ai hen jian dan (budak)

It is a wonderful feeling to celebrate a birthday surrounded by people who mean a whole lot to me. It is a wonderful feeling to do that even if for no reason at all. Tonight, we had dinner at Spizza at Harbour Front. We laughed a lot and talked a lot (and loudly sometimes) over a whole lot of pizza. I love the loud, jangly, mixed-up sound of so many familiar voices at the table, meaning the same thing in so many different ways. I love bringing people together just to be happy. I love it that I know such good, smart, kind people and I can call them friends.

Then I arrange my arms and legs just right for sleep. Sometimes when I do that, I think there is nothing wrong in the whole world. I think it is how my dogs feel, too, when they lie down and sigh loud out their noses.
- Elizabeth Berg, True To Form

I am happy. Really.

Thank you.

Fortuitous findings.

On my way home today, I bought three roses to place at our altar at home – 2 lilac, 1 a lovely pastel that hinted of pink. I needed something to take the edge off this head-aching listlessness. The lilac roses let off a soft, comforting scent.

I put on my earphones and walked all the way home from the train station. I've been doing that a lot lately. It’s my private time, my quiet time. I love it. Sometimes, I cross the road legitimately at the traffic lights. Sometimes, when the way is clear, I trot across the middle of the road just for the childish satisfaction of getting away with it. Either way, I get to choose. When I walk home, I know exactly where I’m going and how to get there. My feet cooperate; my body is in sync with the cracks on the pavements that lead the way home. I am in complete control. And I realize that is what I feel I’m lacking in my life at the moment.

I am sick of the mess that inertia and purposelessness have been leaving lying around. So I decided to pack my room and put everything away where they belong. I lit my sandalwood candle and watched the shadows dance with a kind of wild abandonment that seemed at once like some kind of release. I wanted to dance along…

Some people believe in fate or providence or destiny or whatever it is that tells them that everything will be ok. I believe in God and His hand that guides me, shelters me and envelopes me in an indescribable love. I believe that when He leads and if I follow, that is when I will be ok.

A strange longing.

There is a strange longing that strikes me deep inside sometimes.
A longing for people – family, friends, people who could have been.
To be more than I am, more than I’m doing or what I’ve done.
To see more than I’ve seen or ever been.
To be somewhere else.
Mistakes unmade, regrets undone.
To be a brilliant or famous or rich or gorgeous.
To be anything other than who I am.
Alternative possibilities and parallel roads; heartbreaks and heartaches.
Just for a while.