Strung together like amateur poetry

Was searching through old emails looking for a particular invoice. Instead, I found an old thread, conversations made up of short clipped sentences strung together into paragraphs, like amateur poetry. Back and forth, teetering on the edge of confessions of heartache and reeking of heartbreak.

We were young. We didn't know what we were doing. What we should do, what to do. Don't want to hurt each other while trying not to get hurt.

She saw through my armor and I called her out on her baggage.

Truth in words and truth can be cruel when you assume the worst in the intention. I didn't understand. Couldn't have understood.

Maybe I could have helped her if I had treated her as a friend instead of someone who had the power to break my heart.

Maybe then she could have found something she needed to live on for.

Maybe.

But now all that lives on are just her words, strung together like amateur poetry.

Night Sky

When I was younger and whenever things got bad, I used to sit by a particular window at the house to look up at the night sky because it was the only place in the house that had the clearest view. Well, not exactly, because there were window grills but it was the only place where I could at least see quite a bit out into the distance because it wasn't blocked by buildings or trees. But still it comforted me a little because as I looked up into the gray night sky, the bars in the way of my view were just a symbolic barrier that has to be there for me to overcome to be worthy of the rewards of being free and amongst infinite possibilities.

So I worked hard. And I was free. I moved out and lived in places where the sun shone brighter albeit hasher but the winds were kinder and the nights were like refreshing chill glasses of moscato after a beautiful day. Because of the distance away from the city, the night sky was brilliant and more beautiful than I ever saw in that house. The view was panoramically astonishing, stars danced brighter and the darkness promised a mystery of endless wonder. I looked up each night, as light from dead astronomical bodies travelled down millions of years after their death to this space and time where I just happen to peer up, looking for hope, meaning and peace.

But one day, I lost my mind and pretty much everything else that meant anything of value to me. Except my family. And their house. Now when I see the same window again, all I see are just bars.

Like clockwork

It wasn't all totally nonsense though. I could still recognize fear and puzzlement, especially in the faces of the strangers that came to see me everyday in the morning after breakfast, like clockwork. They came in their lab coats and their clipboards full of notes, scribbling while observing me as surely as how one observes a monkey in a cage. Some had kind looks, some blank and some with eyes darting, unsure as to how to maintain eye contact while I peered into the depths of their souls. It was just as much of a two way street as any other regular interactions in the Outside world. Just that in this scenario neither one of us knew how to pretend to be.

The Attending had hid his ID badge behind his tie and I decided that I shan't bring that up with him for by him doing that I knew that he already knew ID badges was my crux issue. It seemed to me that we were going to play a game of chicken about my unrelenting paranoia of badge-wearing hospital employees not being who they were. But as the questions unfolded, my smugness slowly dissipated as I struggled to answer what I think they wanted me to answer, just as I have always did even on the Outside. I was getting all the answers incorrect and I see them, one by one, shaking their heads and pens writhing furiously. This must be how drowning feels like for it was all going wrong, as how everything had before that had me landing in this strange and unsettling place. It was my turn to dart my eyes around desperately, hoping for some clue in the expressions of my captor's lab-coat-entourage. I slowly realized this was another failed day because my chest tightened with a familiar hurt as my breath stuck itself in my throat, festering into a lump bigger and bigger, surely enough to suffocate me. It was pointless. My persona cracked and split even further, like a line running down a wall of old paint that was ready to flake off into dust any second.

The Attending shook his head with finality and like a virus it spread to the others in the group. Pity filled the faces of each person I looked upon, all impervious to my imploring desperation. Judgement never felt as stinging as it did on the Outside as I pleaded fruitlessly while they left, one by one out of my door.

It happened that night

It was another night shift and I was driving to work. After I got off the freeway I was to merge onto the main road and from a distance I saw a stationary car in the middle, blocking traffic. Hm. Something must have had happened. Yet there were no emergency vehicles around and no flashing police lights. Traffic was moving relatively smoothly and it was just a singular car. However, as I got closer, I started to notice other things. There was a man, a regular joe, directing traffic. Firm and calm, he was doing a pretty good job. About three other people were around the vehicle and I started to wonder why/what it was doing there and not at the side of the road. Then I noticed a shiny object, a bicycle wheel, crushed under the tire. My eyes automatically tried to seek out the rest of the bicycle and as I was doing so I saw one of the people around the vehicle, a lady, bend down and looked under the car. So I tried to see what she was looking at. That's when I saw a hand right under the middle of the car. The hand was attached to a blue-sleeved arm and that's all I could see. Suddenly I realized that the pool of reflective liquid around the limb was blood.

