i must be getting slightly mad! i was actually thrilled to see that the weather report predicted snow for sunday/monday >.< but since canada, i'm really starting to enjoy the brisk cold and the white softness of snow... =P

i don't think i've ever loved the snow, nor its accompanying cold.

but it was bitingly, bracingly cold in canada. it snowed everyday and i found myself enjoying trekking through snow, feeling the soft crunch beneath my feet. i started to like the tingle on my cheeks, the numbness in my toes.

it was so cold, but i am always where i am, and i always love these little moments.

the kp index is 6 today, highest i've ever seen it. there will be possible active levels all throughout canada in the next 24 hours so fingers crossed and mouth shut for yx's dream of seeing the northern lights to come true!

i really want to get to the atacama desert. i want the sand and the salt flats and the starry skies in such desolation, in such a place, and i want my solitude and my own heart and i don't really know why it has to be there but it has to be because antoine de saint exupery met the little prince in a desert didn't he?

it's so childish, so unreasonable of me, as always.

but if i want it enough, can i have it please? i've already given up so many things this year...

it is so heartbreaking to hang up on my mom each time we skype and i miss my family so much.

>.<

and can i please please please get a place at awasi at the atacama desert in chile?

things are going well!

just received an a for my language and literacy essay despite having rushed it some time ago so feeling quite pleased with myself. doing better than i expected for most classes so i'm quite inspired to work harder!

have also gotten back into the swing of things with early morning workouts and teas and just generally catching up and being on top of things.

^.^

happy happy!

before i left for philly/ny i was worrying over the battery life of my ipod and how i almost certainly would have to do with music for some parts of my long bus journeys. as it turns out, the small sounds of the journey, the quiet murmurings of other passengers, the low rumble of the bus and other cars passing by brought such stillness to my heart that i found the hours melting away.

i don't even remember what i had been contemplating because it seemed almost meditative the way i watched my thoughts run and i just remembered how much i like being with myself. how much i really enjoy solitude and how this gives me such pride because schopenhauer said, that people who value solitude do so because they are sufficiently comfortable with themselves, and i am.

so it was a lovely four and a half hours into new york which passed surprisingly quickly. then! for the first time in my life i ate lunch alone in a proper restaurant and i am delighted to find the self-possession i now have.

and the clouds cleared. the weather report in the morning said it would drizzle in philadelphia but as the bus drew closer to the grey city i love, it wasn't grey at all. the sky was clear and blue with wisps of white clouds, and the sun a brilliant orange and it has always been like this. you get what you want when it no longer matters whether you have it. =)

so much has changed, people left. but i am still capable of walking all of 30 streets to my old apartment. though as i walked, i realised how little i remembered of the place, how faint the sense of loss turned out to be, and how much how much this made me feel like a ghost haunting the corridors of an aged hall. perhaps inevitability of change had taken root in my heart.

but i saw gabriel and joan, and it's still so heartwarming to talk to them. i was so moved by joan's waking up early to make pancakes because i've often suffered at her chronic sleeping in two years ago but two years on, we're so much more rational, so much less ditsy but everything still means so much to us.

and despite a miserably cold bus journey without heating to new york on sunday, i was glad to meet up with the other penn guys, renhua, philip and max. and one moment, (which would serve to cause the distress of my last misadventure before leaving ny) philip and i were in a cafe called mud. we were sitting where the fumes blew from the kitchen and it was small and crowded but i was having my third cup of tea and i realised why people love new york. because of such small moments in such small places where the bass beats from the speakers and the fan turns lazily in a room that almost glows orange, just a moment, yet one that matters.

in the end, there was an unexpected lack of cabs about 35 minutes from the time my bus was to depart. so we decided on the subway last minute but philip brought me to the wrong one! so we had to rush out, run to the orange line and i was so worried i would not recognize my stop and be lost in new york. it didn't help that my phone battery was on its last legs and i realised we've gotten so dependent on technology there was not a single phone number i can remember once the battery died. by the time i got off at 34th street, i had no idea how to get to penn station, i couldn't recognize where i was, and i was frantically asking passer-bys and literally running, boots and scarf through the streets of new york city.

i was such in distress because i imagined the bus would leave, i would have no idea when the next bus would arrive or if i could get on it, my phone battery would die and i would be stuck in new york for the night. but as i was pushing and running my way through the crowded streets of the city, i was so worried but it was just, such a moment too. yx in her crazy boots, small and lost, running unglamourously without even being sure as to where she was going...

in the end, the adrenalin rush kept me warm for the rest of the bus journey and i got back alive and then i sit here today and realised, i've been doing everything i wanted to do. i've felt everything i wanted to feel.

and that is enough. =)

looks like i'll be meeting all the penn people i've missed this weekend!

gabriel's graciously allowed me to bunk over; joan will be free all weekend; philip will entertain me (i hope!) on sunday in ny and still waiting for max to get back to me.

