Avenue Odd

Stunningly beautiful picture

Been a while since i last posted anything personal, so here’s a little update.

Recently had a bad infection on my thigh. According to the doctor, it is an abscess and is a moderately common occurrence.

Definition

An abscess is an enclosed collection of liquefied tissue, known as pus, somewhere in the body. It is the result of the body's defensive reaction to foreign material.

So i had to remove it via a minor operation that vaguely resembles excavation work except done with surgical precision (alright, I'm saying that to comfort myself, for all we know, they might have been discussing shoelace colours. Apparently, its a “bread and butter” type operation, according to the good doctor.)

The trip into the operation theatre was one of a kind, it actually does remind me of the countless episodes of ER i had watched in younger, happier days. I was scheduled for general anesthesia. The conversation with the anesthetists (ok i hope i got that right) was short and the only thing i remembered clearly when i was finally inside the operation theatre.

Her: When was your last meal and drink?
Me: 12 Hours ago
Her: Alright, now take deep breaths, this is oxygen. *Proceeds to place an ‘oxygen mask’ on my sorry mug*
Me: (at this point i can’t speak, but my exact thoughts were as such: YEAH RIGHT *scoffs* OXYGEN MAH LILLY ASS) *konks out*

When finally woke up, I was in the recovery room which was absolutely fuckinfreezing. Next morning, when finally fully awake, I realised they had piled 3 blankets on me, and even then, i remember shivering for dear life.

End result, they hollowed out a rough circle in my left thigh about 2 centimeters across and approximately 1.5 centimeters deep. When i was first introduced to it, it was a raw red mess with bits of muscle and fat tissue apparent. Flesh, raw bloody flesh.

Ok too much info.

I’m fine and recovering well for anyone’s who’s concerned, probably be out of action for another week or so and should be alive and kickin’ once more.

Picture taken off Flickr.com. Originally uploaded on April 11, 2008 by Bizarro.

Spent some time at the jetty off East Coast Park, thinking.

Something came to mind, and never left, all the way till now, 4:36AM 3rd January, 2009.

maybe if i “pen” it, i might finally get to sleep.

Here goes.

I thought of all the important people in my life, the bonds made, ties broken, and bridges that have long been burnt to the ground. Fortunately, the bridges are few and far between, and the bonds, many and intertwined in a web that would make the average brown house spider proud.

Often, these people are taken for granted, and for that I do not apologise, but express my utmost gratitude. I do not apologise, because there are times, when i know that the same thing is happening to me.

There is no substitute for the comfort supplied by the utterly taken for granted relationships. For most, that would have to be their parents, and the few truly trusted, dependable friends. These are the people who will be there no matter what happens, and more importantly, you KNOW that they will be there when you need them to be. They might be continents away, but they will always be there in spirit. They will support you, no questions asked.

Humbly, I dare say that I play that role for a few people and they too me.

Many people complain about being taken for granted, and yes, my thoughts do tend to go there sometimes. “Yeah, call me whenever you need something.” Rings a bell? “Why doesn’t he call to like, say hi or something?” Those are questions that often bounce in my mind, and I know, there and then, that I am being taken for granted.

Sitting on the jetty, i came to terms with it. If we look deeper, and past our selfish interests, being taken for granted is really, a compliment. It means that you’ve become a comfortable, trusted element in another person’s life.

As with all affairs in life, it is always good to hang a little question mark on everything that we have taken for granted, and be thankful that we can behave as we do. For it takes more than an average person to be able to take up that mantle and be, not that knight in shining armour, but simply, the strength for us to carry on when the going gets tough. 

Here’s to all the extraordinary people in my life. Cheers.

Picture taken off Flickr.com. Originally Uploaded on February 19, 2008 by vaneska~tHOmz

Nobody hears its silent scream. Until its too late.

All is music to your ears, until the string snaps.

When it does, do you replace the string, or the guitar?

Will it ever be wound as tight again? Or will it be picked in an atmosphere of preventive sobriety, never sounding as good as it once had?

There are obvious merits about living with one's parents. Clean laundry, home-cooked meals and a fully stocked fridge, to name a few. But still, I feel a longing to leave and lead a life of my own.

I know I will miss the home-cooked meals, and clean laundry, the fully stocked fridge, breakfast in the morning and everything else, but something feels missing - direction.

It's not that one cannot have a direction in life just because he is living under the same roof as his parents, its just.. there are so many things that you just have to learn yourself, on your own, in your own crisis.

Celebrating so many 21st birthdays led me to thinking.. What is all this fanfare about "attaining adulthood" if you cannot cook your own meal? Wash your own laundry? Iron your own clothes? Live independently? Perhaps we have grown older in age, but have we truly matured? Are we truly wiser than a year ago?

I truly appreciate all that my family has done for me, and it is not out of any lack of love for them that I have such sentiments, but there is so much to learn, so much that you cannot learn under the shelter of unconditional love. It may sound condescending, but I sincerely do not want to burden them unnecessarily.

This longing to leave, is it a want for freedom?

