Worn and battered shoes of a beggar in the streets
You only understand how someone really feels
when whatever they felt happens to you too.
In the past, I would listen to the stories from others and empathise with them. I truly, truly empathised with their pain, their emotions. However, my perspective and outlook on life was certainly different from theirs.
It is only when we experience similar inner turmoil, do we finally understand why sometimes, some people would experience things the way they do, and why they express certain things that others would find strange, unfamiliar, or unfathomable.
I used to be one of those people. It was the path of true eudaimonia.
However, sometimes we stray from that path.
And it is when we do, that we begin to truly experience, a glimpse of what others must have felt before.
But then again comes the adage that no one can fully understand another’s feelings, unless you truly walk in his or her shoes. To assume that you can understand one’s feelings is to insist that you know everything, including the person’s individual experiences, and we all know that is not possible.
We are human, and we are uniquely human, in our own individual ways.
As tiny as we are in a universe so large we are able to experience a plethora of emotions and ideas, which, if we had been perfect in the first place, would not have been able to observe in this mortal state. Consider the Anthropic Principle, which suggests the fact of the universe and life itself as human beings are able to observe it; if life weren’t real, there would be no living thing to observe it. If we weren’t human we would not be present existentially to experience the emotions within, or even the lack thereof (which, in itself is a human experience of denial, or trauma).
The second question would then be, what’s next? How do we walk out? With new beliefs, step by step, we can. Translating that belief into action, we also can take the steps to improve the situation, minute by minute.
The ending note is: whatever challenges we face internally or externally, only makes us stronger in the long run, for they let us empathise with others who have felt such in similar waves.
What do you think? Feel free to share your ideas in the comments below!
I look forwards to many more whimsical moments with my friends, who never fail to uplift me, more baking recipes (never been truly fond of it but hey it boosts femininity doesn’t it – perhaps this can be up for debate), finding who I am again (or has it always been there? What’s there to find?), many more previous moments with my family to carve into the mind before they dissipate, more daydreams of growing old in a garden of love and community service, more moments of learning from wise people around me. And let’s hope for world peace. Am grateful to not have had the chance to experience natural disasters yet, in where I live. Hoping for more sustainable energy sources in future so that our precious Earth may stay afloat in this darkening universe.
Hope I live long enough to see humans send spaceships to Alpha Centauri.
Before that I hope I live long enough to see my parents through to the end of their lives.
At a point where things are currently hazy, I hope the fog clears to reveal the path behind.
The path is also for us to write. There are many paths that we can write, the question is which and how.
Much thoughts. Much hope. Much light. Neurons firing, fireworks booming, emotions tingling (or sometimes, the lack thereof).
Aliens. in and outside our heads.
As long as you are here with me, everything will be all right.
Some say the devils are in the shadows, some insist they are in the media, while many others claim they reside in our hearts.
We define ourselves with the stories that we tell about ourselves. When stories have been told of high wisdom, insight, belief and hope, stories of despair and fear have also been told.
The path through the shadows into the light is rocky. It has never been even, nor will it be perfectly so in the years to come, though there could be moments of smoothened ease and confidence.
What we choose to write today, we choose to leave tomorrow.
Even when the darkness seems to be ever-near, never give up towards the light you once kindled. For it could be re-kindled, and has always been there.
A short reflection about the mind and its links to artificial intelligence, Japanese puzzles and life.
A line is a dot that went for a walk.
What is a route? What is a dot? Is a dot the beginning and the route the line? Do both lead to the destination or a never-ending journey beyond the full-stop? What does it mean to grow? And where will it bring us till the very end?
One fine day, I decided to embark on a journey of slither-link puzzles, one of the types of Nikoli puzzles. Slither-link puzzles are dot and number challenges created by the witty Japanese community dating back to the 1980s. In order to solve a puzzle, one is to draw a complete loop within the square box of dots and numbers, ensuring that there is the stated number of lines around each box corresponding to the number within. Where boxes have no numbers, there can be any number of lines surrounding the boxes.
