Myths (1)

Everytime I fill up a survey or a form, there is always invariably this question, either phrased this way or that: 'Sex: m/f' or 'Gender:m/f'

Each time, I'm struck by how gender and sex is used so interchangeably by people, without any question ever crossing their mind. I've always seen 'sex' as the technical anatomical denominator and 'gender' as the social, behavioural, psychological expression (ie: 'masculine' and 'feminine'.)

Again, when the terms 'masculine' and 'feminine' are used, they strike me as classifications which house a variety of descriptors and expected behavioural characteristics. More interestingly, how feminine attributes (gender) to a male (sex), is termed 'effeminate'.

I savour this word. effeminate.

tomboy. staunch. boyish.

fairy. girly. sissy. apron-clinger.

Interesting how all these derogatory terms involve aspects of what is expectedly feminine and masculine and how they cross over for either sex.

Gender is incredibly fluid, just looking at how words are structured in descriptions, behaviour, actions.

Clarity

I've realised something.

I haven't been thinking very much for a while now. There has been less self-introspection and I've often very consciously redirected or corrected my thought processes once I notice them going in a certain direction.

I haven't been thinking clearly, clarity has been very much so not of priority. Yet, bizarrely, I don't think I've ever acted or made decisions so concisely, or clearly before.

I do promise though, to myself at least, to explore further. To poke a little further. There is much to discuss.

On greatness

I've always felt that in order to be truly great, is to go where no one has been before. Or to see things with a completely fresh perspective, that may be considered alien by others. Greatness can often seem incredibly cold, unknown, calculating, assessing and veryvery inhuman. I think the balance is needed, not to forget the point of greatness, which is to better humankind, in whichever sphere or domain ie: music, art, writing, peace, relations, politics, economy, science...etc.

In saying that, I'm sure there will be people who would argue with me on the point of refining talent, achieving greatness, accomplishing great acts. The point I raise though is, despite how some people may say that they do things for themselves, we still perform, create, enact for self-validation through others. What is the point of it all, if there is no one who can appreciate, or pretend to appreciate? Be it now, later, post-humously?

I think it's neccessary to be incredibly alone, to be lonely to reach greatness. To be willing to cut off all human connection for a while, to traverse the depths of self. To explore the psyche, to be incredibly narcisstic, self-obsessed and preoccupied. To be severely introspective and then to direct that very same scope towards the outside world and then to create and recreate.

Again, other questions arises: How is greatness measured, who does the measuring, who agrees to this measured 'quality' or 'quantity', what dictates greatness, how does one dictate such?

It might even be neccessary to be cruel, to be kind. Can any price be worth achieving greatness, be it that perceived by others, one individual or self?

I've read somewhere that true greatness is never recognised within its time. It is always beyond the scope and capacity of society to accept or understand such and will almost always be appreciated post-humously or muchmuch later. Should 'greatness' be received and appreciated within its time, it is no true greatness, but rather one of commonplace convenience.

On being great though, loneliness becomes self-fulfilling. It is no longer a state of mind that needs to be strived for.

fragments of self-realisation (3)

Today, was one of those days that I dont think I quite got through.

I havent been as mortally embarrassed as I was, in a very long time. I realise now, more than ever that I am a creature of preparation. And always needing some form of prior warning, some preconceived expectation or basically some defenses set in place.

I also re-realise the temptation to push people away, to keep them at arms length, to smile that it is all ok, but it really isn't. It's taken me a really long time to allow people into my life, even now, it's a constant struggle. There was always this temptation to sever things, to ensure things never proceeded, which is the reason why I often never finished what I started in terms of friendships, or relationships.

I am also incredibly incredibly shit at verbalising how I feel. My tendency is to freeze into place, or slam up this front of invulnerable iciness. And everything becomes numbed and I cease to feel anything, or care for anything. Sometimes, I succeed, I was alot more successful at it before. But I met people along the way and I realised that there really is alot more to life, so many people that have come to mean a great deal to me and me to them, to not care, to ever simply escape and create that rift of apathy, would and always be a grave mistake on my part.

