Ode to Love – Day 2: Rejection

Boy: hey
Me: hello!
Boy: let’s play a game
Me: haha OK
*proceeds to surf the net while waiting*
30 mins later…
Ahh damn.
Boy:
where are you? 😦
T_T
why are you ignoring me? 😦
play with me
T_T
where are you?
Me:
sorry! I got carried away on the net!
So sorry!
Boy: oh
Me: I’m really sorry…

The following day

Boy: hey
Me: uh hey
Boy: I have something to tell you
Me: ohh okay
Boy is typing…
*switches window*
Beep
Boy: I like you but I wish we could be friends…
Boy is offline.

Hey Boy, thanks so much for telling me how you feel. However, I’m gonna have to be honest with you. I like you as a friend, nothing more. Please don’t take this personally. You are a nice and sensitive person and I’m really glad that we are friends. The right girl will come for you someday. Please understand. And yes, let’s remain friends. 🙂

Message from Boy
Hey, thanks for being honest with me. 🙂 I won’t take this personally. See you around. 🙂

That was pretty much the end.

Ode to Love – Day 1: Heartbreak

What better to start with than bad poetry? Here’s one written by yours truly.

I know how hard it is

To love one of an inferior construct

“What’s here?” she asked –

Cutting between us –

“Love,” you replied

Love.

Il m’a dit

– Tu es la fille plus laid que j’ai jamais vu

We’d exchanged memories, secrets

Of our past

But there was always

A chasm between us

Hands that could not touch

Tu es la fille plus laid

La fille plus laid

Shame.

When we brushed against each other at

The train station the other day

I saw you turn

Je t’aime

Non, je t’aimais

I kept my gaze resolutely in front

Of me.

*Note: Due to the lack of power sockets at my university, I am unfortunately not able to pop online all the time. Hence, scheduled posts. However, I will endeavour to peek in through the WordPress mobile app whenever I can, in case anything disastrous happens. Keep writing! 🙂

Writing 101: Commit to a Writing Practice

Today, celebrate three songs that are significant to you. For your twist, write for fifteen minutes without stopping — and build a writing habit.

1. Livin’ On A Prayer – Bon Jovi

I’m not sure when exactly I heard this song, but I sort of got into a rock phase when I returned from Ireland last year, basically because they have their own rock radio station. Come on, people, we need one here. I don’t exactly fall in love with songs with their meanings first. It’s usually the melody that attracts me and I’ll bounce around to it without knowing what it means until I catch a few words here and there. That’s when I really go crazy over it. This one is amazing because it’s about living in tough circumstances. Making it together. Halfway there. Take my hand. We’ll make it I swear. Life is not a bed of roses. But we’ll survive. Everyone survives no matter what kind of shit happens to them. That’s until they die, but before that happens, they live. Their hearts beat. Our hearts beat. We’re life. Even if it sucks.

2. It’s Time – Imagine Dragons

This song is a little more fun to write about. I discovered this through MTV Push? I can’t really remember. I can only remember receiving a mailer from somewhere I didn’t sign up for. But the contents looked interesting and they were talking about this up and coming band from Vegas? Anyway, I clicked on it and found myself watching an acoustic version of It’s Time. Yes, the very first song I heard from them. What blew me away was their stomping. Everybody knows I love songs with good beats. The synchronicity of their feet and the clapping was just amazing. It made me feel really energetic. I wanted to be there with them, to enjoy myself. I’m never changing who I am. Yeah, it’s a celebrztino of yourself. Keep going. I want to keep bobbing to this song. I don’t know what I’m writing, but non-stop writing for 15 minutes, yeah? Here I am. Keep going. Keep writing.

3. Run – Snow Patrol

I’m pretty sure this song came up many times on local radio, but didn’t catch my attention before. When I heard it again last year, it struck me pretty hard. I guess I was googling songs for depression or something like that. I wanted something to help me out of the hole I’d fallen in and some random website said this song was relatable, because it was written when Gary Lightbody was depressed himself. I think it really made me cry in the dead of the night. I just felt so low and I wanted to disappear so badly, as if you have a choice. Light up. I’ll be right beside you. I was afraid. I didn’t want to feel happy anymore. Sadness is an easy place to sink to and never get up from. But we all know that we have to get better. For everyone around us, for ourselves. Even if it seemed impossible. We have to. Damn. I can’t believe it has been so long ago.

Now, I have to stop my itchy fingers from trying to edit all the strange things I said above. P.S. That live version of Run is the best live video ever.