One of the puzzles I embarked on, Route Takana, proved especially challenging, and so I detoured to the next challenge, Kazuya Kogami, which proved somewhat promising as a challenge to-be-conquered. The irony in the latter is that whatever the challenge, it is bound to be conquered; which is why it is called a challenge in the first place. Unless it was created to be unsolvable, which we could take the Bishop’s Riddle as an example.
The point is, all challenges lead somewhere, as do all journeys. A challenge is the gateway to a journey that is neither inherently good nor bad; but a balance of both, and eventually, to goodness.
These two Nikoli puzzles got me thinking about the concept of different routes, and the application of such not only to life, but to how we navigate reality – both the physical and metaphysical.
With this, we can relate to concepts of breadth search and depth search algorithms. How is this related to the aforementioned topic of routes in life and the mind you might ask? Well, with the rise of technology and the virtual world we must as well look into something trending.
While a breadth search algorithm involves identifying multiple ‘starting points’ to solve a problem, a depth search algorithm looks for pathways deep into the existent space to reach the desired endpoint or destination. We can think of one as surface-level (breadth), and the other as an expedition into the iceberg (depth).
Looking at the differences of these algorithms, we can relate them to life and the mind in a few different, yet overlapping ways.
Every event or action in life resembles a unique ‘starting point’ to which may progress a route towards success. If we apply the breadth search algorithm to our paradigm, every event or action in life is therefore, a venture-point to a journey of goodness.
To the cynical readers, perhaps ‘goodness’ is too much optimism for one, for every journey has its obstacles and rewards. If we want to narrow it down further, not all events or action points may be appropriate venture-points leading to a particular goal – depending on the goal to be defined. However, what is not to say that the routes may overlap nevertheless, bringing one to similar end-points of success depending on the decisions one makes in life?
There is more than one pathway in life, and none are, objectively speaking, inherently good nor bad, as each pathway may branch into a solid optimistic possibility.
It is our decision to decide. When we take one step forwards, the previous step counts as the foundation to the route we embark on. Every step counts, and it is as simple as treating yourself to a coffee when you feel down, or helping a neighbour out one fine afternoon in the lift lobby. Or giving a sincere smile to someone you know on the street.
When life hits you on the head, or when you trip and fall because of some self-negating belief, there’s always the opportunity to swing back up. And that opportunity is now.
They say an identity crisis occurs usually when one is in his or her mid-40s. In truth, it can happen anytime when one experiences unsettling events, both personal and environmental.
The journey then begins, for unravelling whatever knots remain inside the heart, and the new ropes that can be forged towards the optimistic destiny.
What is the ‘window’ then? Is it just any ordinary window in your home? Your shopping mall? Or the church you frequent on Sundays, or the temple where you meet your relatives after long months?
The window, from one simple literal figure of a window defined by panes and glass coverage (or lack thereof), also can refer to the window in our heart, and mind.
What do we choose to see? What do we choose to feel? What do we choose to think? All of these colour our worlds, and the scenery that we see through our window.
The window is objective. Like the literal window with panes and glass, houses and clouds floating by are the objective spacial reality in which we live.
What we notice, then, is what we choose to colour our personal experiences with while looking out the window. And how we see it matters as well.
What are the things that we want to fill our windows with? Clarity and acceptance for the way things are? Or colours from irrational judgement? Or, heightened sense of awe for the simple joys in life?
How we see things, can be described with the metaphor of what we frame our windows with; is it with a curtain of grey mist, a panel of multicoloured stained glass alluding to art nouveau, plain glass, or nothing at all?
In some points of our life, we will realise that the window is covered with something that’s limiting us.
In my current stage, I find myself seeing my window through grey. It is like a shroud that does not clear away.
But look, this is a thought that is simply a thought. What will happen if you choose to blow the misty grey away, and see that there is clarity and blue sky? Again and again we repeat this, and overtime, it becomes undeniably clear, that blue sky in the window of the heart.
