|
|
|
read between the lines
seeing eye to eye this was entirely unexpected: i'd gone over to my maternal grandparents' house to play with my aunt's dogs there (while my parents helped mah mah with an errand) and unwittingly took part in a delightful minute-long gaze with a very pretty dog there (and she is quite pretty, having naturally mascara-ed eyes, and folded, feminine ears compared to her brother's triangular, pointed ones plus four black nails with one dainty white dewclaw nail per paw).now, i'd seen the trio before (suki and simon were the puppies we'd given to my aunt that came from one of our neighbourhood stray mother dogs while tammy was this frantic, anxious temple dog whom my aunt decided to adopt due to the dog's dangerous propensity to knock down elderly temple devotees by jumping on them in excitement) but this hadn't happened yet. anyway, several months on and tammy was finally not as fretful as she used to be (her paws used to try to force my hands down whenever i tried to pat her) although she never sat still the entire hour i was there, while simon had learnt a new trick of putting his paw on your arm (as if to say i'm here, play with me) if you paid attention to the other dogs for too long. when i got around to suki, i squatted across from her and proceeded to pat her head -- and then it happened. this dog, who was nearly at eye level with me as she sat down across from me, started gazing at me with her smiling eyes and grinning mouth for at least one full minute. gradually she started eyeballing me, shifting her gaze from my right eye, to my left, and i kind of stopped my patting for a while as we studied each other. she then broke the gaze and i gave her a back brush (with praises) before tammy started interrupting us. the last time i'd witnessed such an intent, uninterrupted gaze was a few years ago when i had the pleasure of sitting next to a table which had a couple that did just that (staring without speaking) for the entire time they ate through their mcdonald's breakfast meals. it was like the couple were telepathically speaking to each other, not unlike how my aunt's attractive canine here was trying to convey her gladness at my arrival and happiness of just being with me. seriously, are dogs not the best friends in the world? =p a good break "You will come back home and live in peace; i came across these words of promise during my final month of work (john mayer, oh you lie about wasting time in the afternoons of june) and i clung to them till they finally came true. as of 2 july, i am home, i do live in peace, i am secure, and ain't no boss nor parents gonna scare me shitless no more...at least i won't let that happen during this blessed break of mine. =D it's been so long since i've felt this unbothered by people, just free to do my own thing and really have time to think about my personal growth, future, destiny, the like. john mayer never fails to disappoint (my continuum cd has moved to gravity now), nor my old faithful philips discman with double bass boost (it's a pity i've never been able to find a machine or earpiece that can remotely match the bass quality of this bliss-producing gadget). no wait -- mayer disappointed me with battle studies. but i've yet to listen to it on double bass boost yet so that verdict will have to be upheld for now... but i'd like to etch in memory a very recent peaceful day i had (i think it was this tuesday), which was significant in that it was unexpected, rare and relatively inexpensive: two uninterrupted and blissful hours finishing up an overdue issue of odj at a donut-coffee house. my mom had announced her plan to go shopping at one of her favourite (one of my least favourite -- any mall sans an english-language book- or music store is considered useless to me because, what am i going to do with all that time to kill?) malls and i decided to tag along, 'cos it was getting decidedly hot again in the house, it being daytime and this being the equator. i decided to bring the jun-jul-aug 2010 issue of our daily journey which i'd kept in my office (above my bible) but never found the time to complete (sadly, like my bible too -- it gets flipped through a lot but never read from cover to cover...yet) as it was the last copy i'd read up to and , having organised the incoming odj mail in my room recently, really needed to catch up reading on (seriously, i thought i was just 2 or 3 books behind, not 6 =O). i wasn't really sure where i'd read, but i was pretty sure it had to have decent enough drinks and a relatively quiet (read: conducive) area for reading. i passed by a recently-opened local donut-coffee house chain and decided to test out the indoor climate (starbucks was the previous renter -- and i don't know what is it with them in this district but they tend to switch off the air-conditioning in their shops, which is cool for ice-blended drinkers but definitely, literally NOT COOL for hot-tea-or-coffee drinkers like me; another turn-off is that they always try their salesman tactics on me even after repeatedly declining to top-up or upgrade on their already overpriced coffee). the lady at the counter for this particular branch on this particular day knew what to recommend when i asked her for their best hot drink (anyone who says hot chocolate here is clearly a noob because most of the hot chocolates here taste like hot malt or hot cocoa): hazelnut latte. i took one sip and never looked back. the cool thing about ordering a dine-in drink from them is that it comes with a free glazed donut, but that day must've been my golden ticket day because i got a freaking sugar-iced donut instead -- there was so much icing that it was impossible to avoid dropping some onto the tray that held my delectables. more good things to come: i came in at a relatively off-peak hour (slightly after lunchtime), so i got the best pick -- window