Completely Unhinged

"The Conservative Voice contrasted the Virginia Tech massacre with the Appalachian School of Law shooting in 2002, when a disgruntled student killed three students before he was subdued[102] by two other students with personal firearms they had retrieved from their vehicles, declaring that "All the school shootings that have ended abruptly in the last ten years were stopped because a law-abiding citizen—a potential victim—had a gun."[103]


"The Washington Post asked if the tragedy would have occurred if Virginia law did not prohibit the carrying of lawfully concealed weapons on college campuses."[104]


"Virginia Governor Tim Kaine condemned this debate, saying it was "loathsome" that "People who want to take this within 24 hours of the event and use it as a political hobbyhorse." Kaine said on April 17, 2007: "To those who want to make this into some sort of crusade, I say take this elsewhere."[105]


---> I read this today in the library and cracked up.

Who needs comedy when there's real life comedians who not only really take themselves way too seriously, don't know how funny they are in a tragically ridiculous way and just how veryveryvery little they make sense. The sheer illogic and irrationality stumps me. But I laugh still, somewhat painfully--and hysterically.

At night when dancing

Artifice is beautiful at night, in these metropolitan streets, spotted with sidebars and clubs, the air pulses as you pass them by. The body moves, the hips gyrate to the beat and limbs twitch ecstatically to dance.

Music is meant to be the language here in these places but somehow along the way, it has receded into the background, loud but still shoved to the sidelines. It is essential, but music is not the currency or the objective, the prize money is in the exchange of speculative, assessing, side-glances and of lazy but expectant smiles.

Artifice is precious here in these places of false lights, crowds and sticky alcohol laden floors. The flooring is one huge drunk tongue, soaking up human sweat, tasting the moist air between legs and of dancing soles.

All that glitters is gold.

The currency is artifice, the product purchased isn’t just sex anymore, it is the possibility and the titillation of it all. The look, assessment and smile which never quite reaches the eyes.

Body and face are put on display in animation, half in light, cast in shadow. These mannequins on unique shelves, translated onto dance floor and bar stools, constantly moving, slinking and shifting. Each is cast solitary or meshed with another but never truly alone.

Or are they really?

Artifice is in the makeup, harsh and stark in sunlight, but rendered attractive here, unbalanced but shadowy, a touch mysterious and beautiful. It is in the movement, the posturing and posing, the caricatured grace.

Au naturel is not kindly treated here. It looks muddy, especially at the edges, faded and inconspicuous, hardly worthy of notice beside Artifice. True daylight has no place in these places of false moving lights and of flashing disco red and green.

Artifice is nocturnal queen in these metropolitan streets, her mannequins come alive, graceful, sexy and lustful, yet oddly disjointed and displaced. The paradox enhances her power, as nothing is real, nothing is true in what is said or done in these places. Perhaps the music remains the one true language, but is ignored but danced to, shoved to the sidelines, showing its frustration and impatience in its beat.

Traumatised and Venting

Exam was traumatic.

QN :when is oxyen unloading highest:

a) CO2 retention
b)fever
c)1,2,3 deoxygenase
d)fuck you too.
e)I want tom gwinn to burn.

Another: Draw flow volume loop charts of COPD patients at maximal voluntary ventilation, maximal work rate, rest, at steady state exercise.

Answer: Oh seriously, this is why the spirometry machine was invented you asshole! It does the loops for you!

Another: If person' burns 1kg of fat in 6 hours, how long will it take to burn 20kg when patient is 60years old, and is walking at 4.5km/h and Vo2 is at 1L/min.

Answer: you dick head.

Another: Ventilatory Ratio: VE/VO, is higher in prone swimming as opposed to running?

Answer:...

On Constructivity

Personal philosophy: I may bitch, whine, moan, groan, sigh, sniffle and complain --> but I realise the need for constructivity.

This has become a deeply ingrained part of my personality and my thought processes, such that I realise I cannot tolerate very well, this lack in others, or myself when I catch myself doing without it.

