Break up, break down.
Broken.
It's hard to think right now. Hard to think without breaking down into tears. So I mindlessly watch tv shows all day, hoping that their pain will make me forget mine, that their stories will provide me with some distraction to the fact that you're gone, not just from sight but from me. There is no us anymore and that's a hard pill to swallow. Closer than I've ever been to anyone, you were different, and so we were different.
It's so dark outside, it's been raining all day. It's dark inside too, in my head, and I've been crying all day. I really hate to cry. It makes my head hurt, so I try to do it as rarely as possible. I suppose it's apt though, that I cry for you. You were always making me laugh.
The rain will never seem the same again after that night we shared, that was so full of light and sound and heat. Watching a thunderstorm from my window won't be the same without you.
You sang to me. I cried and you sang to me, and it was so beautiful. You said goodbyes are always one of the most intimate moments you can have with a person. The irony of that is indeed painful.
I suppose that fundamental change you always talk about has been made now. There's no going back to what was. You'll leave soon and so will I, and things will be different from here on. You keep telling me things will get better and no doubt it will, but til then, everything's raw, everything hurts, and I feel broken.
Nov 20, 2009
Nov 19, 2009
Seven Years In
Dear 16
Hi from the future.
Not too far in the future. 7 years, to be precise. It took a long time to write this, mostly because there's so much I want to tell you, but so much I shouldn't and it's hard to decide which is which.
So I'll tell you this.
If you were to meet me now, you would not know me. Yes, you will change, drastically. For the better, in some ways, and for the worse, in others. Life isn't a bowl of cherries but it won't be a vale of tears either. There will be bad times, plenty of them, but nothing you can't take. You'll be amazed at how much you can endure.
Now for the sage advice.
Learn to be patient. You have very little of it, and you will have even less in the years to come. Try to understand that things don't always happen when you want it, how you want it.
Control your temper. You lose it far too often.
Stop being so goddamn lazy. It'll be the bane of your existence.
When you go to college, take on a third major. Something in the environmental sciences. You'll regret it if you don't. Oh, and don't take classes with Prof. Hicks. He's going to bore you to tears and seriously bring your gpa down. And for god sake's talk to that HBB. You'll know which one(s). Play a sport in college. No, napping is not a sport. But I won't lie, you'll enjoy every single nap you take. Your bed in college will be divine.
You're going to have a love hate relationship with money. You're going to want it and hate wanting it. You're going to start liking shoes. Yes, you've put it off this long but I'm sorry, it's in the blood.There's a correlation there with the money thing. It's going to drain your finances and kill your feet and you're going to love every minute of it. Keyword for the future: Aldo.
Love your body. I know you think you're fat but you are going to get fatter. Much fatter. So start the body lovin', especially your arms. Strangely enough though, in the years to come you will learn to love your body in a way that you didn't think possible. That's gonna be a refreshing change.
Stay away from boys. They're nothing but trouble and not worth the effort. Find a nice girl and settle down. That said, you're about to get involved with an amazing boy who will be everything you need. But a few years down the line, when he asks the question, the answer is no. As I write this I'm just getting out of something with another amazing boy, so I'm not feeling up for telling you how amazing the right guy can be, and how devastating the wrong one can be. You'll find out in time. You'll learn a lot about yourself from these boys, but remember to take all of you with you when you leave. Also, stop being so damn picky. Look around, date casually. That whole emotion thing you do? Uncool. Sometimes it's ok to think with your metaphorical penis. They do it all the time.
Love isn't all it's cracked up to be. When you get to my age you'll get very cynical about it; you'll get all anti-coupley and disbelieving. This won't be all your fault; most of it will be due to circumstances out of your control. But I think deep down you'll keep believing. I hope you will.
Read more, write more, don't spend so much time on the internet. Yes, the grass will always be greener, and life, I bet, will keep getting harder.
Chin up kid, and good luck.
T
Age 23
Ps. Thanks Gypsy for the tag. I tag N and Vindi. Also, Olg from NY.
Hi from the future.
Not too far in the future. 7 years, to be precise. It took a long time to write this, mostly because there's so much I want to tell you, but so much I shouldn't and it's hard to decide which is which.
So I'll tell you this.
If you were to meet me now, you would not know me. Yes, you will change, drastically. For the better, in some ways, and for the worse, in others. Life isn't a bowl of cherries but it won't be a vale of tears either. There will be bad times, plenty of them, but nothing you can't take. You'll be amazed at how much you can endure.
Now for the sage advice.
Learn to be patient. You have very little of it, and you will have even less in the years to come. Try to understand that things don't always happen when you want it, how you want it.
Control your temper. You lose it far too often.
