Savagely Seeking Solitude

"No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main. If a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as well as if a manor of thy friend's or of thine own were: any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind, and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee. "

So spake John Donne, and everytime I hear that first line, I am tempted to fatuously retort, "Well, what about women?"

I disagree, anyway. Why can't people be islands - solitary and separate? God knows, there are times when I would dearly love to be apart. Some days, I wish wish wish, that I could just burn all the bridges that connect me to people, and be left alone. I even play out the scenarios in my head - exactly how much acid would it take to dissolve the ties that bind? How much bile would I have to produce to get people to leave me be?

But even as I mentally push people away, I know I'll never do it. My spells of solitude-seeking are accompanied by phases where I wish I was less alone - and if that's not the definition of bipolar and disfunctional, then I don't know what is.

I mean, consciously, I know these are people I like, whose company I enjoy, etc - so why would I want to rid myself of them? I think there's something wrong with me, if I see any kind of ties as dependencies that I must rid myself of. I've never been in love, but from where I stand, it seems like the worst kind of dependency - and that seems like a rather unhealthy viewpoint to have, right?

Still, I can't help but wonder how liberating it might be to say, "Fuck off!" to everyone and walk away alone.

*acquires protective clothing & waits for people to throw bricks and stuff*

On a lighter note, people - Apple iPod vs Dell Digital Jukebox? C'mon guys, it's the great question of our time! :D

The Persistence of Memory

I've had this... thing percolating in my brain for ages now - I have to put it into words before it drives me mad. The timing of this post is actually really fortuitous, cause it totally ties into Hem's piece on the evocativeness of smell.

Memory, to me, is a strange beast - a cat, i think - by turns aloof and adoring. I remember the generalities - the way my Grandmother would feed me, shaping rice and curry into bite-sized balls - the cake my other Grandmother always bought for my brother & I cause she knew we liked it - but the specifics are beyond my reach. Details - what was I doing in the summer of 1993 - what my best friend in grade four looked like - are beyond me.

Daily life, however, tends to jog loose fragments of my lost memories. I reach for the stainless steel holding rail on the subway, and i remember grasping the rings on an iron gymnastics bar as I twist into a 360 degree flip. The memory holds me, and I remember the calluses I developed that year from constantly swinging on those rings - the quip flip my stomach would do as i swung upsidedown & back again - the sudden clarity of vision my new glasses gave me - and suddenly, I am back on the subway, and the TTC conductor is telling me we will soon be at Kennedy Station.

These gifts of recollection only serve to underscore how much I cannot remember - but I am glad of them nonetheless, cause they remind me of how much simpler my world used to be. The sound of a subway car pulling into the station always reminds me of the trains in Bombay, when my Mother wouldn't let go of our hands cause she didn't want us to get lost in the crowd. The rain, when it is heavy and persistent, still calls me to hold my hand out a window and revel in it. I always did that when I was younger - as being brought up in a desert country, I thought rain was the most wonderful thing since bread-and-butter. Or the other day, I passed a Tim Hortons, and the smell of the sugar reminded me of tea time at Modern High, when donuts were served, and we'd all go have some - even though I wasn't supposed to, since I brought my lunch from home. I swear, I could taste that donut from more than five years ago - but that was in a different country, and besides, that me is dead.

And what I really want to know is - is it only me who's been abandoned by her memories?

Clear Away The Cobwebs

... swept away by the tide of work, work & more work, i struggle back to find that three months have passed since the last time I updated. wow!

Existential Dilemma #3451: Apple iPod vs Dell Digital Jukebox? The Dell is cheaper, and holds 30 GB to Apple's 20, but it's an iPod, and they're just so... pretty.

I dunno, there is something enormously appealing about the idea of *never* having to delete any songs ever again, don't you think?

School. Again.

[Alice Cooper] SCHOOL'S BACK FOR WINTER!!! [/Alice Cooper]

Eh, it had to happen eventually, and happen it did. Two weeks is so not enough time to shake off the malaise left by a succession of horrible exams, but here I am anyway.

Boxing Day Sales! were not as spectacular as the exclamation point would seem to imply. I mean, I went all through Eaton's, and frankly, there was nothing I wanted to buy! Besides, it seemed all the stores were selling the same sorts of clothes - synthetic turtlenecks (ew!), pinstripe shirts, hooded shirts, and horror of ultimate horrors, the padded winter jacket with fur-trimmed hood. Okay, it's not that I hate the jacket per se, it's just that EVERYONE has one. I mean, i looked around in one store, and saw THREE people wearing the exact same jacket. It's the same with my beloved tweed jackets - everyone else has one, but me! *weep weep* Anyway, the day was not entirely unfruitful - i did buy some tops from Roots (40% off makes me happy :D) and another from Reitman's, so I did do my part for the Canadian Economy. Yees, my shopping motives are totally unselfish...