Very often, we question, why? what for? what good will it do?

But very often as well, why not? It's a start and something may crop up along the way, an opportunity may unfold where you didnt see it before, perspectives may change, relevant people and chances may be met. This is my answer to the effectiveness of rallies, fund-raisers, petitions, to that awkward catch-up talk between people who've had a falling out, that endless track of years towards the completion of a task, degree, job.

I just hope one day, I'm won't be that person, on that bus, on that day (like every other), crestfallen and despairing, stuck in a loop of self-pity and anger and failing to be constructive.

At Face-Value

It is interesting how much we take at face value.

ie: small talk (hypothetical)
"How have you been?"
"Been good, thanks for asking." ---(when really, been really really really shit. tried to slice open my wrist, horizontallyverticallycrisscrossstarmoonspiral, with a bread knife. But didn't work. Figures. then had butter on toast, with the same bread knife.)

"How was your weekend?"
"Was great, thanks." ---(was incredibly repetitive, nothing much happened)


and yet so much which we do not take at face value, vexes us, in inordinate amounts.

Much of the time, when i read a report or watch the news, i question the validity, the encompassing information that is presented, the way it is presented, what is left missing.

I wonder at what is left missing, the books I read, the stories that are told me, the events recounted, the sad little secrets that are dispensed in quiet tones and lidded looks.
What has been edited, filtered, selected and then rearranged, cut and paste and seamlessly realigned. Often human emotion, stress, fear, anger, hurt wreaks havoc in these things, the seams crack open-- alot less seamless and perfect that we would like things to appear.

We maintain facades, impressions, we pay so much attention to how we may come across to others, and yet at the same time constantly question and moralise our actions and reasonings. And then direct that very same behaviour towards others.

Appearances:
I think in more simplistic representations, we see this in the behaviour of girls. The application of makeup, gym, diets, the skim-everything and 97-99% fatfree foods, the nail polish and monthly subscription fashion magazines who seem to host a bevy of know-it-all-women who have it made (fashion, sex, glamour, money). There was a title of a book which particularly appealed to me: "Paint, and the Art of War". There is a certain invulnerability, defense and protection as we layer these literal layers on of appearance, preparing to enter 'war'. The processes of living, of claiming, of gaining and achieving goals: be it in love, career, friends, attention...etc.

I guess for men, there are the parallel similarities, but in opposing ways. The protein shakes, the gym, the accumulation of muscle, size and bulk. The need for performance and success, in drinking, money, sex and women. I deliberately miss out on the criteria of 'love' here, as opposed to the criteria for the apparently successful woman. There seems to be this need for the appearance of masculinity, of physical and emotional invulnerability. The lack of dependence, especially the lack of attachment to women, their girlfriends/mothers. I've known guys who would relax and be almost child-like affectionate when away from the scrutiny of their 'pals', other male company. Who have very very human-like fears such as the fear of loss, abandonment, ostracism, the fear of being seen as a failure as opposed to the fear of failure. And then the defenses and the components of the social facade is slammed back in place when back in the company of others, seamlessly in place, practised and adept. Artfully rearranged, and the awareness of having done so, is fleeting, or never even registered. It is only to the observer, that such a difference can be seen.

We place so much import on appearances. On how we may appear to others in society, our community, family, friends, work mates. So much so, I question how much we do is to conform to the expectations of others, such that everyone operates under the same rules unconsciously, that everyone is pandering to everyone and nothing really ever gets done. Ingenuity, passion, ideals, dreams are lost and forever inaccessible, as we lose the capacity, the perception and the abilities to enforce and sustain such things in reality. The greatest tragedy...is when we get so caught up in life, in the passing of time and we think, they think, others...that we never notice this quiet, strangled dying. Apathy, indifference, selective reception of information become the norm, the taste of everything is dulled but secure and the same.

Cynicism. is the hallmark in the death of the idealist.

