Keepin' On
Despite having been MIA for a little while, the earth still turns… Dubya may return to Singapore, the Pussycat Dolls found their new doll and one of my best friends in the whole world is getting married tomorrow! I can’t believe that Ying Yi and Daniel are actually getting married because I still remember the time he got into contact with her, the time when they first met and the time she realised that he was the one for her. Dinner with them tonight was loads of fun, we went to a Chinese restaurant and ate good Chinese food, the highlight of the evening being dessert.
Daniel ordered a “snow frog” for me, which I pictured as looking something like a little green toad all encrusted in shaved ice, sitting on a herbal jelly lilly pad (appetising, much). It really turned out to be little frog lungs in a cold, sweet soup which honestly, tastes a lot better than it sounds. The frog lungs looked and felt a lot like little white puffy pieces of jelly and with the syrup, it was really like eating a normal, sweet Chinese dessert. I cannot wait for tomorrow because I just love weddings and Ying Yi looks happier than I’ve ever seen her.
The last few nights were spent curled up with M in a week of pure bliss, driving around drinking beer and playing Placebo too loudly, sitting on the sticky green couches in her lobby and watching TV. These last days of moving out of school and coming back home are slowly starting to sink in, the reality being that I have finished four years of school and now that I try to look back on them, everything is a blur of late night walks around campus and bleary-eyed classes, early morning Macdonald’s breakfasts and moving back and forth between hostel rooms. For some reason, it feels like I should have paid better attention, really treasured these days of freedom and new experience. Standing quietly in my hostel room on the night before my last exam, I felt a cold wind laced with rain buffeting through my open window and a thought suddenly came to mind: It feels so good to be young and alive.
Teetering on the brink between sheltered freedom and having to go out and make a living for myself, I suddenly see that the days are passing too fast. People are growing up and moving on. People are getting married. And before it’s too late I should stand still and hold time fast in my fist so that I’ll never grow old believing, as my parents do, that youth is wasted on the young. I want to be aware that I’m young now, not look back and start in surprise because I used to be. This sounds rather a melodramatic thought at 22. But I thought the same at 17 and I still look back on my college days and wonder why I didn’t throw a little bit more of myself into it. 22 is 25 before you know it, and then 30. Whole decades pass and life gets in the way. Things ebb and flow and work and family intervene and you don’t make time to do the little things you always wanted to do and then suddenly, you forget you ever wanted to do them.
And at some point, I suppose we all stop thinking, “Wow, there’s still a lot of life left,” and start wondering, “Where did I just let all that time go?” Dr. Matthews told us in our last lecture with him that he realised that had happened to him when he found himself working on the first Christmas after he got married. “Do the things you want to before it’s too late guys. Take some time now to figure out what the important things in life are. And I’ll let you in on a little secret,” He paused, lowered his voice and gestured to the stacks of copious notes we had made over the semester. “It isn’t this stuff!”
So that night, the night before my final paper, when the cold wind seeped through the window and breathed on my face, I cracked my window wide open and stuck my head out, letting the sharp breeze whip through my hair and spray gusts of rain on my skin. Then, in the same spirit which compelled me to eat a “snow frog”, I turned away from the window, broke into a canter and didn’t stop till I’d gotten downstairs. It didn’t feel like the time for notes or memorising or reading by the light of a desk lamp.
It felt like the moment for enjoying the fact that I could run, that I could still remember how I liked the sensation of rain on my face. I walked in the puddles with water percolating through the leaves and imagined myself standing out in the rain in school, then in Singapore, the world, the galaxy, the Universe and I forgot all about the impending examination, the six chapters left to finish before I could finally fall asleep. I strolled slowly in the cold, one tiny person in the enormous, unending scheme of things, enjoying the more fleeting phenomenon of my youth.
The trees, bowed deep in their neverending wisdom and silence, watched me.
Daniel ordered a “snow frog” for me, which I pictured as looking something like a little green toad all encrusted in shaved ice, sitting on a herbal jelly lilly pad (appetising, much). It really turned out to be little frog lungs in a cold, sweet soup which honestly, tastes a lot better than it sounds. The frog lungs looked and felt a lot like little white puffy pieces of jelly and with the syrup, it was really like eating a normal, sweet Chinese dessert. I cannot wait for tomorrow because I just love weddings and Ying Yi looks happier than I’ve ever seen her.