I hope I reach there someday. Every moment is a blessing to do such.
If you are reading this now, and feeling the same way, I wish you well.
In the meantime, let’s grab a cup of tea or mocha, and enjoy the sunset outside your balcony window. What a view. Look, someone is there as well. It’s your loved one. You have never been alone, and never will be. Because another stands beside you as well.
If tea or mocha isn’t to your taste, maybe a glass of wine. Or simply water. Every drop of life is something to be grateful for, may it fall into the soil of your heart and blossom like a seedling into a daffodil.
Enjoy the view, this movie of life.
May every moment of my life and the life of others be one of wisdom, flourishing, and inner peace! ~ Matthieu Ricard
We are not descendents of the Pheonix nor are we eagles, dragons or angels, but we have the human blood of Icarus. To soar too high would send us plummeting down to the depths of hell, while to fly too low would risk us drenching our wings.
But we can break free from our weakness and achieve what is in our reach and build upon that.
I think now, while writing this, that the meaning of ‘soar’ does not necessarily equate ‘flying as highly as possible’.
But to steer one’s wings well at the epitome of skill at a suitable height that will not drown nor scorch us.
Even this requires specialisation and tenacity, arduous revision of skill.
But for some of us thrill comes in touching the sun.
So perhaps the meaning of ‘soar’ differs for each of us.
What does it mean for you?
~
Often there are so many things that cloud our mind, coalescing into a blanket of stars that we want to pluck from the sky, or reach in our ships, one by one. With too many islands the map’s routes become a tangled mess, and with too many seeds in a plot of land the saplings may compete and rid themselves of sufficient space to breathe in the long run.
It’s a human plight to have too many things on the plate, so many ambitions all at once, lumped together under one long list for ‘Ambition’, ‘Dream’ or ‘Mission’ in life.
There are bound to be different points in life where we find ourselves standing at a crossroad with criss-crossing signs. We have to decide what to continue, what to drop, and what to move on from. With every step forwards, the road grows narrower, and we find that life itself becomes like a shrinking tube as we are forced to streamline the things that we are doing to make the most of our last moments on this Earth.
It is definitely a tragedy for people who like doing many things, such as myself. Though, I find, with each passing day, that it is the reality.
Perhaps it does not have to sound so bleak, for in the shrinking tube the vines of attention may condense upon a single route together, blooming at the crevice when the route is completed, before branching off again to begin another.
In every bloom of pea-flowers we can see the greyness of the tube sprouting blossoms of colours that expand and become a part of the overarching form, widening into a horizon like the bell of a morning glory.
There will always be things to explore, that we want to explore, that we want to do. The question is how many, and for how long.
I can go on and on, but then there wouldn’t be a conclusion to this passage, which just goes to show how undecided I am, myself, when it comes to streamlining the things that I want to do in life.
It will be frustrating to have to let some projects go as others bloom into the years, but hard choices have to be made, and if life were ever too easy such that anything and everything could be done, perhaps it would lose its meaning.
Because we cannot have everything, and anything.
Just as we cannot do everything, and anything.
I guess I will trust in the process, and learn to make hard choices. There are reasons for happenings; as there is a reason for everything. As Einstein believed, the Universe does not play dice. I quote another person whose birthday we’ve just celebrated yesterday: “Perfection simply doesn’t exist…without imperfection, neither you nor I would exist” ~ Stephen Hawking. These two quotes mean different things, but they are complementary.
For, on one hand, we must accept that there are bound to be imperfections in the routes that we take; paths may be blocked, stops may be anti-climatic, and hail may rain. On the other hand, the detours, re-mapping and accidents may all be part of a scheme of heaven or whatever you call it – fate, for the paths that we would eventually take.
In a world of chaos, there is one compass that we may trust – and that is the compass of faith. Faith that whatever we are experiencing, have experienced, and are to experience – are crucial to the shaping of our imperfect yet insightful human voyage.
When the time comes, perhaps there is always room for exploration, and it does not have to stop.
As long as we don’t fly too close to the Sun, it should be fine.