There was no movement. And in my heart there was no hope.

So please, if You see it fit, grant a little mercy and grace for the poor soul.

Psych Ward 101

I don't really remember much actually. All I do retain are bits and pieces of what happened the way I perceived it while it happened. So basically things were just outright confusing and scary from the get go.

I woke up in a unfamiliar room, with no clue how I got there, feeling all drugged up and paranoid. Where the fuck was I? How did I get here? Where is here? What's going on? Plus all the other residue paranoid thoughts that I already had running in the background of my mind before the hospitalization, I was a total train wreak that was all but just one station away from screaming bloody murder.

There's a door. I got up. Opened it, stuck my head out and took a peek. There's a hallway. I gingerly stepped out, taking in my environment. There's a paper pasted on the door directly in front of my room. It has "AWOL risk" on it. I turned left and walked down the hallway. There's a payphone on my right. Then comes a room with people and tables and chairs in it. I stand at the doorway, unsure what to do. This is where I stop remembering things in linear fashion. I remember being very frighten and moments from freaking out but willing myself to keep calm. Someone asked if I was "my name" and I nodded. Food appeared. I asked for a pencil. The nurses were old and wrinkled and kinda mean. They upset me. I took the food back to the room. There were other doors similar to mine which means there were other rooms. And from what I now can see from my admission documents, I then got myself busy scribbling all sorts of names, words, things down on those papers. A nurse came into the room, scolded me for bringing food in and took it away. I didn't touch it yet and I was hungry. I remembered her for that.

Time passed. Bits and pieces again. The room had a funeral feel to it. The bed was not a fancy hospital bed. It sinks when you lie on it and under the sheets the actual mattress was rubbery and felt melty. Above the bed was a big white box. (which was just a light box) Somehow my brain then decided that I was sent here to die. The white box melts whoever lies on the bed into the coffin-like solid but with drawers wooden frame. I had to sleep (sedatives). But I had to stay awake because I didn't want to die. Then I couldn't take it and slept on the desk. Mind you, I just had a lumbar puncture which means someone stuck a HUGE needle into my spine to collect liquid so my back was beyond sore. That means sleeping on a desk half my length was not going to be comfortable, I would be in more pain, more sleep deprived and remain just as paranoid.

They moved me out of the substance abuse unit to the ICU after just a few days probably after all my tests came back normal but I didn't really come out of the psychosis till like three quarters of my stay. Probably because I spent the early parts of it not understanding what was really going on and secretly thinking I can outsmart outplay outlast my captors by pretending to be getting better.

Time passed. Bits and pieces. Friends came and went, fellow crazy people made me even more confused or added on to my delusions, family flew into town, some staff made things worse, some staff made things clearer and I had another psychotic breakdown and two intramuscular injections of anti-psychotics. When you have to be dragged to seclusion, held down and injected, it's not a good thing but at least now I have a name to it.

Psych Ward 101, thy name is Bipolar I most recent episode manic with psychotic features.

Ludicrous

Do you know how apathetic or insensitive alot of people in Asia are to "accidental deaths"?

I was 16. Out of a homeroom of 40 students, there were only 9 girls. Naturally, we girls formed quite a bond and got very protective of each other although we may not know one as well as the other. The school had around 10 or so homerooms per grade. There were only 5 grades. Basically, it's a damn small school.

One day there was news spreading around that a girl from one of the lower grade passed away. Accidentally fell off her high rise apartment building. But not from her home apartment, rather, just outside her unit somewhere along the open-air corridor. For that to happen, she had to on-purposely climb over the solid smooth concrete safety barrier which was to the height of my neck and had no stepping-stone design whatsoever as my eyes had observed. That's one hell of a determined climb, if not probably made easier by a conscious act of physically moving something there to prop oneself up and over the barrier. And the barrier was not designed to be sat on while enjoying the glorious horizon - unless you have a death wish. It had a long horizontal metal rod on it which would make it very uncomfortable and more importantly, unstable, to sit on.

