Life is not bad, nor good. Optimism? Not present. My health is declining, and my Thesis has not been going well: I haven’t been able to run any experiments fully in 4 weeks now due to cell contaminations.

China, I miss. Family… bonds. Makes me notice the sad truth: Not much to say… not many people to say things to.

Questions questions questions questions questions…………………………………………………………

International environmental law… not for me?

Pure love… exists only in fictions?

The future… what is it for? WHO is it for?

All I can see is the rain, through the sheet of rain… a feeling of inner decay that the rain cannot seem to wash away.

As a human being, I have always been changing. So I am changing now, morphing into a new entity.

I can face the difficulties, the bitterness, and the sweetness lying ahead of me.

Thank you, for these precious feelings.

The summer internship has been going fairly well: the girls I’m staying with are all very nice and pleasant to be around. Photography work is mainly sitting in front of a computer and “playing space invader”– cleaning dust spots. Scott and Peter are both very friendly and interesting in their own ways. The connection that I used to feel when being around motivational others is coming back a little at a time. Been running and practicing the guitar everyday, and continuing with my photography (thoughless into it somehow, maybe because of too much office work related to it).

Still something is missing. Old news, something has always been missing.

World cup has been tremendously exciting and heart wrenching to watch. Seeing the players that worked so hard for a dream achieve their goals and losing their chances makes me wonder about the purpose of all of our existences. Having grown up, are all of our childhood dreams merely fragmented memories to us now? I remember having so much passion and drive for simple goals, and the tenacity to cling on the smallest of hopes, the smallest of happiness. I am afraid that I won’t be leading the worthwhile life that I’d dreamed… I am terrified. It seems like everyone’s life settles into a single unchanging shape after we step over an invisible barrier in our lives, and from that point on, the life that you lead is the life you are going to have. Those soccer players’ lives are revolved around a single (or multiple) goal (s), like becoming a better player, scoring more points, win the World Cup. But most of us that are out here in the sea of society are just carrying out our everyday tasks, taking breaks of fun to do the things we enjoy, and go back to an familiar and largely unperturbed rhythm of living. And what happens when that rhythm is broken? The soccer players cannot be soccer players for all of their lives… when their careers end, will most of them become one of us? An “useful” member of society? Why do we cling onto that set pattern? Why does that become our definition? And then there are people who are born with wealth, with silver spoons attached to their mouths. Or people who are exceptionally attractive in physical appearance… these people need to do little (in comparison with others) in order to live a comfortable and more exciting (in the sense that they get to experience more) lives. Of course the world isn’t fair, but it seems at some level all of us are trapped, by ourselves and the society around us.

I don’t want to lead a petty life– and good work is the way to avoid such a pitiful downfall. But I have not found work that make me feel like I’m alive, or contributing some higher leveled (worthwhile to MY soul’s) mentality to the humankind. All those dreams that I had as a kid, why are they so hard to see through these many years of dusty memories? For 3 years I’ve been hiding in a corner, retreating into a pattern of self doubt, lack of accomplishment, and some sort of … thin fabric of depression…

So what now?

I miss Daddy greatly… he would understand how I feel. I can still see him putting 4th of July steaks and corn onto that old rusty grill. At those times, his eyes were always shining brightly as if he was still a boy, excited for a taste of the delicious smelling food for the first time. But thinking closely now, it seemed like he was rarely very happy. He had his rhythm of living that he did not wish for, but could no longer avoid. As he got older and older, he did not do anymore art, but only stared at the TV screen with announcers screaming at each others’ stupidity. Did he see the fall of humanity in himself? Or did he realize that it’s no use to keep on dreaming? Did see that many years later I would come to the same realization?

I don’t want to disappoint anymore. Not myself nor those who I’ve loved and passed onto another world. I must find what it is that I need to do in order to shine, for myself and for the world. The clock is ticking. Another Holiday has come and will be gone. As ephemeral  and unattainable as my dream may seem, I need to continue wading my way through it, thick as the fog is…

But right now, allow me to feel soft on the inside… even if it’s just for a little while.

Someone told me that unhappiness is temporary. That is true, why are we, as humans, so satisfied with those “temporary” sadnesses?

Sleep, I got to.

Mind- scattered.

Focus- blurred.

