mood in gastric pain


Time Tricks

I had a darn long day today. We had a WHOLE day's worth of laboratory safety talks, complete with first aid lessons and CPR-on-dummy demonstrations. Had tuition straight after that. My day started at the ungodly hour of 8.30 am and it didn't end til 10 pm. Trundled through my front door only at 11 pm. I am SO knackered.

And I miss Rudy. I can't wait for this LDR to end (I mean the LD, not the R).

Life nowadays has been nothing short of crazy. Cramming tuitions in between school to make a living, stealing short getaways out of (and around) singapore, drowning frustrations with good food from across the state borders, taking odd jobs for that extra moolah (like putting my trusty but rusty Indonesian to good use by translating stock market documents), and then some.

Sometimes I wonder if I am biting off more than I can chew. But I don't care, because if a crazy life means I could feel more alive, I would take it up in a heartbeat.

And yet, amidst the rush hours, there were pockets of time when I could get lost in myself. Those were the moments that were fleeting but so precious. That 15-minute walk back home, that long bus ride to school. Today when I was on the crowded train, I was stoning away when Big Yellow Taxi burst out through my earphones. And I was *snap* virtually transported to another place and time. So random. So unplanned. It was as though someone pulled me by the collar, took me flying by the speed of light and then plonked me right smack in the middle of memory lane, somewhere not very far from here.

Today, it brought me to PFI, the company I was interning in last semester. It was that exact moment when I was standing beside line 3, standing over a cardbox tray and sticking sticky labels onto little pouches (I was always complaining about sticking labels onto pouches because they were so bloody mundane that my mind always went blank and my brain ceased to operate). And then Wayne came over, saw the blank look on my face, and knowing fully well the time warp zone that I was in, amusedly shouted "FELICIA, WHAT DAY IS IT!"

And then it brought me to my room (or should I say ex-room) in Crestridge Crescent. And I was stunned at how crystal clear the images were, right down to the furring on the carpet, the black spots at the base of my cupboard, and the slightly starchy feel of the comforter. The thin layer of dust on the fan that I never bothered to clean.

And then I was in the kitchen, opening the cupboard. I was looking through the collection of spices, looking at the stack of cookbooks. I could see everything. Even the creases on the spice labels, the long tear on the cover of a particularly thick cookbook. The white bottle of Homebrand salt, the black pepper grinder, the broken salt grinder. Then the fridge - the half grated Colby cheese on the egg tray, as well as the ubiquitous bits and pieces of chocolates at the fridge door.

It was so surreal, as though if I closed my eyes and reached out with my hands, I could actually touch them and feel them under my fingers. In that other consciousness, the me who was standing on that memory lane did a double take. But eventually found that they were indeed real as real can be. It was one of those moments when time really did stand still. Not the cliche kind, but the achingly pure and inexplicably tangible sort. That very essence of time, it stood perfectly still.

And then I thought maybe I'd give Wayne a ring. So we had a short chat. It was hilarious. But it was also strange. Like as though I never really left.

So as I sat in a corner of that stuffy little bus 168, cruising through the expressway, I found an odd sense of comfort, knowing that amidst this crazy life, my memories are exactly where I left them. Intact and beautifully whole.

Labels: emo, mumble jumbles