We die a little each time, we make a compromise on our morals, our ethics, ideals...the little deaths that are deviously appear as transparent, that give us a false sense of control, that it is OK and we can always catch up, or fix it up later.

So much tragedy has occurred to pander to the expectations of others, actions have been carried out simply because they think so, they think it is WRONG. This anonymous, ambiguous but univeral collective of THEY. Honour killings, suicides between motherfatherbrothersisterfamilyfriendssociety, dispelling the bonds and history and memory of love, kinship, common humanity...in the name of what is thought to be RIGHT? Religion and tradition has often be the source of this contention, of this strife and tragedy.

It becomes this loop.

what is wrong, right, moral, immoral, who is to say so. who has right of way, and why, through brute force, more knowledge, more money, more experience, the majority?

the question has been asked many, many times before.

the answer, the discourses, the topics, spectrum of ideas and contexts are infinite...and so infinitely incomplete.

fragments of self-realisation

I would have liked to accelerate those moments where I have been miserable, embarrassed or in pain. Especially in those times when my perception of humanity fails me. Paradoxically though, i savour those moments, replaying the images and conversations in slideshow pastiche. Every detail and pang, a shake of salt, a dash of vinegar and that twist of green, green lime.

Perhaps it is simply that, in those situations, my idealism is brutalised, harshly dealt with, punched all the way through, leaving the taste of burnt meat and the smell of singed disbelief.

I am left drowning as reality floods in, torrential, heavy, sucking me further into my collapsed bubble of faith.

Even then though, such ruination has a purpose. The sheer pain shocks me to realise just how fragile, vulnerable we are. And just how deluded we are in the times when we believe we are invulnerable, buoyed by this false sense of security: "that all is well". Pain serves another purpose: we are reminded...I am reminded, just how alive we are, and how very much so still, despite everything... we...I...quest to remain so.

Unspoken

They looked at each other. She was deliberately and fixedly pleasant.

She was afraid of the intensity of her emotion, afraid it would spill over into the space between them and stain the fabric and knots of what they had.

She was afraid of the consequences. She was afraid, that he might reject her, cast her aside in sympathetic apathy, perhaps worse, that he might reciprocate, but not enough, not enough to even whet her appetite for him.

She understood then, how it felt for love to consume someone and for the lover to want, even need, to imbibe, ingest and savour the beloved.

Love was not blind, it only made clearer what there was to be loved. She was afraid of this disabling clarity, its insightfulness only made clearer to her of her own ineptitude and flaws. She was stricken and then blinder than she had been before.

She turned slightly away, her smile firm, yet brittle in its façade, a little cracked at the edges.

They lost eye contact and continued their conversation, so platonic and everyday that she was afraid that it might all have been a game that they had agreed to play and whose rules she did not know.

She was content with this though, to let lie for now, but only just. This scene of summer sun, sun chairs under opened umbrellas and brewed coffees, and the flower in the vase between them. It simmered with her uncertainty and what and how she felt, just under the surface, clenched tightly behind her cracked smile.

Let's have a play with words

Farewells are usually never pleasant, or wanted. We all fear loss, absence despite our instrinsic streak to trudge on, since our fight for survival and resililence for self-perpetuation is engineered in our genes. Except for those anomalies who live by their emotions and fluctuating sense of self-worth, the martyrs, the suicides, the war-worthy and bound.

Farewells have a life of their own. They have evolved, divided, giving new life to a sibling: the good-bye.

We say goodbye, with the poignant sentimentality, tight little smile when we leave those who we actually give a damn about. I was always told to be polite, to be respectful, even to those we dislike. I admire that firm placidity, that sense of consideration, but I hold my reservations still when I form them and I say goodbye when i mean it, 'bye', when it is a cursory politeness to do so, the 'cya' and the 'later', the occasionally 'fuck-off-would-ya!'.

So then, the goodbye, the bye, the farewell which encompasses the goodbye.

What then makes the goodbye, good? Is it not a contradiction, an irony?