And we can look back on the road that we’ve taken and feel that we have travelled long and far, and relish in the warmth of the setting sun.
A smoke masked the air in dilute swashes, spreading floating flecks of golden dust. The sound diminished to a quiet, suspenseful silence. Time stood still for a moment, akin to a shard in frozen glass. It soaked in a majestic glow within the crowded hall. The lights dimmed some more to a quiet sepia.
With a hushed slide of fabric, the velvet curtains began to move, drawing apart a deep maroon. A click of two fingers sounded, echoing. Beams of yellow lit the centre of the stage, illuminating emerging hands, feet, and faces.
The theatre had come alive.
A glowing globe lit through the shadows of the back curtains, floating across the stage on a prop-stick, invisible to all save for the ushering crew.
It cast flickers of flame that landed softly on the spectators’ faces, dancing on their skin and in their eyes.
Among them, a boy sits, star-struck and dazed.
The dancer’s movements were like a crane’s, graceful and elegant, lifting his body into the air like a swirl of fresh air.
He leapt. It kept the audience in awe, who clapped in joy. But not the boy. For the leap had left a spring in his heart, now wound tight like a string ready to be bowed; a chord waiting to be played.
Someday, he will take the stage.
~
This passage came to me 5 minutes before the start of Momotaro and the Magnificent Peach, a production by the local theatre company, Wild Rice. In the theatre, I felt this suspense that was very different from the suspense one feels during different moments of the show. It was a suspense for the beginning – that some people say may make or break the production. It was an anticipation to be surprised, moved, and kept rooted to my seat. And it was served well by the passionate voices, dances, and immaculate set of the play.
During the show I felt in awe during many moments, and very inspired by the scenes that unfolded. In the scenes we saw, not only the story events, but also the snapshots of individual emotion, exhilaration, passion and flow that emanated from the actors, all of whom have their own stories and styles that seeped through their theatric art.
So this passage came to me in that moment, and I hoped to convey all of these…which is hard, because not everything in a moment can be captured in solely one medium.
Except, perhaps writing in itself is not just one medium; it can be multi-sensory and multidisciplinary, as it involves our imagination, memories – all of which can activate the 5 senses to varying degrees, and unlock different infusions of experiences conceived from the amazing quality of human being.
In the theatre the oeuvre was not only displayed, but conveyed. From the heart sounded the strokes of humanity, interwoven into the scripted fabrics that would not have come alive without the actors and the participants’ engagement.
I must add that the boy in the passage is inspired by one of the younger participants – there were some children watching the performance, and their eyes were large with wonder. Perhaps we’ve all been there too. And perhaps this young boy will be a character in a future short story. Who knows.
I only wish that our arts and culture retains its spirit that it has been embodying since times of the past till the present, even when waves of change may threaten their existences in the possible futures.
The first time I felt so enthralled by a window display was on the summery evening of the 21st of November at the 2nd level of Ion City.
A ‘summery evening’ is ironic indeed given there are no seasons in Singapore. But the fine, delicate paper twigs encapsulating a northern star, complete with picturesque flora, the epitome of sculptural finesse (man- or machine-made, TBC) reflected the warmth of a Summer’s sun with the mere glow of hanging light bulbs.
A paper window. Paper house with paper screens. And of course, the highlight: two mannequins in white like the Hellenistic fashions of Homer’s fantasies. The warmth emanating was, of course, artificial. No more real than the glow from the heart beating inside this human body. In a moment everything resumed to their ordinary pace and the scene became a distant, though slightly pulsating memory.
What was it about the window display that called out to me? Why did it fascinate me so when it’s not the first of its kind?
Art by Yuken Teruya
Mimicry. Mime. Mimesis. The design shouted ‘Nature’ and that which is not at the same time. The twines of paper leaves played on light and shadow, mimicking the vines in my grandmother’s backyard, the sorrel in the shrubs near sidewalks we frequent. Fractal after fractal, overly geometric yet no more mathematical than the trees of Eden. In playing on the fantasies of my imagination, they had managed to grow their way into my heart, shoot after shoot, bud after bud, young and permanent.
