did i dream it all?

if i had known. that my memory was so fallible, that i will not be able to remember 85.37849% of the past, i would have made a more conscious effort to record down everything. i would have written down your names, taken photos of your smiles, treasured keepsakes of the past. i would have made more dilligent entries in my diaries, unlike the sporadic records that i am keeping now in this blog. flipping through my time-ancient diaries, it was filled with soppy accounts of romantic encounters. there is more to life than boys, you know, i nearly wanted to scream at the younger version of my self. i wish there were more details about the times i spent with her, friends that stood with me, the little moments that people made me laugh, or cry for that matter and the little things that mattered. now, everything is like a fresh blanket of snow in my mind, white, pure, clean ......and blank.

then again, would it matter if i remember? would it make a difference? friends that were so close are like strangers now. the hours that we have spent talking, laughing, all vague memories of the past. like the wind that blows and caress my face, a distant music in my soul. did it happen? or was it all in the mind? no photos, no videos, no physical evidence of the past. you don't even smile at me anymore. memories.

looking in the face of death

they say that when your life is hanging by a thread, that when you are on the brink of death, your life will flash before your eyes. i waited in the oppressing silence that blanketed us all, but my mind was completely blank. no visual images flitted through my brain, no past pictures spinned through my consciousness like the film reel in a movie theater. there was nothing except apprehension, and fear. cold debilitating fear.

we were seconds away from touchdown onto the airport runaway. it has been a good holiday, a little too cold perhaps, a little tiring, but a welcomed break from the hustle and bustle of the daily grind. i could see the trees and the grass on the ground, and was instinctively bracing myself for the soft jolt of the wheels hitting the tarmac. it never came. instead the airplane abruptly increased its speed again and took off into the sky once more. in that split second, i could feel cold numbing fear spreading through my body. my first instinct was to throw a protective hand over the little one that was seated next to me.

what could have gone wrong? why are we flying into the sky again instead of landing? is there something wrong with the plane? a million questions raced through my mind, all unspoken for fear of raising panic amongst my little ones. the higher the plane rose, the greater my fear became. the chances of surviving a crash to the ground is drastically diminishing by the milli-seconds, i acknowledged with a sinking heart. will this be my last thought? will i get a chance to laugh about this, to share my story? will this be the end?

i told myself not to be afraid, that i have no reason to be afraid. i have done all that i wanted to do, all that i can do. i have lived a good life. my only regret perhaps was that my children were too young and that they did not have the chance to live their life. still, we were together. the cabin was deafening with the sound of silence. not a sound in the air. everybody looked around nervously at each other, the same questions shining in their eyes. suddenly, the flight attendant announced on the p.a., 'please turn off your handphone'. i couldn't believe that i will be dying because of someone's idiocy, someone's obstinateness! without communication, we were just a hair's breadth from flight disaster. after a short while, the flight attendant announced again with an urgent tone, 'please turn off your handphone immediately!'. sigh. is it too late? will turning off the handphone stop the plane from crashing few hundred feet onto the cold hard ground below?

after what seemed like an eternity, after surrending myself to fate, the pilot finally came on the air. 'please do not be alarmed. there was traffic on the runaway just now, so we will be making a turn around and attempt to land again'. everyone was relieved. at the very least, we were not facing a malfunctioning plane. so we came very near to crashing into another plane on the runaway, still we are in once piece now, right? the worst should be behind. somehow, the error with the traffic controller did not surprise me in the least. still, i would have been grateful to be spared the terror and subjected instead to the plain old boring drill of landing safely and uneventfully on the ground, aside from the slight jolt to the fragile body. never have the jostle been welcomed with such warm relief a few minutes later, signifying that we were once again on good ol' hard ground. i was seriously contemplating whether to fall onto my knees on the hard tarmac and kissing the ground passionately. somehow i didn't think they will look favourably on my running out of the jetbridge and making a crazy dash for the strictly-authorised-personnel-only tarmac. i made do with a weak smile and a quick prayer to the powers that be.