We say goodbye all the time, we may not realise it but we do so to our body and cells every single passing moment. Each sunset and sunrise, is a little different, each meeting, kiss, orgasm is just that little bit dissimilar. Our bodies acknowledge all this as our years creep up on us, our skin becomes crepe-like, our hair silvers, eyesight fades, to our organs failing us, after a lifetime of accumulated little goodbyes.

So why not make each goodbye a good one?

Treasure each moment, glimpse, glance, drink in the sounds, sights, tastes, each smile of shared amusement and laughter, every act of kindness.

Just a taste of what was.

Anger and Hate are emotions to hold if you are inclined to withold human compassion or forgiveness. Hate is an ugly, ugly emotion. It is both electrifying and yet draining. You feel both paradoxically alive and dead.

Hate is empowering. It empowers her when she is faced with a father at moments like these.

Lazyfoulmouthedbitterhatefulhypocriticalselfpreoccupied

man

who sired her. It was a genetic accident, this conception. The events leading up to then and the maintainence of things such that she was brought into the world: was termed in her latter years most aptly as the : 'immaculate, elaborate facade'.

It is however an empty empowerment and she acknowledges this. It does not build character, or add grace or definition to strength. But it can bend a person, who would succumb to it, to commit grave and heinous things.

And when it is all too late, too much has been lost. Including that of our myths of self-integrity, dignity,---and humanity.

Despair

People are mistaken about the nature of despair. They are often too priviledged to truly understand the hellish depths of it. They take on the melanchology, finding it tragic and beautiful, pursuing it in the Petrarchan way. But despair is stark, beyond pain, pitch-black and you keep falling, never knowing exactly when impact is to occur, but almost wishing you would hit the ground and shatter into that state of unknowing. Feeling the physicality of the experience, knowing the climax of the pain is imminent, yet indefinite, kept on the edge, shrieking silent in the hollow vertical tunnel. Everything is so dark that you cannot see, even with eyes wide open. There is only wind and your eyes hurt with the stinging of it. So black, your senses fool you. They become numbed and useless, giving rise to this sense of displacement and loss, such that you feel that perhaps everything is simply suspended in a vacuum of nothingness.

fragments of self-realisation

She realized, too early in her youth that no one could help her except perhaps the divine, but even God would not help those who could not help themselves, she knew she had to instigate something, save what was left of herself to become something other, more than what she was.

Others

They all realized too soon that they were too human, in their lack of divinity and all its implied powers, and would look away in shame, later regressing to a state of staged-side whispers : ridiculous! outcast! shameful! different!

They hence excused themselves and increased the distance between them and her.

Sweetness

She returned to him, thinking to overdose him on his own brand of treatment. She plagiarized in action and kissed him deeply, knowing he felt for her more than she did at this moment. It is sweet, at this moment anyway.

However, she notices from then on in her brilliant yet dark career, all that she takes is sweet and pleasure is evoked within as she takes one last kiss from each of them. And it is sweet. So sweet that she catches herself craving for it, when she adds sugar to her tea or coffee tasting, yet finding it forever wanting in its lack of sweetness.

as i romanticise the bitter sharpness...

fragment on a scrap piece of paper (5/06):

Truth was once a canvas of faceted, pristine crystal which transcended heaven, encompassed hell and was firmly rooted in between, fixed in the annals of our reality.

One day, a great hammer rose and descended, striking against its roots; once, twice, thrice. The number three has hence since become the magic number of wishes, chances, choices in this newly wrought, shattered and shredded reality.

Truth became shards, painful things with wicked points and jagged edges. Blood easily flowed, tears shed plentifully and blindness was the common affliction when caught in its glare. Truth fell in great pieces, some crumbled and disintegrated into dust which has since permeated our atmosphere and lingers on unused, untouched things, in corners and most easily on velvet and silken surfaces.

We breathe it in and sneeze, unable to accept or assimilate it in its entirety. Our eyes blink and water, shedding tears and we sniffle when we get too close. And others shuffle a little away or flinch, and respond with a sympathetic : “Bless you”.