She was the younger sister of one of us 9 girls. My classmate's childhood friend was a close guy friend of mine. In fact, both girls were his childhood friends. He was there with the family all throughout the crisis and the media circus that followed after. The whole damn world including him claimed it was accidental, ludicrously trying to explain the mechanics of how it happened. Obviously I wasn't there, it wasn't decent to challenge grief stricken people and the family did not need to deal with the added burden/stigma especially since it would be blown up as the media was involved. So I respected what I was told/heard and told my inner Sherlock Holmes to let it go.

Few days later we had a physics class and the teacher was ill so we had the Substitute. She was a middle-aged lady who I can tell have no malice in her heart whatsoever. Eager to be liked and is the definition of "not jaded at all". Half way through teaching about mass, acceleration and force, we took a break and she decided it was a good time to ask the class if we knew about "the girl in the news".

Silence. You could hear the eyeballs looking at each other and then at this female classmate.

No one said a word. Lady then wondered out aloud if we knew which homeroom the girl was in or what her name was or if we knew anyone who knew the girl. Erm. Wow. The lady, ever so clueless, thought that we as kids probably were not as informed because we ain't the news watching kind of demographic so she decided to dish out the 'details' of this case to us and comment on the matter with her media molded opinion. In her defense, the media had never mentioned that 'the girl' had a sister in the same damn school. Her ramblings started to become a little judgmental and presumptuous and a mutual friend (we're still friends for a reason and you know who you are) decided it's enough by requesting to return to the physics. Lady was so perplexed by our unwillingness to listen to this juicy gossip and unexpected desire for physics. She started a few attempts for our interest and maybe engagement in the topic but my friend would just simply reply on behalf of the class, "Yeah, ok, you're right. Interesting. Now let's go back to the work" every single time.

Lady finally realized that something is up and is about to get back into the physics...or so we thought. She looked at the the drawing she drew on the board to illustrate how mass, acceleration and force worked and decided that using 'the girl from the news' would make understanding the concept easier. I kid you not - she literally joked about how if the girl was XX mass and gravity/acceleration/whathefuckever was XX, we could calculate the force.

Now, is this just being apathetic or insensitive? Does it mean that if we did not know the person, or people related to the person, it makes it ok to for us to belittle what happened? So what if we didn't know the person or didn't really know if it was an accidental death? What happened to common human decency, empathy and basic respect for the dead? How did we as a people, as a society become like...this? And don't you dare brush her off as an anomaly. Because convincing yourself that there isn't a problem isn't going to make the problem go away. It would just make it as ludicrous as failing to recognize the epidemic that is happening to our society/people by calling it/them "accidental deaths".

It ain't a small world after all

When people say "I'm going to go find myself" they usually don't take a year off to do that. But that's what I did. And yes, this year of Sabbatical technically wasn't supposed to be but it just...became.

I've tried so many different hats, worn different identities. I guess the dress always looks different in your mind than when you are actually in it. Haven't found the perfect fit yet but at least now I have some ideas. Some things can be improved on and some things need to go. The practical part of me is pissed that I spent so much time with nothing to show for but the spiritual side begs, no, politely demands to differ.

Not really sure who I am...but sure as hell know who I'm not. It's not much but I think it might just be enough, for now.

If it's time for me to move on and try this new version of the dress somewhere else, so be it. It ain't a small world after all.

Hospital adventures of the treasured kind

Being hospitalized is like having a slumber party with strangers. Exciting like a slumber party because you get to spend the night at a place that's not familiar with parental units lurking nearby. Yet terrifying because it's a room full of strangers with pained looks on their faces even when asleep with tubes sticking out of them and fierce middle aged mother-like nurses keeping an eye on you like a disapproving hawk while you watch television till late into the night because you're supposed to be resting/sleeping.