view with a comfy armchair. so i sat and read in peace, often looking to the clouds for rest of eyes and mind. the skies that day were pretty interesting to watch -- i saw four different shapes of clouds that day of the stratus and cumulus kind. the sky started out a bit dark like it was going to rain, but then the wind blew those clouds away and left thin wispy ones in their place, which soon became puffs of giant white popcorn. but i mean, other than the really great conditions i was in, the reading itself prompted some fleeting but significant moments of clarity within my mind -- which was much welcomed and needed after going on autopilot and working like a stressed-out dog for so long (i really have god to thank for having lasted the longest i've ever lasted at a job so far). these were moments of awakening where, as if someone pinched me out of my semi-sleep from one of those pods in the matrix's real world and i suddenly remembered life was so much bigger than me and my own little telescopic world. moments of contentment where, in the space of that few minutes (a few minutes per moment), i saw the actual (as opposed to the perceived) position of priority my worries were, in this limited mortal coil of mine (thanks duran duran and kevin max, for reminding me of that hamlet term). as in, those material things that i worried about because i (or society) perceived them to be important didn't matter so much, now that i'd been reminded that i already possessed eternal things that were of far greater value for this life and the life to come. anyway, there were three readings that jumped out from the pages to me, the key quotes of which i will list below (for future reference):
guess to really live is to love, then. even if time and time again i seem to be disappointed (my observation still holds true that i've known more christians who don't act like christians*
and more non-christians who act like christians than the other way round).
*christians here referring to the mannerisms and self-sacrificial love as described of new testament christians in the bible
"God wants to bring good things into our lives...The problem comes when: • We think we deserve something. • We make our happiness dependent on whether we get what we want."i think i deserve good things happening to me. at times, i've made my happiness dependent on whether i get what i want. obviously, when i am aware of this thought pattern, i move away from it. it's when i'm unaware that i've gone down this path because i'm caught up in my own pursuit of happiness that catches me off guard. it's easy to forget the Giver and just look at the gifts, until the gifts are withheld. "We know intellectually that we are the children of God, adopted by grace into His family, and yet we emotionally relate to our Father as slaves who must earn His acceptance by our own effort. We mistakenly suppose that our integrity or servant’s heart attracted God’s attention, and so we try harder in a futile attempt to achieve what we can only receive... ...we need to continue to look at our true picture. Don’t be misled by what you have or have not done. Embrace your true identity. Own it. Then ask God for grace to become what you already are." ODJ, 17 Aug 2010it's been a long but fruitful journey of working away from seeing god as the a distant being from the top looking down on me and finally starting to accept that this god has adopted me as his beloved daughter and isn't affected by what other terrible things his other children have said about me. some of those terrible things might have a hint of truth in them but it has been a process of accepting that despite my weaknesses (low tolerance for negative criticism is one of them), god loves me for who i am, and who i intrinsically am does not change. i will and have obviously developed in personal growth, but the soul that resides in me that the holy spirit has been proud to join itself to (not because of what i've done but what He's done), remains the same. and it is this truth that i must keep reminding myself of in my ongoing search for identity and purpose in these crucial (read: flexible to change) adolescent years. also, a phrase that caught my attention (from a 12 aug 2010 ODJ reading) gave me an idea of a different meaning it could assume: "lying awake at night, listening to the call of the wild..." that sounds like it could be the lyrics to a song, or has basically what i've been doing lately, hahah (with the meaning of "wild" being different from what's been described in the reading). to me, the call of the wild is the call of my destiny, the things i dream of becoming someday, where i might live in the future (not necessarily in the geographic sense but in the self-evolutionary one). sometimes, it's fun lying awake, listening to good music, and just 'nightdreaming' ('daydreaming' just doesn't cut it) of all the possibilities. i've always realised since i was young that, the younger you are, the more hopeful you're likely to be, 'cos there are so many possibilities as to who you could become or what your career would be in the future, but as you get older and see those dreams with hopes attached to them dashed, then you're forced to limit your dreaming. nonetheless, i've always resolved never to give up on that one particular dream of mine, to fight for it until it becomes a reality even if 'the adults' have said it's impossible (makes me want to get them proven wrong even more). but sometimes it's not so fun 'cause, like any epic journey, there are self-doubts along the way. but i'm still trusting god that this is part of his plan that i'll see happening at the right time. i have to keep living that way. of course, i haven't had the luxury of daydreaming that much for the past few years that have been my life of running the rat race. but i'm starting again, to hope towards what i'm really hoping for.
