i just realized

i haven't felt happy in a really long time.

i mean i have laughed on many different occasions throughout this period of time, but i haven't felt like walking around my house like i used to and just be satisfied with everything as it is, like i used to. and that level of happy isn't even the highest level of happy that exists. that's like just a 6 on a scale of 1 to 10. and even that i haven't felt in a long time.

maybe its' because i haven't felt like i'm doing anything positive in the world, or i'm not making any progress or something. everything just feels like a blur with the past being over too fast and the future being to slow to reach me.

or maybe its' just this perpetual level of shagness i keep feeling. there is just this tendency to sigh at everything. sigh at the computer, sigh at the dog, sigh at the clock, sigh at everything.

i wonder what drives people to smoke or drink or go on one night stands. i mean most people do it because it has become a habit to them. they are just used to lighting a cigarette everytime they are not doing anything or going to a club to grind every midnight. but its more interesting to see how they start. i mean people don't do things for no reasons. there has to be this compelling reason for them to do such a thing that they have never done before as well as a trigger, a strong push when you're already near the edge. so the interesting thing is under what circumstances do they get that, both the nearing of the edge and the big push. i think 90% of people already have something they hate in their lives, no matter how insignificant it may seem to you. a person could be worrying about his test scores while another just had his breakup, its' all pretty compelling reason to feel sad about your life, but depending on who you are it may not affect you just as severely. but more interestingly, where do they get that big push? is it when they are surrounded by friends who are just as intoxicated, or when they just feel so overwhelmed by all that emotion they just pick up the nearest stress reliever (or so they think) and do it.

i don't know

i just realised the last time i felt happy was when i was in tekong. when everyone else around me was sad. maybe i'm a sadist that way. but i felt happy waking up in the morning and knowing that i am going to train to become a better person and a better soldier. and i felt even happier during my parade when i finally "graduated" and my parents were there to see me.

and then after that, everything became pretty much meaningless. i haven't consoled in a friend in so long, it just feels so difficult. there never feels like there is a right time for this kind of thing, but yet you still know that there are things you have to get off your chest even if you can't phrase them in words and sentences. so many times of the day, i feel like my friends are all moving off without me, and it feels lonely, even though they are just standing there beside me. isn't it strange to feel lonely in a crowd of friends? and for the record, i think my friends are the greatest in the world, i just don't know how to reciprocate them.

maybe this feeling isn't sadness, maybe its' loneliness.

some things

i wish i had a baseball bat

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Joy is watching your friend smile because he earned something and he knows it
Sorrow is watching your father not being able to compose himself everytime he thinks about his mother
Envy is watching your friends become a couple and wishing you could have the same
Pride is watching your students get something he worked hard for
Regret is watching your father tell you about the stories you wish your knew earlier
Happiness is looking at your family and knowing that there can never be a substitute
Contentment is not caring who is looking

I wished I watched less and did more.

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Emma Watson cut her hair a few days ago. it takes some time to get used to. the weird thing is that every time i see her i get used to this demure, high class, elegant girl and woman because everything she does feels like things have been thought over, and also its always very comfortable to see her do certain things like speaking in a certain way that makes her feel girlish and just very cute and yet when you see her cut such a short pixie cut, immediate things come to mind like the singer pink and other punk-like girls out there. so its kind of weird to see her personality come off in such a drastically different look. but i doubt she will change much, or at least sincerely hope she doesn't change her tune and voice and personality and everything that i love about her. also, i have been given pink a lot less credit than she deserves, seeing as she does many not only humanitarian things but also does not "rebel" for the sake of doing so, much like most "rebels" nowadays.

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i have been doing a lot of thinking lately since my grandmother's death. thinking about my own funeral in the hopefully distant future. thinking about how i would react if the people closest to me would go one day. thinking about the idea of forever. during her funeral, there was a part where we had to throw coins into a small bucket of water and try and get her to "cross the bridge". after we did that, the priest/ religious person would go up on the small stand and chant certain hymns.as he reached a certain part in the hymn, suddenly a lot of people would start crying and i didn't understand at first because he was speaking in dialect. later i found out that the "hymn" or so i thought was actually the priest addressing the mourners, telling us to live our lives to the fullest and do more charity work and stay healthy for the sake of each other and that would have been what she would have wanted. the part where people cried the hardest was actually about him saying that she is gone from our lives forever and we will never see her again until it was our turn. my aunt was so shook up by this she started muttering to herself in the middle of the night when we were doing work for the next day.

so i started thinking about the idea of forever, the fact that from now on when we go to her house , we will never shout Ah Ma from outside the door like we've been doing the past 19 years, the fact that my father and my aunts and all their siblings will no longer have their parents around to talk to them, the fact that my cousins will never hear from her to go study ever again. and it pains me so much. i felt like i never fully coped with her death and even more scarily that i am already so shook up when i never even fully appreciated her when she was around , how would i react when the ones closest to me go.

My cousin also said something to me that shook me up throughout the whole funeral. he was buring the incense paper when he started to talk to himself. he said :"i just realized that i never told her i love her" and that is going to be a regret that he has to live with for the rest of his life.

i don't ever want to have a regret like that.

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i also have been thinking about what i would want my funeral to be like. i've actually been thinking about since i was in secondary school but i never got it penned down. firstly, money issues, a quarter will go to my parents, a quarter will go to my god grandparents. a quarter will go to my brother along with any worldly possessions that i may still have. 10% will go to charity, either an orphanage or the international red cross or the salvation army, that is for any of my surviving relatives to decide. 10% will go to my school, SRJC and HIHS, generally with more going to the jc. the last 5% will be given or donated to whomever needs it the most, as deemed by my surviving relatives. should any of my relatives pass before me, the money will go in this order, my brother, my parents, my god grandparents and their family.

as for the funeral itself, nothing overly religious, just maybe a small joss stick bin and some incense paper for the more conservative minded who still wish to pray for me. other than that, i want joyous band music to be played around the place and also framed pictures of words from famous people put up on the walls. either quotes from famous people, or things i said myself. i also want people to have paper to write what they would have wanted to say to me which will be put together with me and cremated. i also believe in no loose ends, so if anything is not finished by the time of my death or any issues or remarks not said, hopefully this will be the channel to do so.


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change is getting more and more burdensome