stopping in time

for 7 days everything was a nihility. nothing existed, nothing was in its place. no sadness, no happiness, no boredom, no hastiness, no pressure, no desires. nary a thought passed through the cranial space. except cold. cutting, biting chill to the bones. cold when you sleep, cold when you wake up, cold when you go to the toilet. cold when you eat. the only time that the cold is replaced by some heat is after a good warm shower, after standing motionless whilst the hot steamy water cascade over you for what seemed like an eternity. and even then, the warmth only stays with you for 5 minutes. and then you are cold again. 6 degrees. and yet they said it would be 25. it's the same old story always. i bring the cold with me. i wonder why that is so.

we ate. we slept. we read. we poured over a japanese drama. we ate some more. and we slept some more. amidst all the new year festivities, all the people coming in and out the door with the standard greetings, hands tightly clasped together and nodding in the same automatic motion, all the laughing, talking and listening that was my chinese new year. i did so much. yet it seems like i did nothing. nothing but eat and sleep. no clock to look at, no hurried ticking of the hands to catch up with. i did nothing. and it was the only way i could unwind. it was the only way i could stop. it was the only way i could catch my breath.

when you HAVE to believe in superstition

the chinese fortune-telling almanac says that today is not a good day to do anything. which explains why i am not working today. that and the fact that i am battling an incoming flu. not that i am a firm believer of superstition, but anything that tells you that it is not a good idea to work has strong merits going for it. not something to scoff at.

it doesn't say, however, that not working is extremely tiresome. i have just discovered that i am bored witless, hence this rambling post. never realise when working has taken over my life, to the point that i do not know what to do with the free time on my hand. still, i am obstinate about not working. i've got principles, you know. i'll just continue pottering around here, filling my time with absolutely nothing. the chinese almanac says so.

what i will like to know is

weekends should be about sleeping in bed and leisurely breakfast, about slowing down and breathing in the flowers, if the smog is not rampant and the sun not scorching down, like it is now. what a damper.

when i was little, mum would start pounding on the door around 10 in the morning, telling me to get a start on my day, the sun is shining up to my bum and all the stuffs that mothers shout about to get your lazy carcass out of bed. in the blink of an eye, i'm all old and cynical now and realisation dawned that i can't sleep late. much as i want to, the alarm in my head jolts to awareness with the early morning sun. such a cruel twist of fate. want most, have not. have most, want not. perhaps it's the pre-conditions of getting old; you don't need as much sleep; regardless of how much you crave for it, apparently your body doesn't. or perhaps it's deeper into the subconscious. with each ticking of the clock, knowing that time left is limited and morbid as the thought may be, it is more effective than all the alarm clocks in the world.

i welcome the early start of a new day, if only it preludes the start of a good breakfast. last weekend we drove around the area looking, searching, hunting for a place to have a nice leisurely breakfast. we were armed, with a thick weekend edition of the newspaper, promising many hours of peaceful reading. it only served to confirm what i already know. the other vexation of growing old, besides creaking joints that wake you up when you toss and turn, is that no respectable eateries are open when your stomach announces its start of a new day. used to be all you needed was breakfast, at 12pm. now, you need nourishment, sustenance, ambience, at 7 am in the morning. but nothing is open. aside from the 24hours macdonald with its vacuum-dried scrambled egg and cold stiffling cafes, and the forever-open mamak places with their heart-clogging nasi lemak and roti canai. you can only have those so often in one week before you keel over, clutching at your chest. if you are willing to wait, willing to deny your stomach satisfaction, at the very least until 8.30am, those kopitiam chains are popping up everywhere faster than mushrooms. again, you can only go for roti bakar and omega 3 eggs so many times before your body trembles at the mere mention of the words. so, when you are almost 40, when you wake up at 7am in the morning, where do you go for a good breakfast? that's what i will like to know.