Writing 101: A Room with a View (or Just a View)

If I had the power of teleportation, or the magical ability to create a portkey, I’d most definitely want to go somewhere up north where I could see the Northern Lights. I can’t remember exactly when I came to be aware of this phenomenon, but I’m pretty sure I knew of its existence before Brother Bear. Over the years, my exposure to the elusive lights only increased together with my unexplained affinity with vast expanses of snow (I still haven’t seen this in real life). I’ve read up on the technicalities of the display, but that doesn’t take away its surrealism.

Just close your eyes for a moment and imagine yourself situated on snowy ground inches deep. The warm wooden cabin is just beside you. You’ve been awake for hours, waiting, squirming uneasily on a large, comfy armchair, right in front of the fire. Unable to breathe properly, you’ve decided to trade the yellowish coziness for the piercing white cold. You wait. You think you see the sky lighten a little, but you could be over-thinking. But no, the black of the night has definitely lightened into an inky blue. Before you have time to process this, however, the heavens explode suddenly into yellow. “Oh my god.” You burst into laughter. No, not maniacal laughter. A laughter full of wonder; a laughter accompanied by tears. “Darling!” You call out, keeping your gaze to the sky. You are not going to sacrifice a few seconds of the display to make sure the love of your life emerges from the cabin. You watch a curtain of green light flowing as if there was a breeze. You don’t even hear the door slam behind you. “Oh my god.” You recognize that voice at once. You chuckle, but never tear your eyes away. The beams dance around as if they’re putting up a theatrical performance. A flash of pink appears amongst the green. Icing on the cake. As you watch the waves curve and whirl about in front of their navy blue backdrop, you hit upon a feeling; a strange, hollow feeling that catches you by your chest and your throat. The Earth stops spinning. Time stops moving. You are alone in the universe. All at once, you understand what it means to be human. You’ve never known this, nor will ever know it again, but just for a few seconds, you are the universe.

Writing 101: Unlock the Mind

I was happy today.

It is a momentous occasion because I hardly ever feel pure joy or bliss at any point of time. Today, I made the customary trek back to my dorm from school. There was a slight breeze blowing. It didn’t do much to relieve the stifling heat, but it did cause a shower of leaves. I had the radio in my earpiece, playing an extremely catchy anthem. My mood soared upon hearing the song. I smiled and bobbed along, oblivious to the sprinkling of people walking past me. I pretended it was autumn for once, with the trees around me raining down the leaves they have no use of anymore. I turned the evergreens orange. I had transported myself into a new world where I was comfortable and happy.

I felt good. Rejuvenated even. It’s as if I didn’t lose sleep last night, writing my essay. I was so carried away that I shared a link about something interesting to a whatsapp group in which I usually participate as an audience. Nobody replied, as usual, but it didn’t bother me until later.

I’ve been thinking about this whole social anxiety thing and how it’s making me sick. As in literally sick. I’ve been having abdominal cramps on and off for the past few weeks, which one doctor attributed to a parasite infection, causing a huge scare among my roommate and I. After I’d completed the course of antibiotics, but it didn’t get better, I went to the clinic again. This one thinks it’s a physical manifestation of the psychological. In Sherlock à la Cumberbatch style, he began asking questions, occasionally pausing to rest his chin on his thumbs, hands together, forefinger pointing upwards. “You must be angry at someone,” he deduced.

Which is nowhere near right, but I’ll leave this till next time.

Writing in the City

I don’t know about you, but I live in a big city. In fact, the entire country is one big city. In places like this, inspiration is pretty hard to come by. By the way, when I say pretty, I usually mean very. There’s hardly a quiet moment for one to sit down and let her imagination run wild, let alone weave out a thread of events that could potentially unravel into one of the finest works derived through passivity.

There is something to be said about people and nature, if the act of sitting under a tree could cause a person’s neurons to fire up brilliant ideas – and I’m not just talking about the revered physicist who’d literally received a hard knock on the head doing so, but people who dream up pictures and translate them into words that others translate back into pictures.

Phoenix Park, Dublin

Having said that, isn’t it only natural for people to be surrounded by nature? I guess something went wrong down the evolution pathway that began drawing us further and further away. Hence, the dawn of the pasty girl who lives on Doritos and the Internet. Somehow, I feel that being close to nature gives us the inspiration to create, to impress upon the world a conjuring in return for the beauty it has given us.

Nevertheless, I can’t emphasise enough that living in a concrete jungle does provide us with sufficient fodder to work on. It’s just that there’s something missing. I guess we could all work on sci-fi epics in which the world has been taken over by smartphones and human beings are slaves of the technology they’d created years ago – which in my opinion isn’t too far off. These would make thought-provoking pieces that give us that sense of impending doom (that strangely, many of us are after). However, the most beautiful pieces of written work usually involve depictions of the natural environment, be it the landscape or the weather.