respite i like my current haircut now that it's finally growing itself out (i had to have two hairdressers cut it 'cos they couldn't get it right, and unfortunately the last one hacked off a thick load of my hair even though i told him to only shape the fringe...ugh these clueless-on-emo-haircuts ah bengs). i get up, look at myself in the mirror and walk out of the house rocking a genuine just-woken-up look without appearing unruly). dido's no angel album is playing in my ears right now...heaven. anyway, i wanted to recapitulate on the recent fortnight that's just passed, starting with why i still stand by the opinion that staying back beyond working hours in the office to finish up whatever i can is a good idea (despite my parents protesting, my mom constantly calling my cell and office phones in her usual fretful mode and my dad even threatening to get me kicked out on the final night, which i stupidly believed and is something that he might have succeeded in doing but failed in terms of gaining my respect). like i was telling my brother over a cuppa teh tarik during a late-night supper on my car rental trip below, i wasn't doing it for the company boss so much as i was doing it for my eternal boss. also, i knew that going through with it would build my confidence for facing tougher situations ahead of life, which is something my parents never seem to understand (frustratingly, they still make considerable efforts to shield me from making mistakes in life because i'm "so immature and helpless" without realising that the only way i can really grow up is to be allowed to learn to make my own mistakes based on my own decisions, not theirs). anyway, on to the trip. what started as an impromptu one-day car rental the day after my final day at work so that i could show my ex-colleague and his housemate around town turned into a six-day stateside personal trip (save for a one-day deviation to malacca state) simply because i couldn't bear to let the car or rather, driving, go (i did exchange the proton exora for a wira on the second day after accidentally scraping the mpv's side as i tried to turn my way out of the spiral ramp of a shopping mall's underground parking outlet). sure, my parents complained that the wira's seat cushioning was so sunken in that it touched the metal frame, and the wira couldn't go beyond a certain speed (it'd start to feel dangerously wobbly and off-balance) compared to other heavier cars i've driven, but it was a pretty homely car to me, and it enabled me to relive my high-school audio memories by only having a cassette (instead of CD) player in its deck. the car rental assistant smiled knowingly when he pulled out kavana's instinct from the cassette player, still shocked that i still own working cassettes (what can i say, i just like collecting and keeping certain old things). we then proceeded to chat about anthony kavanagh -- how that was his last record and how he was pretty good in those boyband-crazy days [note: i found out later he's still a regular fixture in UK television audience's minds]. but the emotional music backbone of this trip would have to be jars of clay's if i left the zoo, which i hadn't listened to since i forgot about my cassette collection and turned to CDs. i happened to pop it in as i pulled out of a parking lot in self-toured batu pahat (my brother had come along to provide directions), which was fitting since strains of "goodbye-eye, hye-ee, eye-ee-eye" started coming out from the speakers (from the first track's goodbye, goodnight). i'll also never forget driving along jonker lane's old shops tearing up at the refrain "we will come running, fall in His arms; the tears will fall down..." from jars of clay's love song for a savior (okay so it was from their eponymous first album, but the third zoo album was still the one i most played). again, the theme of safeness in the Father's arms and tears of relief from there being no more need to hide when we see Him again was evident through this refrain. other places that car took me (and my bro or dad, depending on the location and not counting the evening i drove my family out to dinner) were desaru (beautiful arched senai-desaru toll bride, but disappointingly reduced number of resorts when my dad and i finally reached desaru itself), kluang (where my bro and i saw transformers: dark side of the moon, which was the first time i'd seen the franchise and liked it to my surprise), batu pahat (where bro and i discovered a pretty nifty town-famous coffee franchise called rengit coffee), muar (where a mall with tissue paper-equipped, free toilet stalls actually existed and where i got a good view of the town as i drove along the curved bridge over muar river itself) and the non-heritage sites of malacca (marina centre where i pulled the handbrake up in time before my front tyres almost fell into the small longkang in front of where i was parking due to nervousness of two observing police officers on motorcycles who then got a shock but subsequently started making small talk with me and sharing that they were from jb too, tanjong klebang and pantai kundor). freedom, independence, allocation for deep thought, joy...these were reasons for why i'd keep postponing my return of the car to the next day and so on...until i reluctantly called it quits on the sixth day and went back to being a parent-policed, car-less kid =p |
|
|
.jpg){kind=link}