No wonder it is the case that nature is all around us yet never with us. In many advertisements, some unnecessarily related to mother nature, we may see references to her living children. Soft, willowy, and natural. A similar statement glimmered on a store label: “Made by nature, wrapped by us.” Something about it promised God-given rawness – the connection with that which is ethereal, unlike the crafts of man’s machines. Organic. Beyond the laws of order. The laws of the Universe; Gaia, and that which is bled from her.
Is this why we desire nature to be kept behind glass windows – bound, kept as specimens, allowed to roam yet only ever by our perusal? It’s no wonder we romanticize forests, but fear the malaria, weevils, overgrowth and decay. Fears, like large, nauseating monsters, some biologically produced through years of silent evolution, haunt us frequently on one end. On the other, it’s the awe-eliciting spectrum of exuberance in leaf and petal blooming in marmalade ochre of soil and dust, eliciting notions of the ‘real’ and the ‘pure’ from the ground we once slept on, naked, without cement or cloth.
Art by Yuken Teruya
It seems ‘nature’ has drifted from its independent truth in our negotiation of its ironies. Something else has grown to replace its stead, as it is described and desired in tandem with our ideals, through which we have created our own version of ‘nature’, a paradise like heaven. There are things we cannot stand about Nature. And in extraordinary movements we have carved paths away from it, as minuscule as the atoms melded together in plutonium.
Yet Nature is always omnipresent in our creations, its signature pulsing through the fake ferns that we create, that archetype of ‘going back to the roots’. As much as mankind tries to push away from Nature as distinctly above, a certain pull seems to be exerted no less introjected than one of a baby marmoset towards its mother, like the force of gravity anchoring a falling apple towards the core of this rock in orbit, a mere sphere in a system of many.
Even if we keep Nature’s creations in jars and life-support, we still see that it either dies, or becomes not quite the same, as is with chemically preserved roses that don’t smell like winds blowing through rustling leaves across the fields to find the damp pine and pickle of thorn-riddled bushes.
But this seems to be a debate placed at the farthest ends of the mind’s eye as the cut roses, preserved flowers, and chemically dyed baby’s breath are arranged in porcelain vases, mesmerisingly fragile, out of reach on rows and rows of shelves, just one of many in a big dollar business.
Don’t we just love flowers?
Art by Yuken Teruya
~
These were some thoughts I had from a moment of window shopping a few weeks back. The Window Display was by Louise Vuitton actually. It looked like an artwork in that moment.
*please do contact me if you would be interested to publish my story elsewhere – and comments/feedback are welcome! ^^ Always looking to hone my writing.
A short story about one man’s grapple with life’s ends.
~
Light from the monitor’s screen continued to shine in its blue glare as the bespectacled man picked up his phone. Someone had sent him an urgent text, and he wondered what it was about. Very rarely did he receive texts from this number. It was an acquaintance from a past long gone. A past of glory and peak in his work. Not to say that it was no longer the heyday for him. In fact, his heydays had just begun. With less delegations than before, he felt happier with the time bequeathed him to ponder over things that mattered much more.
As one’s sun rises in the day and stands tall at noon, it descends towards the golden hours of the evening. Within rounds of the clock, it welcomes the rise of a new sun in the next dawn. Such is the cycle of all things, in work, success, and life itself. One had little choice but to let go.
Clicking on the notification, the pop-up opened, revealing a new message from an old friend. A line of text stood across a flash of black, still and silent like monuments in a single ensemble. With a full-stop the train had ended. An air of finality. A sinking feeling robbed his heart of a beat.
“She just died this morning.”
Alone in the room, a silence punctured deep down. A dark hole had formed.
~
The hall was quiet yet alive with people. A sombre mood filled the dense air as eulogies were spoken, and heads were bowed by the glow of the cross.
