Letting go

Sleep was intermittent last night. I was aware I was replaying bits of my last conversation with him in my head, almost reaching the surface of consciousness but still under the pull of sleep. I kept thinking of the line he texted: This is not a convo I would have. It was so definitive, the words hardened. He laid the final nail in the coffin and left with such resoluteness, leaving me staring at the ground, wondering how I had missed the signs, and what were these signs? I had calculated my steps and exercised caution but failed to consider him part of the equation, and now the numbers don't add up. Was it complacency that blinded me? I took his affection for granted. 

Yet his cruelty is doing me a kindness. I can now allow what it was, what could have been, to crumble in front of me. It will settle and lay in a mess. Familiar bits will stick out, jogging my memory to relive scenes of us. I will be tempted to bury the remnants, to hurry the grieving so I don't feel so broken. But won't it haunt me from the depths of the deep earth anyway, in the darkest hours of the night? I might as well sit with it. Let it wash over me. 

Day one. "The Wisp Sings" plays on a loop. I feel a sore ache in my ankle after tripping down the stairs from the MRT this morning. Immediately I thought of telling him what happened, what a klutz I was, and we could laugh about it together. That would have happened in a different time and space. Today, I bear the ache alone.

The unbearable heaviness of being

You give yourself away, hoping that your person will accept you wholly and unconditionally. And he does, embracing even the parts you know are flawed and so lacking. There are many ways to say I love you, but nothing speaks of the same volume as committing to a promising lifetime together. I so desperately want to give you all the time I have in the world, to spend the rest of my years with the man who has made an indelible impression on me. But there are forces greater than the both of us, so I spent the night absently dancing to the music of a busker, eyes glistening, wishing I could be home instead sobbing my eyes out.

September

Chasing sunsets at the ocean's edge, marvelling at the glorious harmony of blues and pinks and the strokes of gold, listening to the rhythm of wave upon wave, surrendering all unease to the vast expanse, feeling like everything that I would ever need in this world was right there at my feet. There is little else that we trust with as much certainty as the fact that the sun will set beyond the horizon today, and will rise above again tomorrow.

Small fish in the sea

This weekend marks the end of an agonising week, one of which I was tormented by the burden of potential failure and disappointment. What started out as a leisure pursuit to escape routine grew unwittingly into a source of stress that I had no desire for. Mental anguish plagued the long days, while night offered little respite with my mind refusing to rest from the nagging anxiety.

But discomfort is an excellent teacher, for little did I know how little I knew. For a long time I settled comfortably in the shell of my oyster, priding over little triumphs and ignorant of the powerful currents of the world beyond. Only through the crevices formed by this immense pressure was I rudely awakened from my complacency, forced to re-examine my own fragile position in this big sea.

And from there, bruised and battered, I will build myself up again.

The oceans in us

I must have worked for hours on end; time is lost on me when there is so much to be done. My eyes are tired and my head is heavy. I struggle to find motivation to exercise, when just barely a week ago I had so much fervour to run every single night.

Was I better off back then? I can't imagine so. It was weary being a prisoner in my own head, listening to paranoiac voices, replaying unreliable memories, and feeling a void so gaping that I myself am genuinely taken by surprise at the extent of the departure. An encounter so brief, yet so commanding. For the draw of the ocean is the thrilling potential for new discoveries, felt most intensely only at shore, with gentle waves, lapping at your feet, bearing promises (which can be broken).

Perhaps now that I am more emotionally balanced (to be able to look back with objectivity is indeed a lesson in itself), there is no impetus for movement; no build-up of excessive energy that I must vent in order not to combust internally, no desperate need for distractions to drown gnawing emotions. Just dull white noise rumbling on quotidian details. Boredom growing from oblivion. Lethargy making itself comfortable in my consciousness. 

It's hard to say which I prefer.