The last few nights were spent curled up with M in a week of pure bliss, driving around drinking beer and playing Placebo too loudly, sitting on the sticky green couches in her lobby and watching TV. These last days of moving out of school and coming back home are slowly starting to sink in, the reality being that I have finished four years of school and now that I try to look back on them, everything is a blur of late night walks around campus and bleary-eyed classes, early morning Macdonald’s breakfasts and moving back and forth between hostel rooms. For some reason, it feels like I should have paid better attention, really treasured these days of freedom and new experience. Standing quietly in my hostel room on the night before my last exam, I felt a cold wind laced with rain buffeting through my open window and a thought suddenly came to mind: It feels so good to be young and alive.
Teetering on the brink between sheltered freedom and having to go out and make a living for myself, I suddenly see that the days are passing too fast. People are growing up and moving on. People are getting married. And before it’s too late I should stand still and hold time fast in my fist so that I’ll never grow old believing, as my parents do, that youth is wasted on the young. I want to be aware that I’m young now, not look back and start in surprise because I used to be. This sounds rather a melodramatic thought at 22. But I thought the same at 17 and I still look back on my college days and wonder why I didn’t throw a little bit more of myself into it. 22 is 25 before you know it, and then 30. Whole decades pass and life gets in the way. Things ebb and flow and work and family intervene and you don’t make time to do the little things you always wanted to do and then suddenly, you forget you ever wanted to do them.
And at some point, I suppose we all stop thinking, “Wow, there’s still a lot of life left,” and start wondering, “Where did I just let all that time go?” Dr. Matthews told us in our last lecture with him that he realised that had happened to him when he found himself working on the first Christmas after he got married. “Do the things you want to before it’s too late guys. Take some time now to figure out what the important things in life are. And I’ll let you in on a little secret,” He paused, lowered his voice and gestured to the stacks of copious notes we had made over the semester. “It isn’t this stuff!”
So that night, the night before my final paper, when the cold wind seeped through the window and breathed on my face, I cracked my window wide open and stuck my head out, letting the sharp breeze whip through my hair and spray gusts of rain on my skin. Then, in the same spirit which compelled me to eat a “snow frog”, I turned away from the window, broke into a canter and didn’t stop till I’d gotten downstairs. It didn’t feel like the time for notes or memorising or reading by the light of a desk lamp.
It felt like the moment for enjoying the fact that I could run, that I could still remember how I liked the sensation of rain on my face. I walked in the puddles with water percolating through the leaves and imagined myself standing out in the rain in school, then in Singapore, the world, the galaxy, the Universe and I forgot all about the impending examination, the six chapters left to finish before I could finally fall asleep. I strolled slowly in the cold, one tiny person in the enormous, unending scheme of things, enjoying the more fleeting phenomenon of my youth.
The trees, bowed deep in their neverending wisdom and silence, watched me.
She said, she said at 11:27 pm
3 Comments:
That was beautiful. Totally had that sort of feeling myself the day before my last paper, took a look at the mountain of textbooks and notes I've accumalated over the years, and wish I had tried harder, took more pictures, as the sems blend into each other, in one continous blur. Was walking in the drizzle after my paper, thinking of what has just passed, the school was relatively empty, as the exam period was ending, and I remembered how intimidating it looked in my first year. The possibilities that lie ahead seem exciting and daunting at the same time, but I hope we do something meaningful, as life will pass quickly. I'm just glad I got to know the girl in my psych1101 class a little better,even if only towards the end =P
Here's to more mcdonald's breakfasts in the years ahead.
Babe... I definitely sense more Mac's breakfasts (and lunches and dinners?!) ahead of us. I'm really glad to have gotten to know you rather than having left school wondering what could have been. And the end of school is just another beginning, I suppose, and nostalgia also comes with hope. I'll always look back on this last semester with you fondly, but I also hope we'll be trying harder, taking more pictures and making new memories together no matter what we do.
wow, it's beautiful. it really makes me think back on how time has flown past...and we're on the brink of a new tomorrow
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