Stop being so goddamn lazy. It'll be the bane of your existence.
When you go to college, take on a third major. Something in the environmental sciences. You'll regret it if you don't. Oh, and don't take classes with Prof. Hicks. He's going to bore you to tears and seriously bring your gpa down. And for god sake's talk to that HBB. You'll know which one(s). Play a sport in college. No, napping is not a sport. But I won't lie, you'll enjoy every single nap you take. Your bed in college will be divine.
You're going to have a love hate relationship with money. You're going to want it and hate wanting it. You're going to start liking shoes. Yes, you've put it off this long but I'm sorry, it's in the blood.There's a correlation there with the money thing. It's going to drain your finances and kill your feet and you're going to love every minute of it. Keyword for the future: Aldo.
Love your body. I know you think you're fat but you are going to get fatter. Much fatter. So start the body lovin', especially your arms. Strangely enough though, in the years to come you will learn to love your body in a way that you didn't think possible. That's gonna be a refreshing change.
Stay away from boys. They're nothing but trouble and not worth the effort. Find a nice girl and settle down. That said, you're about to get involved with an amazing boy who will be everything you need. But a few years down the line, when he asks the question, the answer is no. As I write this I'm just getting out of something with another amazing boy, so I'm not feeling up for telling you how amazing the right guy can be, and how devastating the wrong one can be. You'll find out in time. You'll learn a lot about yourself from these boys, but remember to take all of you with you when you leave. Also, stop being so damn picky. Look around, date casually. That whole emotion thing you do? Uncool. Sometimes it's ok to think with your metaphorical penis. They do it all the time.
Love isn't all it's cracked up to be. When you get to my age you'll get very cynical about it; you'll get all anti-coupley and disbelieving. This won't be all your fault; most of it will be due to circumstances out of your control. But I think deep down you'll keep believing. I hope you will.
Read more, write more, don't spend so much time on the internet. Yes, the grass will always be greener, and life, I bet, will keep getting harder.
Chin up kid, and good luck.
T
Age 23
Ps. Thanks Gypsy for the tag. I tag N and Vindi. Also, Olg from NY.
Nov 15, 2009
Armchair Politics
Far be it from me to engage in armchair politics but interesting games are being played on the island and, as distasteful a subject as it may be to me, I can't help but be fascinated watching as the plot unfolds.
So the General is now a potential 'common candidate' and the Opposition has thrown its lot in with him. The President is yet to announce his decision on the presidential election, which he will most likely do today at the SLFP convention. If he postpones it to two years from now and has the General Election first, well then it'll be interesting to see for how long the General can prolong his hype. Will it give him campaign time to build up mass support or will the people forget about the war under the burden of rising prices and unemployment?
It is interesting to me, among other things, how the Opposition will blindly support a man who yet has no election manifesto and was until recently a crucial player on the Government's team. A man of war no less, who has no political experience, though I will readily admit that that is not a requirement to enter politics in Sri Lanka. What power does to man is an interesting study. How far will you go and to what depths will you sink to gain and keep this elusive, desirable power?
So maybe what the country needs is a straight arrow from the army? A man of rigid discipline and strict anti-corruption regulations. A man who clearly loves power and is not burdened by a none too substantial ego. Surely, after 4 years of Rajapakse rule, where your connections are your most important qualifications, bribery and corruption is rampant, the freedom of the press is a thing of the past and you can't move without stepping on the shattered remains of Sri Lanka's foreign relations, well maybe after all that, we need a new someone?
For my part, I find the General to be a scary man. I don't like war but I'm not a pacifist. I'm as happy as the next person that the war is over, as long the next person isn't one of our Sinhala-Buddhist zealots. I will readily admit that I'm fairly naive when it comes to politics and war and the ways of the world (why can't everyone just get along?) but I understand that it takes balls of steels to fight a battle and do the needful, no matter how distasteful the needful may be, so let me not be the one to withhold credit where credit is due.
I watched Sarath Fonseka speak about his war strategy and was impressed by his discipline and focus, his alleged cleaning up of corruption in the army et al. But I've also read his famous interview, the nationalist, racist, call it what you will overtones chillingly obvious.
"I strongly believe that this country belongs to the Sinhalese but there are minority communities and we treat them like our people. [...] They can live in this country with us. But they must not try to, under the pretext of being a minority, demand undue things." (Canadian National Post – 23 September 2008)
So when I read his resignation letter, which included gems like the following:
"There is no clear policy to win the hearts and minds of the Tamil people, which will surely ruin the victory, attained paving the way for yet another uprising in the future."