^.^

so excited about meeting joan again especially since our last conversation about bad karma is unfolding for me =P

leaving for ny/philly tomorrow!

i'm sure i'll be constantly tearing with nostalgia in philly but it's really lovely to be back after so long =)

now to get all the work out of the way...

up and running. =)

last night the guys were talking about registering for the vermont marathon and cy asked me if i would like to join them to which i reacted with utmost shock because i HATE running.

but for some reason i was thinking about it since i've been in the mood to do all sorts of random things for the longest time. so today i ran at the gym for all of 20 minutes during which i was telling myself there's NO WAY i'm ever going to run a marathon because i hated every minute of that short 20 minutes.

but then, as i got off the treadmill and started walking back i was actually raring to go for a bit more (except that there was a girl on the treadmill beside me and i was sure she'll think i'm quite insane if i turned back) so *gasp* could yx do a marathon afterall?

ok! so i shall start a training program and see how it goes for the next couple of weeks before i decide whether or not to embark on this insane venture =P

(and i need to mention that the endorphin rush after running is amazing ^.^)

please let the getaway happen!

oh no! my life is really a rerun! i know i'm supposed to be a bit sadder but as usual the quickest way to get me out of the doldrums is for me to be amused by the strange humour of god.

for example, i was reading my old posts from penn again and at the beginning of november i posted the lyrics of james blunt's goodbye my lover which i felt to be apt (in various ways) then but goodness! it's far far far more apt now and it's just, funny.

so i suppose i haven't quite broken the circle of bad karma yet. must try thinking out of the box next time yx =P

i don't believe what i believe because i chose to avert my eyes at every negative turn. i don't believe in the beauty of a world so dark and dirty at times because i am naive and refuse to acknowledge evidence otherwise. i believe because i chose to, despite everything else.

and if i manage to smile and be happy, it's not because i've acquired a monstrous heartlessness. it's because i found strength from my beliefs and this, is just another necessary step for me to grow into that which i want to be.

so trust me friends, trust that i will never concede and please don't carry a burden of guilt.

because i am not changed. =)

reading my thoughts at penn, same november two years ago, and it had been my favorite month since. november with its long walks, november with penn's landing and septa strikes, november with thanksgiving dinner and one perfect extended moment, november with my dreams and my fluttery heart, there in a grey city which i never liked, but loved, so much.

and this is november too, i always cry in november. but when december starts, i will be holding new thoughts, new feelings close; it's always been this way.

and all my life, i have wanted one thing, and then one more. i wanted a dream, and i wanted to never realise it.

so perfection is this, is such. i tipped pandora's box over when i opened it, hope came first before despair. and what's left but dark feelings, i'm shutting it now.

i don't believe in storms and dark clouds. the sun will still shine insistently.

it must be nice to have someone guard your happiness so fiercely that nothing else could come in its way. but i never felt that was my life, and i won't complain.

it's just such, and there's nothing i ask.

starting to feel the claws of depression clutching at the edges of my mind.

Will the magic be gone once you memorize the lyrics of the song you love, once you comprehend the mystery of syllables you can't catch?

Do you want to let this mystery remain just as it is; pristine, untouched, or unravel it with your own hands?

Pandora's box has not been opened fully, it is merely half-opened. What else remains in the box?


Love,
Dream.

how long can i live a life of boundaries and constraints?

how much will i eventually concede, things that matter most to me, pride, ideals, freedom?

i don't know how to feel...

i'm not even a startlingly, strikingly beautiful person. but even so, sometimes i feel that any semblance of looks serves entirely no purpose at all, and that in the bigger scheme of things, looking attractive has given me nothing but grief my entire life.

(like how i can't even speak of this without caution and moderated words)

maybe everything is just dream and dust, and i'll always be wanting one more day, one more thing that i cannot have.

i cannot ask.

sometimes you just can't know which goodbye should be the last. but if there has to be one, it might as well be the one you already said.

however, heartbreakingly, unexpected.

i'll always be happy. =)