the youngest, and it took me a long, long time to figure out who I am. Maybe I'm fast forwarding a little to where you must be now, and I mean it's not like we can skip all the past, right? So you're probably a little confused, but I'm basically hoping that you're not lost to me, that between me and you we kinda got something a little figured out, the way that I guess my elder sister and I, me, kor, never really made sense of, never really got to. We lost, that I know, but I'm hoping that somehow you and I made it. I'm really hoping that's true, that that's some part of me in you that would have somehow given you the courage to be a girl, a woman. I'm guessing you're sassy, notwithstanding all that, I'm guessing with my sniping and my bullshit somehow you're a lot funnier and maybe you make me laugh. Very few girls can make kor laugh, you know that? It's true! But I'm guessing you can make me laugh that ridiculous laugh that I make when I'm alone and I'm just fucking enormously tickled. I wonder whether you have that same laugh as I do, because no one else does, that booming, ridiculous, insane laugh. I hope you do! I would be so proud of myself if that were the case.

I'm guessing you're cute as a fucking pin poking through a button on some fucking fuzzy belly of a plush unicorn. God damn it, I bet you're the cutest thing I've ever seen. You know, I've fallen in love twice in my life. Twice, two proper times. I still bet you're the cutest, though, I bet you're the cutest. Hannah, I bet you're cuter than the lot of em put together. I bet you're funny. I wouldn't bet you're smarter than me - I just don't sense it. It's not that I don't believe there isn't anyone smarter than me, it's just that I don't sense it. Of course I can fucking handle having someone smarter than me in the family, what are you, stupid? Sorry, I like saying that a lot, well, at least thinking that out loud. But if you were smarter than me, well, come on now, you know and I know that that would take a lot of smartening. Hey, I'd be your biggest fan if you were. But let's just not say you're the smartest kid in the family, OK? We'll talk it over, we'll leave that for now. I bet you're funny! I'm dying to know that you're funny, kid. I'm fucking dying to know that you're funny.

I bet you'd like Casablanca too. I bet it! Casablanca is great. I only watched it around the time that I was in NUS, you know. I wonder what you'd study. I would miss the hell out of you if you went overseas, or worse, NTU. Fucking NTU. Anyway, I bet you'd love Casablanca. It's this old timer war romance with some real fucking movie lines, man, and a real bit of music too it. You must remember this, a kiss is just a kiss, a sigh, is just a sigh ... Wow, man, I think you'd like all the old timey stuff, same as me. I wonder if you're the purest of all of us, me included. Maybe somehow with you, we'd be closer. Maybe you're the best of us, maybe you bring out the best in us more of the time than anything. I bet you don't give a damn about photos, same as me. Well, this is maybe just wishful thinking.

Hannah, where are you now? Where are you? Can you hear me? Can you feel me reaching out to you, calling you from where I am? Can you hear me being here, holding your hand? Am I, will you stay with me, please, baby sister? I'm sorry, baby, I'm sorry.

I wonder if you'll like me, Hanny, because you know, I think all the kids I know like me. I think you'll like me! But at least that's what I'm thinking. I like to give people nicknames. You can have a funny one, or a cute one, or a cool ass one. But you cannot call me strange nicknames, because it doesn't work like that. Nobody calls me strange names anyway. Wee Jin is pretty fucking strange to begin with. You can fucking call me kor, or mister bear, or something, even Hey Buddy when you're annoyed with me. I would go what and probably glare at you, even though that sounds very mean. I don't want to hear you swear but I guess someday I'll let you do it when I'm around. You probably don't like to drink, but what do I know, right? God, you'd better not get influenced by bad kids. I would kick the fuck out of some punk kid who even thinks about giving you the wrong idea. Yeah, there is no half assed brothering around here. Mm hmm. Oh, boy, that kid who you like, he'd better have something to back his shit up. I do not find him funny, nor smart, nor good enough to be cocky. This is a conversation we're going to have a lot. You won't like it, I think, I'm not your dad. But god damn it, there's going to be some standards around here. Hannah, I'm talking to you, and I'm trying to do it as if you know I'm worth listening to. We're going to have to work that out a little, I think. I don't know how patient I am, sometimes. Usually I have to realise that I need to take a couple steps back so that this weird thing called "patience" can sometimes happen. Oh, you're going to know this about me, and you're going to grudgingly like it. I am a bad, bad tempered kid, man. I ain't gonna yell at you, but if I do, God, just don't, let's just not. I am a bad tempered man, kid, I know it hurts things pretty bad, but I just have this god damn fuse that will get triggered. But all that aside, you've got to like me, that's all there is to it. You've just got to like me, Hanny penny. Wow, it'd be so surreal doing all the stuff I want to do with you. Maybe all this is going to come true.

Kor loves you, OK baby, hugs! Mama would love you so much! Goodnight, Hannah. God bless you, mei.

CCXII - narcissus

It used to be that photos of yourself which weren't too flattering were merely artefacts, merely artifacts, I can't decide which. A little vaguely embarrassing, or maybe slightly endearing given some time, a little, well, what can you do. These things happen, it's just a bad photo of you. Nobody's wonderful all the time, a disney princess in every shot. Maybe with a little less horror and a little more bemusement a small window opens onto your sense of self esteem. But OK, no need to get into neuroses. But I think these days you try to hide these things somewhere they don't see the light of day. God, a bad photo. Let's get rid of the evidence and pretend that only some distilled notions of beauty exist in these momentary frames. I find that so awful. What are you afraid of exactly? What bugs you about so called imperfection? That you don't look beautiful from any other angle and at every other time the cameras aren't turned on? That to the people sitting beside you and whatever they don't know what you look like except through the clinically desensitised square of a photograph? That through eyes you could never look through someone is judging your odd features in some totality of beauty that you could never add up to? Geez, I just find that awful. It's so sad that the concept of photography, how we think of that in the general, has come to only so much. Wondering why some people look fabulous in photographs. It's all so silly. Examine the picture in your heart first. I remember reading that somewhere, or maybe I'm paraphrasing. Real truth and beauty is far above what appears unglamorous. Light doesn't reveal what looks good, it reveals what we should have known.

"Thinking should be done before and after, not during photographing. Success depends on the extent of one's general culture. one's set of values, one's clarity of mind, one's vivacity. The thing to be feared most is the artificially contrived, the contrary to life."

"Without the participation of intuition, sensibility, and understanding, photography is nothing. All these faculties must be closely harnessed, and it is then that the capture of a rare picture becomes a real physical delight."

- Henri Cartier-Bresson