It sucks being sick. It sucks even more when it's happening during the 2003 SARS outbreak and the whole continent is paranoid resulting in enforcing strict hospital visiting policies. Not to mention hospitals are already THE number one place to avoid. With friends not encouraged to visit and parents having to work, I was bummed and bored. So I spent my time being a translator for two lovely ladies who had been bed mates for quite a while but as one could only speak English and the other only Mandarin, their daily interactions consisted only of gestures, eye contact and an abundance of smiles. I must say, for 2 people who have never exchanged a single verbal word with each other, they somehow managed to form a strong friendship with an easy understanding. Me being bilingual and translating was just a small bonus for them and not surprisingly, their conversations reflected the bond they have formed. Family, husbands and current events were just the few topics they touched on amongst many conversations. When our fellow room bed mate started going dangerously crazy and had to be physically restrained to be transferred to Psych, the incident naturally became the focus of one of the most animated conversation for them and leaving me finding the whole predicament I was in very amusing.

Despite the strict hospital visiting policies, V surprised me by showing up. We were hanging out in the common room when my parents surprised us by showing up. She left and after much allaying of my parents worries, they left. I went to take a long ass shower as I had 2 huge ass IV line thing stuck in both hands. It was a painful operation that left me quite annoyed. When I came out of the bathroom the nurses chided me for being such a disappearing act patient. Not really their fault, I snuck out to 7-11 with V earlier (hospital food = yuck) and we gave them quite the nuclear panic attack. Oops. I got escorted to my bed by a nurse determined to make me feel guilty and I noticed that there was a note on my food table.

"Sleep well huh - V"

Being sick ultimately didn't suck that badly afterall.

That Day

The sound of pain echoed in his mind. It was a small car and the radio was on but over the forgettable pop music of 2005 was the unmistakable stifled quiet sobbing. "So this is how sorrow sounds like." The lights turned red in the distance just before the entrance of the freeway. He rolled the car to a stop, tormented over if he should turn to look at his daughter. There was so much he wanted to do but he couldn't. He knew why she would react like this and the difference between knowing and seeing was exactly how he expected - gut wrenching and visceral. He wanted to tell her that everything would be okay, that this maybe shouldn't hurt as bad as it should but he also knew that those two choices would be thrown right back at his face. He just didn't know what to say to ease her pain. As a young man he knew this day would one day come, where something would happen which would totally destroy his little girl and there's nothing he can do but watch as she struggles not to completely fall apart.

A sigh. The lights are going to change soon. He would have to drive on the freeway, eyes straight ahead and mind occupied. With that, a father's instinct overwhelmed and he turned.

Her headphones was on and she was looking far into the distance, away from him. There was nothing he can say that she could listen. A brief false relief. Suddenly her body twitched. And then again. And once more.

Her heartache became his heartbreak.

If he gets rejected, so be it. He reached out and tenderly placed his hand on her shoulder. She stiffen. A squeeze. She didn't push him away but she also didn't react in any other way.

The lights turned green and a father and daughter went on with their day.

Anger will drive you...mad

I had the slimiest encounter with Evil Corporate America yesterday. They love to lure you in with professions of serving you with the utmost respect but the system is designed in a way to screw with both the customer and the employees. Pissed off at the company and so tempted to yell bad bad names at their people but its employees are just foot soldiers trying to stay alive on the blood soaked battlefield. Long story short, I left the horrendously sickening Victoria Secret store on 3rd street Santa Monica Promenade in a quiet boiling rage. Tourists around me were smiling, laughing and shopping - happily sharpening the teeth of 'nice harmless grandma' who is actually the big bad wolf as he gleefully prepare to snarl "All the better to eat you with" when the time is ripe.

I got into my car and like a typical Los Angeleno, raged with the machine and its sound system.

Now if you have driven around Santa Monica before, you know that they have random pedestrian crossings along their major roads. (btw, whoever planned it that way needs his/her road planning license revoked. It's LA. Cars trumps people and so with such a predisposition, sometimes cars TRAMPLE over people)

I scowled at every red light and abused the gas pedal every chance i got. My head throbbed and my hands gripped into the rubbery portions of the steering wheel. I stared straight ahead, staring at only the car in front of me and nothing else. Didn't even know what street I was on, I just knew I was heading east. I was majorly triggered and seething...mad. In the mist of the haziness, the winged one with the ridiculous halo struggled to get my attention as it forced my lungs to take slow deep breaths and attempted to transfer the anger-induced-strength from my right leg to my jaw as I bit down on my left fist, hard. All my focus was on the car in front of me but as some of the haze dissipated, my eyes relaxed and noticed that the cars on the other lanes had started braking. Suddenly I felt like I going too fast. Something was not right. Instinctively my eyes swept all over as I slowed down. A yellow pedestrian sign was up and not too far ahead were white strips on the road. A lady and two little girls were teetering at the side of the road, trying to get to the other side with their lives and limbs intact. I rolled to a stop while taking another deep breath and trying to keep the one with the pitch fork from constructing a frustrated sneer on my face as I nodded to the lady to let her know they're safe to pass.