TTC Pet Peeves:

1. The PDA people - The mornin' commute is bad enough without the lovey-dovey pair in the corner of the compartment continually rubbing noses and swapping spit. People, get a ROOM and out of our faces.
   
2. The dog people - Someone accused me today of being dog-phobic, and that's not entirely true. I'm only scared of dogs I don't know yet - which means that I'm scared of all the dogs in the world, except two. So yeah, I'm not entirely appreciative when over-enthusiastic dog owners decide to have their dog play effin' catch in the subway compartment. Oh, and the pair of dog-lovers who decided to bring THREE (that's right, folks - not one, not two, but three!) dogs on a crowded bus, and then fumbled ineffectively when two of the dogs slipped off their leashes - yeah, I'm not too fond of them either.
   
3. The wonderful way the buses don't show up on the days you have exams - but that's another rant for another day. :-D
   

Music I'm listening to - Music from the O.C., Mix 2 - especially Dios Malos' "You've got me all wrong", Nada Surf's cover of "If you leave" & Keane's "Walnut Tree." Seriously good tracks, all of them. Oh, and The Prodigy's "Spitfire" (from the album Always Outnumbered, Never Outgunned) is quite possibly one of the most catchy tunes ever.

If anyone wants a gmail invite, just leave a comment below - i have ten of those puppies, just waiting for a good home. :D

Now I leave you with a bunch of arcane quizzes. What can I say - if you get 'em, you get 'em. :D

Which Rurouni Kenshin Character Are You?

Test Created By oronoda

what's your cowboy bebop theme song?

This last one isn't a quiz, but I included it, cause it's funny. What's your warning label?

electric.abacus may explode without warning

M EXPLOSIVE

Username:

From Go-Quiz.com

P.S. Visit Hem's blog and convince her not to stop blogging. :D Strength in numbers, people!

Christmas Catching Up

First of all, MERRY CHRISTMAS!!! :-D

Okay, I realize I haven't done this in... quite a while. The exams were... overwhelming, to say the very least. You've all see that cartoon where a character suddenly gets buried under a mountain of snow? That was me, at exam time - blinking madly, looking dazed, and listening to the chirping of imaginary songbirds as they circled my head. Yes, the exams weren't great - and it didn't exactly help that i had 3 exams in 3 days, which shot my concentration to hell for my last, and WORST, exam. On top of that, I managed to catch a cold! muchos argh!!!

Anyway, that's all over and done with, thankfully. I greeted my meagre 2-week holiday with the sort of joy usually reserved for wedding days and other such momentous occasions: "Oh, Joy, Rapture and Bliss! The freedom to watch television again at last, to catch up on my manga and anime reading!" I said as much to Steph, on our post-exam shopping trip! And then I realized - there are no new tv show episodes for the last 2 weeks of January, the Kakashi Gaiden on Naruto ain't all that great, and Bleach manga and anime episodes come few and far between. So yeah, I've spent a whole week doing absolutely nothing, and y'know what, it's been fun. :-D

The family and I went for midnight mass last night - un-fortunately, we thought it started at 11:30, and so got there nice and early at 10:45 - except it started at midnight. Me sitting with nothing to do for more than an hour? Baaad things happen. I mean, one can only critique the clothes of your fellow congregation members for so long, right? And before you start telling me I should be less critical of people's dress choice, remember - there is NO excuse for wearing a tan suit with a blue shirt and a red tie - none whatsoever. To make matters worse, the suit wasn't even well tailored! Anyway, one can only mentally pick apart outfits for so long; as time wore on, I began to contemplate hurling various pieces of jewellery at random people: "Wouldn't it be fun to nail that random guy with this chunky ring?" But then I remembered - my aim sucks! Attempts at recruiting family members into my zany throw-stuff-at-people scheme failed, so the good people of my parish remain uninjured and unharassed for now. :-D

Theoretical Question: How exactly do you go about breaking off a friendship? Or maybe an acquaintance? I mean, suppose you find that you and person X are completely incompatible - but this is someone whom you see almost every day, so you can't just go out of your way to avoid her/him - what are you supposed to do? How are you supposed to say, "My God, you're really f***ing annoying, and my life would be so much happier if I didn't have to put up with your idiotic bullshit!!" How do you say all that, except polite, like? All this is strictly theoretical, mind - this could be a useful piece of information to have, right? ;-)

Shameless Plug Time! Go read h3lios' blog, the link is on the right. h3lios is a friend of my esteemed brother, who spends way too much time annoying me on msn (juuust kidding! :-P) Now he's got a webpage, who knows what'll happen?

Off for now. Next update whenever. Or whenever i'm sufficiently bugged about updating. :-D

Take care all! Bye!

PS - Best wishes for a happy new year!