Saturday, January 07, 2006
Somehow, for some reason when I'm happy I feel no urge to write.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not feeling sad right now. Just a little claustrophobic, trapped here in my little jail cell on the ward tending to patients' whims and desires. This morning was particularly entertaining, being badgered by nurses to complete nine discharges stat, because the patients were badgering them, because they wanted to go home right now. Nevermind that there was only one doctor around, and he had to see a patient on intensive care first... and nevermind that no amount of badgering would have made me arrive any sooner - in fact, if I could have my way the converse would be true.
So anyway.
*****
Circle in the City
I don't know if any of you have noticed but the ERP gantries are reproducing like bunnies.
Now a simple sojourn into the city for an essential life's amenity - such as a steak sandwich and a martini or five at Mortons - has one passing through the unpearly gates of not just one, but two ERP gantries.
I imagine the concept is much like Dante's circles of hell... I reached level two, yay me. What's the elusive prize that lies right at the heart of the myriad rings of gantries, one wonders? What price happiness.... twelve dollars? :)
*****
Unexpected
There was something about her that was simply... perfect.
It wasn't something easy to qualify, or quantify. It wasn't simply about that stunning (but deceptively gentle) smile that would flash across her face from time to time, like a much-awaited ray of warm sunshine piercing through clouds on an overcast day. But it was a fair dash of this.
It wasn't just about those large, remarkably alive eyes that stopped his breath once as he watched her watching him over the rim of a cocktail glass. But it was a large measure of this.
It wasn't merely the chocolately richness of her laugh, or the funny, nasal squawks and moans she sometimes emanated when she was clowning around. Nor simply about her witty repartee which she wielded with simple ease. Both of these were present in abundance though.
It did have almost everything to do with the way everything seemed so easy and natural around her; how she somehow drew out long-forgotten laughter and effortless conversation from him; how lunch, or dinner (or a... "talking session") could last forever if they weren't careful - how time flashed by both of them and left them pleasantly surprised in their mutual company. How he could just watch her watching him as they smiled, and laughed, and flirted with each other with their eyes... and feel happy simply to be near her.
How the movie moments he had forgotten how to experience, but learnt how to almost-create, like a director does before his video camera, but painting instead on the cluttered canvas of his life - "almost-create" because one can never truly capture the essence of the moment unless it happens absolutely spontaneously, and against our wills -- how those moments had sprung into his life again, quite unexpectedly - moment, after moment, after moment, searing themselves into his mind.
At some point he had started to fall - very much against his will - in.. more than like... with her.
*****
Wordless
There is a strange power in words, sometimes - like weaving a spell of thought and mind, casting into your readers - or, in my earlier days - listeners - one's thoughts and feelings or perhaps just giving them a little of your mirth and happiness... for them. Yet when that power is applied incorrectly, the magic doesn't just fail to happen - sometimes it fades.
Once upon a time the words came too easily, daily on the telephone...
I love you...?
I love you.
I miss you.
I can't remember it all that well now, the words seem long lost in the mists of time - or perhaps just in the seas between my ears.... but I remember that I was happy to speak them - it was a little like taking an intoxicating drug. I was happy to hear them as well...... it was as if the words alone were making us euphoric, to hear these secret confessions in our head spilled out across the seas of our souls a thousand miles across the world...
Except, somehow in retrospect the significance was missing - or perhaps the magic was used up... and the words seem hollow, and empty, and devoid of meaning.
It wasn't love, then... it was just infatuation. And when the moment passed....
... the words became, just words.
Point. Counterpoint. Query, answer, and refrain.
Empty.
I am afraid of those words again, the way I had been a myriad lifetimes ago with Her. I am afraid to speak them because that foray into self-discovery, into near hedonistic experimentation with the Words... led to disappointment, and an utter lack of significance and permanence... to a memory that was powerful for an instant, then lost, blooming, then fading away like a transient rose in the ever changing garden of time.
I couldn't speak them to Her often enough - if at all - because it seemed precious... too precious, like a drop of life's blood - only to be uttered in a moment of absolute sincerity... in an instant of absolute certainty. When the stars crossed a certain way, or the feng-shui calenders aligned... or whatever. Laugh.
And so if I do not speak those words often enough now... can I be blamed for wanting something... more than I deserve?
*****
Falling
Once upon a time, when I was very small, I used to have this strange dream of falling - just falling. Through nothing, through empty air, with my arms outstretched, and my eyes closed. Black, all around me.
No unpleasant thoughts of the ground rushing up to meet me... no nauseating sensation of vertigo or horrible visuals of rapidly enlarging skyscrapers... or even sheep.
Just wonderful, liberating tranquilty. Peace.
It was a nice dream.
Sometimes, listening to the oddly therapeutic sound of your heartbeat and drowsing off... it feels like that.
*****
Without Grace
You don't think she's beautiful? Why not? - she asked.
Because she is without grace - he answered.
She may learn how to be one day, but I feel she will never be able to... and hence she cannot be beautiful, to me. Do you understand?
She paused, for a moment, then replied : Yes.