She lifted her hand in acknowledgment, nodded and...smiled. As the Mary Poppins-esque lady walked forward, her girls -blissfully unaware of the veins that moments ago were popping out of my neck - looked at me, smiled and started skipping alongside their guardian.

The winged one with the ridiculous halo gave me a pointed look while the one with the pitch fork suddenly went missing.

"Ahh what the hell," I thought to myself, "I'm going to get some Jamba Juice."

The Killing M.O

When I was under 6 (cant remember the exact age) I was watching a Batman cartoon. It was the first time they introduced The Joker and this Joker ain't wacky Jack Nicholson or even murderous Heath Ledger. He was worse. He was evilly scary, his manic laughter along with that psychotic smile scarred the living shit out of my child's mind. I was terrified for days, haunted in fact. I couldn't go to my parents because I knew that my parents would not be able to allay my fears as they would be more concerned about preventing me from watching 'scary stuff on tv again' aka 'no more watching tv.' I guess it's easier to not expose a child to the 'evils of the world' rather than educating and reassuring a child that scary things that go bump in the night are not necessarily to be feared.

How did I cope? When they say that the mind is capable of powerful things, they are not kidding.

When an unwanted memory or an unpleasant thought springs up in my mind, I've trained my mind so well that I am actually able to force it out or just bury it quick before it can linger. No thinking, no hurting's the Modus Operandi. It wasn't easy at first, The Joker stayed in there for quite a while. But as the years passed and more things happened, I got better with time and practice.

Yet somewhere deep down in my gut something tells me that it's mentally unhealthy.

Oh dear.

A Dog called Mr B

When I was growing up, I've never had a cat or a dog because my father did not want them in the house. So pets I had were fishes and tortoises. The fishes always die quick and mysteriously, I've had so many I've lost count. Yet I always remember the ones that lasted. How, you ask? Well, see, when the fishes died I would flush them down the toilet, quick and easy, it was just like they were never there. Out of all the fishes that died, only two I buried with handmade cardboard headstones and one of them lasted long enough for me to have named.

Can you imagine being a child and having a pet, something you care enough to feed everyday and change its water every so often but not allowing yourself to get too attached to it by naming it lest it died on you, again? What do you think a child learns from such experiences?

That fish was the only pet I've ever named. After that, I had a tortoise. I had it for a long while. But one day it had to go as it got too big. My dad drove me and my sister to the pond. As I took that tortoise out and placed it on the grass next to the pond, a sudden unfamiliar emotion took over me. I did not recognize or understand this emotion but it was strong, too strong. It took all of my being to 'be normal' and it took my father a while to realize that I was not ok.

Throughout this time, I had violin lessons every Sunday at my teacher's place and one day his family rescued a kitten. It was black and white, furry little thing was the size of my palm. I started going to lessons early just to play with it. Violin lessons became less dreary. But one day it disappeared, without a reason. My new found yearnings for Sundays disappeared as well.

I didnt have a pet ever since. Whenever people starts aww-ing at animals I stand apart, as emotionally dead as a doornail. After a while I realized that I couldn't do that, lest someone decides to ask me why I'm as such so I got pretty good at faking "Oh so cuteeeee!!!" I even mastered the eyebrows and hand to the heart action.

Now, a friend of mine has a bulldog (let's call him 'Mr B') and when my friend had to go out of town he would need someone to take care of Mr B. Simple stuff - change his pee pad, fill up his water and food bowl and take him out for walks. Mr B is usually taken care of by my other friends but once in a while I got asked when everyone else was unavailable. My early encounters with Mr B were few and far in between and they were strictly business - I'm doing a favor for a friend, that was it. No talking, no petting and no playing. However, recently my exposure to Mr B increased. Our relationship... grew. In the beginning I would just stare at him without saying a word for a long time. He would sit and fidget, panting/breathing/slobbering like how bulldogs do but once in a while he would just stop and look back at me. Our eyes would lock, almost like we were playing a game of who would look away first. Soon, I started calling his name more often which led to me starting to talk to him. "Let's go for a walk now, Mr B." or "Are you thirsty? Ok, fine I'll fill your water bowl up." or "Mr B, do you know you shit alot?"

