The cutest thing

So I was thinking, instead of all those disasterous posts that I've been crapping about all the time, I'd write something stupid and cute!

Yes, I'm referring to my dog. the biscuit.

(as if I haven't been complaining enough about her)

SO...for starters, here she is:

Don't let those looks deceive you. She's as evil as Stitch can get.

She's turning 8 this year, which means she's an old lady. And boy does she act like one.

Anyways, when I first got her she was only 2 months old. Whining and all. And since I was staying in the college hostel at that time, I had to sneak her in to my room (a prison cell) to keep her there. So I had this huge bag in which i just put her in, she was only as big as my palm, so no problem.

First day I put her in my room, I went to get some water for her. Guess what she did? Barked the freaking hostel down, she did! If she weren't so cute then she'd probably be eaten alive. Or strangled to pulp. By me.

That was the start of her existence in the hostel. Oh, everyone in my block knew she existed. Cause of that one day. She had to make her mark.

Amongst the other things that she did, as all my friends in the hostel who would know (cause they doggy-sat for her), she peed and pooped right under beds just right where you couldn't reach it that you had to drag the bed out and all the furniture around it, to clean it. She'd be happily sitting in a corner watching you with her head tilted to one side. So when you're done cleaning it and putting back the furniture, there'd be no more strength left even to yell at her.

She loves taking road trips, although i have no idea why. The moment she gets in the car, she just falls alseep. Till she hears the handbrake being pulled and you open the door. And then the madness starts.

There was this one time (and i say one because we learnt our lesson and never did it again) where we were playing scrabble on the floor, at home. With her minding her own business. Right?

No.

You know how scrabble boards can't be moved if not all the tiles will just be messed up and all hell breaks loose?

So Cookie decides at the last round, which means all the freaking words are all stuck together and complicated and shit, to walk across the Scrabble board. From left to right, before we could do anything. And the four of us unanimously shouted COOKIE! (its like our favourite scream word when she's around, next to NO!)

She paused, turned around and sat there while we tried to arrange the words back on the board. I think we gave up.

[Wow. I drafted this a good 4 years back.]

As time passed, and as people go through tough times, so did she. She's lost an eye, and can't see in the other, which is completely unfortunate. She's still as greedy as she can get though, she knows exactly where her food bowl is, and knows how to get into her cage to sleep. Oh, she hated her cage for the longest time. Because it was a sign of punishment. We used to lock her in her cage if she did something wrong. So when we had to mop the floor and put her in so that we wouldn't have her paw prints all over the place, she barked the house down. Pity my ears.

But all the same, love her, I do.

Change

Someone mentioned in passing that I wasn’t like this compared to a few years ago. A change in appearance, change in character, change in life views. Could be anything. I brushed that comment off and said “nonsense, people don’t really change”. They grow, they don’t change.

But it stuck, and now I’m wondering if it could actually be possible. Probably not a hundred and eighty degree change, but a change nonetheless.

We all go through the motions: we wake up, go to school, work, we see friends, colleagues, we laugh, bitch, gossip about the stars and the sky, we laugh over dumb shit and cry over the stupidest things, we celebrate birthdays, Christmas and new year, and some more birthdays, we travel, hike up mountains, read countless books, and then one day, you think, how did I end up here?

And then you remember. Life. That happened. The sweet doesn’t change. The bitter does. You would not have noticed it immediately (like I didn’t), but I suppose we can always go back to that one event or some cumulative events that caused you to react, act, behave in a certain way. Like a defensive system.

Like if it works to be a bitch to block of sympathy, a bitch it is. Or if being around people makes you feel less lonely, plans after plans it will be. Or making unconventional decisions just because it would make you feel a little better, even if it attracts unwanted reactions.

Or it could all just be in the mind. If I don’t do it, no one else will. And some will say “but if you don’t afford an opportunity to others, how would you know they won’t do it?” Affording opportunities means having to wait. Having to wait means to be in anticipation. Being in anticipation means having an expectation of someone else. Having such kind of expectations are totally beyond your control, and if such expectations can only be fulfilled with some prompting, then I say there shouldn’t even be an opportunity given because it defeats the whole purpose.

 And then such mind set changes your decisions and such decisions change the way you react to things happening around you. Over time, it becomes a norm, a part of you, and eventually, you.

What it means to Fly.

I looked out my bedroom window last night. It was quiet, no cars passing by, no one walking around the neighborhood. There wasn't even a cat in sight. The skies were dark blue, vast, with patches of cotton candy clouds, and staring beyond the gaps of the fluff, a glance into infinity.

As I walked into the office this morning, it was still dark, the lights on the buildings down below visible, trails of headlights glimmered on the freeway in the distance. Silence.

Both times, the same thought crossed my mind. There is definitely something more than what I'm going through right now. Something better, something more exciting, something meaningful, something touching to the core. 

Some may say "just be contented with what you have". Others "you're already better than many others!". While I say: Why are you so contented, if you know you can achieve greatness or greater things, shouldn't you be sprinting after it? Is there a ceiling to how much expectations one can have? 

Expectations. My biggest stumbling block. But why? Is it because I know I can or am able to meet the highest standard you impose on me, and therefore assume that you should be able to likewise? It's not as though I'm reaching for the stars. I've been repeatedly disappointed to the point where I think it's time my expectations be lowered. How is it to be done, this lowering exercise? I have no idea. All I know is it's going the other way. Which just means that I'm in deep s***. Because no it's gotten so high no possible normal human being will be able to reach it. How now, brown cow? 

I almost sound like I'm having a mid-life crisis. 

I guess the genius answer would be, you either stop being a normal person, or I'll have to deal with it myself and probably wither off with the nagging questions of whys and what ifs. Can't find a reason to be happy in my heartache, cause I should know better than that. #joshgroban

Just a ponder

So I'm just sitting here listening to my favourite songs of all times, including Ed Sheeran's Thinking Out Loud and Russell Curtis' Sons. And because my mind is endlessly wandering off somewhere it's not supposed to (i.e. dream/fantasy land), I thought I'd pull myself back to reality and see how much I've grown over the past year. I was genuinely surprised at myself that I have not written much in the past couple of years. I guess when you're happy and everything's good, you don't think much, and you just go with the flow of life. It's been 5 years. We ignore things and just live on as if nothing's happened.

But things happen everyday. Like how we lose people all the time. Like her, like dad, and now him. Superstitious beliefs would call for a "cleansing" ritual. To rid of "bad-luck" that befalls us. Then we mourn, and cry, and blame ourselves. For not doing enough, for not saying enough, for not acting enough. 

We think of the "what ifs" and cry some more. And we wonder, and ponder, we pause and think, and recall memories so engraved in our minds, but more so we think of the very last moments, on what could have been done. 

We blame ourselves, curse a little bit more, cry a lot, and sooner or later we run out of tears and we get on with our lives, a day at a time. 

We never forget, we just choose not to remember. 

There will be times when we scroll through old posts or pictures, or we somehow spot something that reminds us of that certain someone, and we start the cycle again. 

We think, feel, smile and cry all at the same time, as if they were still around. 

Then you snap out of it. For you know they are never returning. All that remains are memories that were created. And for that, it should be the foundation of which we live our lives. Memories.