I'm sorry, but I find it hard to buy. A leopard doesn't change its spots, (though when faced with political glory anything is possible) and if these are the views held by one who could be potentially running for president, I see a bleak future, for minorities specifically, and for Sri Lanka as a whole. Maybe I'm wrong. I hope I'm wrong.
As I type this I'm reading all manner of articles in the Sunday papers. The President has accepted the General's resignation with immediate effect, but apparently the letter of resignation wasn't supposed to be submitted til after the SLFP convention, and now the General's peeps are getting transferred all over the place. In the meantime, Ranil is in India, trying to sell them on the General, and the Opposition is running helter skelter trying to convince everyone to back this 'common candidate' even though presidential elections have not yet been announced. Oh the power struggles. This is better than anything the Maha Gedare- Bold and the Beautiful lot could come up with.
As it stands, if the presidential elections go down next year, and if Sarath Fonseka runs for president, it'll come down to the people to choose between the lesser of two evils and for the life of me I can't figure out which is which.
God help us all.
So the General is now a potential 'common candidate' and the Opposition has thrown its lot in with him. The President is yet to announce his decision on the presidential election, which he will most likely do today at the SLFP convention. If he postpones it to two years from now and has the General Election first, well then it'll be interesting to see for how long the General can prolong his hype. Will it give him campaign time to build up mass support or will the people forget about the war under the burden of rising prices and unemployment?
It is interesting to me, among other things, how the Opposition will blindly support a man who yet has no election manifesto and was until recently a crucial player on the Government's team. A man of war no less, who has no political experience, though I will readily admit that that is not a requirement to enter politics in Sri Lanka. What power does to man is an interesting study. How far will you go and to what depths will you sink to gain and keep this elusive, desirable power?
So maybe what the country needs is a straight arrow from the army? A man of rigid discipline and strict anti-corruption regulations. A man who clearly loves power and is not burdened by a none too substantial ego. Surely, after 4 years of Rajapakse rule, where your connections are your most important qualifications, bribery and corruption is rampant, the freedom of the press is a thing of the past and you can't move without stepping on the shattered remains of Sri Lanka's foreign relations, well maybe after all that, we need a new someone?
For my part, I find the General to be a scary man. I don't like war but I'm not a pacifist. I'm as happy as the next person that the war is over, as long the next person isn't one of our Sinhala-Buddhist zealots. I will readily admit that I'm fairly naive when it comes to politics and war and the ways of the world (why can't everyone just get along?) but I understand that it takes balls of steels to fight a battle and do the needful, no matter how distasteful the needful may be, so let me not be the one to withhold credit where credit is due.
I watched Sarath Fonseka speak about his war strategy and was impressed by his discipline and focus, his alleged cleaning up of corruption in the army et al. But I've also read his famous interview, the nationalist, racist, call it what you will overtones chillingly obvious.
"I strongly believe that this country belongs to the Sinhalese but there are minority communities and we treat them like our people. [...] They can live in this country with us. But they must not try to, under the pretext of being a minority, demand undue things." (Canadian National Post – 23 September 2008)
So when I read his resignation letter, which included gems like the following:
"There is no clear policy to win the hearts and minds of the Tamil people, which will surely ruin the victory, attained paving the way for yet another uprising in the future."
I'm sorry, but I find it hard to buy. A leopard doesn't change its spots, (though when faced with political glory anything is possible) and if these are the views held by one who could be potentially running for president, I see a bleak future, for minorities specifically, and for Sri Lanka as a whole. Maybe I'm wrong. I hope I'm wrong.
As I type this I'm reading all manner of articles in the Sunday papers. The President has accepted the General's resignation with immediate effect, but apparently the letter of resignation wasn't supposed to be submitted til after the SLFP convention, and now the General's peeps are getting transferred all over the place. In the meantime, Ranil is in India, trying to sell them on the General, and the Opposition is running helter skelter trying to convince everyone to back this 'common candidate' even though presidential elections have not yet been announced. Oh the power struggles. This is better than anything the Maha Gedare- Bold and the Beautiful lot could come up with.
As it stands, if the presidential elections go down next year, and if Sarath Fonseka runs for president, it'll come down to the people to choose between the lesser of two evils and for the life of me I can't figure out which is which.
God help us all.
Nov 2, 2009
In Colour
The problem with having friends with fancy cameras and oodles of technical knowledge is that pretty soon you start feeling like you can't take pictures anymore unless you have an SLR and know all about f-stops. You put away your insignificant little consumer camera and start dreaming of all the pictures you will take one day with your canon rebel... all the while forgetting that actually, you really just love taking pictures. So I dusted off my camera that had been shunned into the deep recesses of my bag and took a stroll around the garden for some digital macro downtime.
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