One thing led to another and soon whenever I go over to my friend's place to take care of Mr B I started to stay there longer. I would play with him and spend significant time doing nothing else but rubbing his head and neck. When I'm sitting at the edge of the bed with my Mac he would come by and rest his head by my feet. Sometimes I would absent minded-ly just rub/pet his head without even looking over. I don't know if he likes what I'm doing but he didn't bite me so I guess it's alright with him.

Last night it was dinner at my friend's place. A bunch of us went over and some were helping out in the kitchen. I asked to use the computer by the table in the living room to check out the recipe of the dessert my friend was making. His boyfriend (let's call him S) was on the couch typing away at his computer. S spends the weekends there so he has alot more exposure to Mr B than I do. Mr B wandered about, tottering in and out of the kitchen and living room, probably perplexed and excited at this sudden influx of people. As I started reading the recipe, Mr B came by sniffling at me. I looked down and a small smile grew. He sniffled some more, circled by me a few times and suddenly, he laid down next to my feet resting his head on the floor. It didn't occur to me what this meant until S stopped typing and looked up at us across the room.

"Hey, he loves you!"

I froze. "What?" I looked over to S across a spacious and empty living room and then down at Mr B. Mr B just blinked. I paused for a long while, without a reply. I think my silence puzzled S. He didn't know that it took ME a while to realize what I felt.

It took me a while to realize that I felt my heart...swell.

Queerly beloved

A friend of mine is getting married and yesterday at a nice chillout place where we all like to hang out was the impromptu wedding planning. When you have a table full of straight girls with token queers and straight boys, expect to have loud squealing while the tokens' bemused faces look around the not-so-chill-after-all-place apologetically.

First there was the shopping list, then there was the invitation list which led to the job/duties list. It tickles me that I'm in charge of the bachelor party while my gay guy friend (let's call him HBC) is in charge of the bachelorette's. The conversation then took a turn to who is going to walk my friend down the aisle as this would be a small friends-only ceremony as her family is in Hawaii and her BF's family is in Japan.

HBC and I looked at each other. And we realized, what about US? The gay ones, the ones that deify wedding conventions? Who's going to be the one getting walked down the aisle? We already would have to bear with the constant jokes of who's the MAN or WOMAN in the relationship when it's done with. So how do we decide? Do we flip a coin? While HBC and I are hypothetically speaking, I wondered out loud if it would even happen at all - should my Dad survive his disappointment-triggered-heart-attack. For a moment we were silent because HBC echoed my sentiments regarding his family.

We don't know how it works for us, the queer ones. I never thought I'll even get married, ever, because it just wasn't in the cards for me, socially. I'll probably never get to introduce THE GIRL to my grandmother and watch her smile with pride like how she did when my younger sister brought her BF to Sunday brunch. I'll probably never be able to have my parents recognize/acknowledge their GRANDCHILD because I don't think I'll be a birth mother. I'll probably never have my dad 'give me away' even if I win the hypothetical coin flip. So I probably shouldn't try getting married which meant I should never let myself fall in love because it just wasn't in the cards and it hurts too much to not be able to REALLY marry someone you love.

But it took the impending straight wedding of one of my closest friends for us, me at least, to figure some of it out. It wasn't in the cards, however, there's also no fate but what we make for ourselves. (Yes, he's now the Governor of my current home, California. PS: If you are not a fan of TERMINATOR, ignore everything in these parentheses.) For that moment we were silent because HBC echoed my sentiments regarding his family but then he smiled and said " It's ok, I'll walk YOU down the aisle." And suddenly my heart swelled and everything felt right as I replied "And I'll walk YOU down your aisle." We high fived. It's the queer version of handshaking a sealed deal, fyi.

I don't know how it works but I'll figure it out as I go. The one advantage? I get to do things my way.