Yet another summer is approaching… Lately I have been thinking about my life, the way I envisioned it to be when I was little, a teenager, a high schooler. How I thought college would be magnificent. Expecting to come out changed, but still idealistic and hopeful. Still wishing to achieve something worthwhile. How difficult that mission seems to be at this point!

I wonder if that is the reality of life? That is, you are constantly chasing after a dream that cannot be fulfilled. Lena said in class the other day, putting Dostoevsky’s ideas into words: we humans have a huge problem with the void. We always try to fill in that emptiness with something. But it seems that “that something” can be so disappointing, and maybe even worse than the void itself. Say we fill that void with a dream, an ideal– when the dream fails to take concrete form, what is lost?? It is worse than the void, because not only are we left with the void, but also with the shattered fragments of the dream. And often, we are the ones forced to smash that dream, that one dream that is ours alone with a hammer handed to us by reality.

Loneliness is a strange thing– it can creep up on me from behind or greet me face to face, saying “Hi, I’m back”. Either way, it takes off its hat and walks straight into me. Then I’m rendered helpless. Against my will, I am subjected to its every whim: checking FB every 2 seconds, going on every chat program I know of to look for someone, anyone  to talk to. But then to Loneliness, not just “anyone” can suffice. So it grows larger inside me as I sit with a halo of darkish grey realizing that there is NO ONE there. No one that can chase Loneliness out of my soul. Not that there wasn’t ever anyone, but simply no one at THIS VERY TIME. But it’s always that “VERY TIME” that always seem so empty… too empty.

OK I am feeling better now (because Jules just brought me a scone at my work!). So here my rambling shall stop.

I can only wait for you somewhere in the distant (or not so distant) future…

Yet it is a wait that could be put to an end so abruptly by one look, one sentence, one gesture… from you

So let my heart be still, for now.

Also, less than 2 1/2 week till end of the school year. I don’t want to get sick ( I might be beginning to). 4 of essays. 4 final exams. Days in the lab pondering the meaning and the purpose of my existence.

The only advice for myself:

“Let it be”

Do you remember… those oh so distant memories?

Are we still the same?

Will we ever be the same again?

Once, I blossomed for you,

just that once.

Kind of stressed out right now. Registrar hasn’t been processing my transcript from last semester, and you know how fun that can be. REUs are making me want to pull my hair out, as well as the two exam/quiz I have coming up this Wednesday. If only I can memorize the complete electron transport + glycolysis + proton motive force + fermentation pathways. Biology and I have a pretty strong love/hate relationship, with “strong” belonging to the latter emotion.

Also, I think the reason that I haven’t been in a very good mood for the past couple of days comes a lot from academic work as well as personal relationships. Those 2 are inevitably interwined for me: Amount of time spent on academic stuff  and amount(quality?) of social life are indeed negatively correlated. And can’t I not have pop bio on my brain? Apparently not. Gosh, the word brain too. There is NO escape.

Okay, I’m gonna stop being overly [insert adj] and start [insert ...]

Stopping. Even just for a sec. Not thinking about academics, the future, the people around me, myself, the ants on the table, that delicious bar of white chocolate, that acoustic guitar that I’m never gonna get, those memories of the past.

Stop!

You’ve thought about them all.

Now really stop. and just let it be.

First, I am feeling a lot better compared to the state I was at during my last post. I have settled into the Reed Rhythm. It is now the 3rd week of school and as crazy as work is starting to get, I am generally in a pretty peaceful mind state.

When there is so much to be done, one stops worrying about the future future, but focus on the present/immediate future. Or at least that seems to be the way I work. Bah, I kind of wish I had more drive in general to “think bigger”, but I am doing little things everyday that serves to take me outside of the bubble. Photo-of-they-day project has been extremely rewarding and I have been able to keep it up (so far!), which is always a nice thing to know in the back of my head. Also, I’ve been reading more Murakami and this collection of short stories– though not progressing at a speed that I wish to be mainly because I have so much school reading that I need to get done as well as upcoming exams/tests/papers and the like.

Anyhows, I have to run, but here is a section from “The Wind-up Bird Chronicle” that I stumbled upon that echoes my thoughts/ feelings perfectly: ” Is it possible, finally, for one human being to achieve perfect understanding of another? We can invest enormous time and energy in serious efforts to know another person, but in the end, how close are we able to come to that person’s essence? We convince ourselves that we know the other person well, but do we really know anything important about anyone?” Hmm. Gotta chew on that, I suppose.