There were Buddhists, Muslims, Taoists, Catholics, and Christians in the church. But it did not matter. Everyone had convened that day to attend to the one thing that had brought them together. Life and death itself.
A wooden coffin lay at the heart of the hall, covered in flowers that, despite their colours, seemed hung with heaviness.
The man stood among the masses. His colleagues were with him, some silent, some talking about memories of their senior. Others who knew nothing of her in person joined the chatter.
It had taken him a while to get back to his senses, sitting in that quiet room. Having felt the minutes gone by he decided he must get up. Rising, the colour had drained from his body and the floor felt cold to the heels when they touched. Opening the door, he saw his wife, and she sensed the shadow that had passed his face and stayed there, painted. They hugged, and he told her what had happened. Sorrow flowed from her, and she caressed him in a deep embrace, sending comfort as a wetness clouded his vision and her features.
Yet, the shadow did not seem to pass.
Not even now.
He forced a smile and glanced at some of his colleagues. They were reminiscing.
He opened his mouth to speak. Yet, nothing seemed to want to come out. And he found himself turning back, looking at the coffin again.
She had always been a powerful force, brutally honest, and for very good reason. Never the most welcomed in meetings or social gatherings, yet the person whose opinion little would doubt. For she was that straightforward, and straightforward people are hard to come by.
A fatal blood clot had formed in her heart. In less than an instant during her daily run, her body had entered an Ischemic stroke. By the time the paramedics had come, it was too late to save her.
Was it truly her time to go?
He could not help but wonder. She was less than ten years his senior.
And gone, just like that.
Looking at the coffin, he saw her lying in there, hands crossed peacefully in floral embalm. She looked to be in a deep, everlasting, sleep.
What was salvation? And who exactly needs saving now?
The figure morphed. He saw himself.
When would it be his time to go as well?
Was he even ready to go?
He caught hold of these self-centred thoughts, and tried to shrug them off. The moment was about her, not himself.
But such is the nature of death, it unites us all, yet isolates us in its prompts to introject!
It spares no one.
Quietly, the man felt his hands rub against each other in a tired clasp. The thoughts had begun to weigh down upon him in a dark, grey cloud, visible to none, save for himself.
He heard her boisterous voice in the background as she dishes out criticisms on a project, hands gripping paper slides in the scene at the back of his mind.
A smile crept slowly over his cracked lips. What a person she had been, such strength and honesty; such horror had she stoked in the faces of many, every a work meeting.
The rain had stopped, and a soft sunlight had seeped in through the stained glass. It cascaded down the stone walls, landing on the coffin, illuminating it as dust glimmered in the rising air.
Then, like a spark, it dawned upon him; the realisation of something.
She had left, but she was living on. Inside him, inside his colleague, and all who knew her. And who actually cared.
What is life but a train of memories, a path of legacy imprinted through how others remember us, not for what we had but how we treated them?
It is but a train of many moments.
Moments, it seems, that vanish as quickly as mists from fleeting breaths.
~
I wrote this story with inspiration from my father’s experience. Less than two days ago he had received a sudden text one afternoon, notifying him of the death of his senior at work. She had left this world, but her spirit and memories live on in the hearts of many, among whom is my father. It took him a while to recover for it had been so sudden.
Life and death are things we acknowledge but which we don’t really talk about. Perhaps someday there will be a time when we can talk about it openly without having to fear any taboos on the topic. It is a topic that is painful, but something we cannot ignore given it seeps in the threads of our being, of nature and of life itself.
Here’s to life and to death.
Wishing everyone well, and stay safe.
-Ai Wei
*Please do contact me for queries if you would like to feature any of my writings on your website/publication. And please do credit me – let’s support creativity with integrity <3.
This short story has been submitted to CRAFT, and I am pending their response. Crosses fingers (eek).