Life is filled with strange ironies. A few days later, he found grace.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not feeling sad right now. Just a little claustrophobic, trapped here in my little jail cell on the ward tending to patients' whims and desires. This morning was particularly entertaining, being badgered by nurses to complete nine discharges stat, because the patients were badgering them, because they wanted to go home right now. Nevermind that there was only one doctor around, and he had to see a patient on intensive care first... and nevermind that no amount of badgering would have made me arrive any sooner - in fact, if I could have my way the converse would be true.
So anyway.
*****
Circle in the City
I don't know if any of you have noticed but the ERP gantries are reproducing like bunnies.
Now a simple sojourn into the city for an essential life's amenity - such as a steak sandwich and a martini or five at Mortons - has one passing through the unpearly gates of not just one, but two ERP gantries.
I imagine the concept is much like Dante's circles of hell... I reached level two, yay me. What's the elusive prize that lies right at the heart of the myriad rings of gantries, one wonders? What price happiness.... twelve dollars? :)
*****
Unexpected
There was something about her that was simply... perfect.
It wasn't something easy to qualify, or quantify. It wasn't simply about that stunning (but deceptively gentle) smile that would flash across her face from time to time, like a much-awaited ray of warm sunshine piercing through clouds on an overcast day. But it was a fair dash of this.
It wasn't just about those large, remarkably alive eyes that stopped his breath once as he watched her watching him over the rim of a cocktail glass. But it was a large measure of this.
It wasn't merely the chocolately richness of her laugh, or the funny, nasal squawks and moans she sometimes emanated when she was clowning around. Nor simply about her witty repartee which she wielded with simple ease. Both of these were present in abundance though.
It did have almost everything to do with the way everything seemed so easy and natural around her; how she somehow drew out long-forgotten laughter and effortless conversation from him; how lunch, or dinner (or a... "talking session") could last forever if they weren't careful - how time flashed by both of them and left them pleasantly surprised in their mutual company. How he could just watch her watching him as they smiled, and laughed, and flirted with each other with their eyes... and feel happy simply to be near her.
How the movie moments he had forgotten how to experience, but learnt how to almost-create, like a director does before his video camera, but painting instead on the cluttered canvas of his life - "almost-create" because one can never truly capture the essence of the moment unless it happens absolutely spontaneously, and against our wills -- how those moments had sprung into his life again, quite unexpectedly - moment, after moment, after moment, searing themselves into his mind.
At some point he had started to fall - very much against his will - in.. more than like... with her.
*****
Wordless
There is a strange power in words, sometimes - like weaving a spell of thought and mind, casting into your readers - or, in my earlier days - listeners - one's thoughts and feelings or perhaps just giving them a little of your mirth and happiness... for them. Yet when that power is applied incorrectly, the magic doesn't just fail to happen - sometimes it fades.
Once upon a time the words came too easily, daily on the telephone...
I love you...?
I love you.
I miss you.
I can't remember it all that well now, the words seem long lost in the mists of time - or perhaps just in the seas between my ears.... but I remember that I was happy to speak them - it was a little like taking an intoxicating drug. I was happy to hear them as well...... it was as if the words alone were making us euphoric, to hear these secret confessions in our head spilled out across the seas of our souls a thousand miles across the world...
Except, somehow in retrospect the significance was missing - or perhaps the magic was used up... and the words seem hollow, and empty, and devoid of meaning.
It wasn't love, then... it was just infatuation. And when the moment passed....
... the words became, just words.
Point. Counterpoint. Query, answer, and refrain.
Empty.
I am afraid of those words again, the way I had been a myriad lifetimes ago with Her. I am afraid to speak them because that foray into self-discovery, into near hedonistic experimentation with the Words... led to disappointment, and an utter lack of significance and permanence... to a memory that was powerful for an instant, then lost, blooming, then fading away like a transient rose in the ever changing garden of time.
I couldn't speak them to Her often enough - if at all - because it seemed precious... too precious, like a drop of life's blood - only to be uttered in a moment of absolute sincerity... in an instant of absolute certainty. When the stars crossed a certain way, or the feng-shui calenders aligned... or whatever. Laugh.
And so if I do not speak those words often enough now... can I be blamed for wanting something... more than I deserve?
*****
Falling
Once upon a time, when I was very small, I used to have this strange dream of falling - just falling. Through nothing, through empty air, with my arms outstretched, and my eyes closed. Black, all around me.
No unpleasant thoughts of the ground rushing up to meet me... no nauseating sensation of vertigo or horrible visuals of rapidly enlarging skyscrapers... or even sheep.
Just wonderful, liberating tranquilty. Peace.
It was a nice dream.
Sometimes, listening to the oddly therapeutic sound of your heartbeat and drowsing off... it feels like that.
*****
Without Grace
You don't think she's beautiful? Why not? - she asked.
Because she is without grace - he answered.
She may learn how to be one day, but I feel she will never be able to... and hence she cannot be beautiful, to me. Do you understand?
She paused, for a moment, then replied : Yes.
Life is filled with strange ironies. A few days later, he found grace.