Many writers and writing sites tell us that writing involves lots of sweat and working your butt off. However, and I can personally vouch for this, a writing that one truly enjoys comes first with that spark of inspiration. A setting, a conversation, a character, either one of these will do. There has to be something that makes you itch to put it down in words. Only then does the hard work come in. By then, the work doesn’t seem that strenuous anymore. In fact, if you could stay up all night writing it, perfecting it, you would.

I’m not trying to undermine those words of wisdom, because it’s true that with practice, one becomes better at their craft. After participating in Camp NaNoWriMo in April, I’ve finally understood the amount of work that gets into writing a novel. The month of mistake-laden word-banging is not going to create an instant work of art and I’m sorry to say that my novel will never see the world. However, it was practice and I do hope that when I figure out where Muse lives (Greece?), the words will flow ever more freely.

“If you are writing without zest, without gusto, without love, without fun, you are only half a writer.”

– Ray Bradbury, Zen in the Art of Writing

Until then, I’ll have to continue searching and prying myself away from the hustle and bustle of the city and the discomforting stillness of the suburban. I get the feeling that she’s avoiding these places.

Camp NaNoWriMo: The Experience

Getting yourself into the mental asylum called NaNoWriMo (What kind of name is that?) is probably one of the best and worst decisions you’ll make. Look! They’ve even set up an affiliate camp for the lunatics who’d volunteer to be admitted. I was one of those crazies.

1 month ago

I’m finished with school… What should I do?

*Opens email inbox*

Camp NaNoWriMo is here!

Hmm… that lunatic camp? Been there once and it was overwhelming.

*Clickity click*

No harm checking it out again… Right?

Word count goal preset at 50,000.

Change it? 10,000? No, screw it. 50,000 it is.

Create your novel.

I don’t have a plan! Oh well, time to adopt that cheesy Nike slogan.

*Goes into over-thinking mode*

Gah! Screw it!

*Types out impromptu novel info to look smart*

Go!

Day 1

*Type type type*

*Enters word count*

Oh yeah! Beat it.

Day 2

*Type type*

I don’t know where my novel’s going… Well, screw it.

*Frustration*

*Enters word count*

Just a few hundred more to reach the mark.

*Tap… tap… backspace backspace backspace*

Screw it.

*Goes to bed*

Day 6

Par 10,000

Words: 6013

Eff eff eff eff eff

*Furious typing*

I’m beat, I’ll catch up during the weekends.

Day 14

Par 23,333

Words: 14,121

Not gonna make it… But passed my first 10,000. Ever.

*Manic typing*

Days 15-27

*Type type type*

Come on, 2,200 words a day and you’ll be fine.

[Writer’s block cameos]

No no no, can’t give up now. NOT NOW.

*Stops chronological writing*

So close, yet so far. Trust me, it pisses you off.

Day 28

Dad: Go to sleep.

NO.

Dad: Why ‘no’?

ROARS.

[Dad leaves]

*Hits daily goal*

Rewards self with reading – More Than This by Patrick Ness. Can’t stop reading. I should really sleep now. Oh wait, another backstory. Finishes book.

[Clock shows 05:36]

Day 29

[Alarm rings at 11:30]

*Groans*

Dammit! Shouldn’t have finished that book.

*Gets up and leaves for friend’s house 45 mins away*

*Watch gulp om nom nom watch gulp gulp om nom nom*

*Returns home*

Sister: You gotta buy bread.

[Clock at +/- 21:00]

I’m screwed…

[Clock shows 23:30]

*Crazyfuriousmanicinsane typing*

*Falls asleep in front of screen*

Okay, half time.

*15-min nap*

Mmm… so comfy. Leave me alone. Don’t wanna get up.

YOU HAVE TO WAKE UP!

*Shuffles into kitchen zombie-style*

*Drinks cold milk*

*Type type type*

3,382 words left.

*Crashes into bed*

Day 30

*Wakes up unnaturally early*

What? Not even 8 hours of sleep?

*Breakfast with Russian earl grey tea*

Oh yeah, gonna win this, baby!

*Crazyfuriousmanicinsane typing*

[Clock shows 18:36]

I’m done…? I’m done. I’M DONE.

*Validates crappy novel*

*Rubs hands nervously*

Congratulations page.

*Permanent smile on face*

NaNoWriMo attempt #3: Success.

Time to release the inner (crazier) editor! But first, an ice-cream treat. 😉