*PICTURE WAS UPLOADED ON JANUARY 1,2006 BY CHAUSS513 ON FLICKR.COM.

With morning classes over.. I now have 5 hours on hand till the next (one hour only) lesson.  While waiting for this lesson, something crossed my mind:

We spend a large part of our lives just waiting, and a good portion of that time, we are waiting for others. Now, that is perfectly fine. For the first 10 minutes or so (lets face it, busses miss us, and jams catch our cars sometimes). After that though it does get slightly (and oftentimes excessively) annoying when we are made to wait, and wait, and.. wait.

As you might have guessed, I am usually the punctual one, and while I pride myself for such punctuality, it never fails to irk me when made to wait anything in excess of ~20mins for anybody. To put it plainly, time, MY time, was being needlessly wasted.

Armed with bristling righteous fury for chronic latecomers of the land, it was decided that I, The Punctual One, will plunge the depths of chronic latecoming and seek the truth and the One Ring to Rule..... nevermind.

Tardiness can seem like an incurable disease sometimes. I do know of people who will make a conscious effort to avoid arriving late. These are the ones who will prepare an hour beforehand, and ultimately, arrive... late.

Habitual latecoming, that is called. However, do know that, THERE IS HOPE! The challenge here is upon deciding on just how important it is for him/her to be on time. In most societies, chronic latecoming is seen - no not as a mental illness, but rather a (serious?) character flaw. Especially in the business world, where (you guessed it) time is money, to waste someone's time is as good as saying 'know what? I cannot be bothered to respect your time, and much less, you.'

Now, with that aside, we move on to the type of lateness that bothers me the most: the "he's-gonna-be-late-anyway" or "I-don't-want-to-stand-there-like-a-clown-waiting-for-him" syndrome.

The reason why this bothers me so much is how this problem can (and will) compound. If Aaron is consistently late by 10minutes, Charles will soon decide to arrive 15minutes after the pre-decided time (surely its ok for her to finally wait for 5 minutes!) So assuming that Charles keeps that up, Aaron will consequently turn up 20 minutes late. Why?

Waiting alone to most people is experienced as a painful, boring and time wasting activity. Above all, it projects an image of a lonely person. Many people have the innate fear of being left all alone, and consequently, hate to be kept waiting, and as such, just keep coming later than the other to avoid the painful experience.

So, what can we do about it?

Being from the fine city state that is Singapore, a monetary penalty comes to mind. For every minute that a party is late, he/she would have to cough up an amount of money, or buy lunch etc. While this may seem like a viable proposition (and is in practice in some social circles actually), personally I feel it will only worsen the situation in the long run; because now, it is "acceptable" to be late, never mind that you have wasted three people's time waiting for you, as long as you buy lunch later, its perfectly fine. I can see a culture building up there, albeit and unhealthy one. (Note: There really is no free lunch. The time wasted waiting for that one person could most probably been put to better use.)

The only piece of real advice I can give is for the punctual party to never fall into the vicious cycle. That way, the person who is making you wait, if he/she considers you of some importance (and since you are meeting up more than once or twice I'd safely say that he does), might 'feel bad' and make an effort to arrive on time in the future.

Alright, for those of you who made it this far, congratulations on conquering my longest wall of text in about two years. Isn't quite the Great Wall.. or the Berlin.. or the Earthworm Jim.. or the Nokia N95.. or the Evian.. or the...

Time is precious, do not waste others' time. Or your own, typing walls of text.

Reading mine, however, is time well spent. Thank you for your precious time.

THE PICTURE WAS TAKEN OFF FLICKR AND ALL CREDIT GOES TO THE ORIGINAL POSTER

The café, truly a great place to appreciate what one has, what one had, and perhaps, what one might have.

Today, seated obliquely before me, were four secondary school girls who were, like myself, in academic pursuit. Much like myself, they are failing miserably. However, their failing miserably meant they were chattering on and on about just about anything that came to their mind. Boys, in-school gossip, the latest hand phones (actually its just THE latest hand phone, the iPhone from Apple, it has finally hit our humble shores and taken the island's Applemaniacs by storm, personally i don't quite see what's the deal with it though :X ...maniacs), the range of topics they covered in my four hours here probably had more coverage than The Herald Tribune International. Oh and did i mention.. boys?

The endless chatter regarding certain lucky bloke by the name of Shawn (yes i caught that much) was just that, endless. In the midst of going gaga, they flipped their geography textbooks, it eludes me how one studies that way.. Perhaps women have it easy like that?

I couldn't help but think back on my own secondary school days. In my school, we were lucky enough to have a beautiful lake in the compound. As much as it was a waste of space, it was a cultural icon of sorts, and it provided for a suitably soothing ambience to study. It was also conducive for idle chatter. Once in a while, a gust of wind will pass by and sweep away some of our notes into the lake. The following panic was always concluded with a friend offering his/her notes to photocopy, since, well it IS a lake and paper kinda gets ruined by water.

Ah yes, friends. The innocence of friendship at that age was priceless. Though i am here alone, here's a silent thankyou from me to all the people who had made any kind of impact in my life.

I am happy for you, girls.