Wow. I never thought I would start writing fiction. Yes, that’s right, fiction. The last time I touched the genre was in my younger days in Secondary school, or early Primary…? It’s hard to pinpoint these exact dates when time just flies by like that. I think it was Primary 6. I remember though, how I scribbled something about a warrior princess (yes, oh my goodness, it was those days with Studio Ghibli and Naruto influences) and just stopped less than halfway into the intro because the words just could not seem to flow through me. It felt intimidating after that, and I gave up writing fictive things altogether. I thought I wasn’t cut out for it. It never left me though.
How does one produce things as fast as the mind imagines them?
Have you ever ‘seen’ an idea randomly play out in your mind like a movie? It felt like that for me even after that day and ideas just kept coming to my head.
Look at that tree, wow, it looks like it could become a dryad – it’s dissolving in the wind as the train passes by. Look, it’s the same uncle sweeping the fallen leaves again. There are some flowers on the ground as well. Maybe he knows something about the garden that we don’t. What about the two siblings quarrelling at the traffic light? They are carrying schoolbags. Are they arguing about who found a golden egg first? What will be of the golden egg? Will it contain chocolate larvae? A thousand butterflies?
source: Unsplash
There’s a limit to how fast we can type or draw and it’ll never be as quick as our imagination (at least, in my experience. If anyone has found a way to achieve this, please do show me how). Sometimes I wish it were possible to write/draw at the rate of how fast ideas grow in my head like the speed of a sapling, fast-forwarded fifty times. For our human capabilities, it seems natural to be disproportionately slower for tangible production than thought. Maybe that’s the beauty of it; we are forced to take our time to savour the ideas in our head, replay them – every memory and every line, to carefully express them in whatever mediums we choose. The process is slow, but it is heartfelt and even more meaningful.
Now that I’ve just ended my 1st semester of my 4th year at University, I am feeling a hunger to write down the ideas that had always hid away in my mind, as time had been spent on writing other things for academia and work.
I started writing my first reflective passage of the series solely for the sake of it on a Monday, 22nd of November, 2021. It was inspired by a shop window at Ion City, among other things (I choose not to reveal the brand name because this is not an advertising post, jokes).
The second passage came to fingertips on the second day, the 23rd, inspired by an old memory of a fallen bird’s nest. The third came next, haunted by recent readings from Yusof Noah Harrari’s Sapiens, and the random thought, “with nowhere we begin with somewhere”.
Unexpectedly, more and more ideas began flowing and characters knocked on my door like visitors from a long time past, and the list of short stories to complete grew and grew. Now, the list stands at 13. Counting the other ideas I have stored in my mind it is at least 15. Many of them are short bouts of inspiration, scenes of a woman looking down at her bowl in the night, remembering her mother, or of a man in the underground looking for light, and a young boy trapped in a labyrinth of old books. I hope to complete all these stories, though the road will be slow and long. With the characters, it is like a journey; every line we write brings more colour to their life, increasing its complexity, richness, and textuality. Not walking with them to the end of their paths is such a waste.
source: Evening Standard
Which is why I’ve begun to write again, not for the deadline of any graded essay, but for these stories I’ve met in my life. Even for the essays we write for work or school, they are expressions on their own with something to learn about ourselves and the world in each piece.
Thinking about it now, perhaps one key thing that has allowed these story seeds to be penned down now is something very simple but scary: not being so afraid of failure anymore. As a child, we live in an ‘ideal’ fantasy world of our imagination. But as a child, we are also supposed to be exploring. It felt the opposite for me. As I grew up I came to realise failure is not as daunting as it seems anymore. It’s a gift instead. With each scrunched paper or fall from a trip you learn something about the story’s needs, or whatever your project needs. It took a while for me to understand this in fuller clarity. If today were your last day, what is one of the things that you would like to do to so that you can leave without regrets?
I hope I can finish all these stories before I die.
May they come to bloom with time. They’ve taught me something very important: to enjoy the small things in life.
From a bowl of soup, a friend’s smile, to the warmth of a relative’s hand, it all makes our life one precious story on its own.
This will be where I document my writing journey, and the story of my stories starts with this step.
Thanks for reading this and I wish you a good day with a story of your own!
The Writing Den 