reeding

Finished Jane Eyre today, amazing classic with all my favourite theme(s), i.e. feminism.  I absolutely admire her calm and composed nature - nothing can derail her or extract more expressive countenances from her usual phlegmatic state. I wished I could be less easily excitable myself sometimes (and also less foul-mouthed as a result) ;)

Jane rejects the marriage proposal of master of Thornfield Hall, Mr Rochester, because he was already married to a lunatic which he keeps locked up. I couldn't for the life of me understand why Jane would leave him because they obviously were so in love. But then again it wouldn't make a good story, would it? And she is admirable because she stood for her independence, rather than be fussed over and be forced in a subordinate position, even to the love of her life. She wanted to be an equal to her husband, who isn't good-looking but has an excellent mind. 


Also, her ability to look past physical appearances and appreciate the spirit living in the shell of a human body is noteworthy. (But then again maybe she taught as such, because she wasn't much of a beauty herself.)


Moving on to 1984 :)

get well mum

Why do we feel so guilty about having fun? About indulging in pleasurable activities? About wasting time? Why do we always hold back when we're enjoying too much?

would a bridge builder, decades after building that one bridge across a dangerous abyss, still be fretting about whether the bridge is intact, whether the back-up catches still work, and whether there were any casualties?

some words were never meant to be said.
not if you paid.
or even with extra booze

can anyone be stable all the time?

curb the kerb

the kerbs at bbdc's driving circuit must feel like doormats.

goodbye, i'm off to thailand! :)

Luh-luh-luh-laryngitis

The past 2 months have been trying, to say the least. Being a 'social animal', not being able to talk (much less sing...!) is the worst feeling. No kidding. All the comments I could have said stay inside me and make me want to implode with gibberish and random words taken out of context. I realise that I COULD get used to nodding mutely and pretending to be a demure girl who has no comments to everything because she doesn't have any brains! Or not.

Aaaaanyway, aside from the emotional trauma my nodule-ridden vocal cords have given me, two months is a pretty long time for self-reflection. So I've lived as a pseudo-introvert instead of being the noisy empty vessel that I usually am, and like they say, still waters run deep. I think I blogged once before about when you're constantly talking, you actually don't have much time to think. And so thinking was what I did!

2 lessons learnt from my bout of laryngitis:

1) Listening to songs as a full work, not just the main melody

Being the wannabe vocalist that I am, I previously listened to my music concentrating around 70% of my attention hearing the vocalist. The lyrics, the tune of the melody, and what kind of voice she was using. I placed very little emphasis on the rest of the band, like the bass, drums, and the backing vocals. I didn't use to be able to tell the harmonies apart. But because I don't sing, I can't imitate the singer in my head, and in fact trying to do so brings the painful (literally) reminder that I can't. Which makes me feel even worse about myself. 

So I focused more on what I should have! I'm not saying that I do now, but I'm trying! Also, I've ventured into checking out music that are not vocalist-driven, a practice that I realise was incredibly myopic (and also a tad selfish) of me in the past.

One downside is that it's difficult to write songs when you're mute. It's hard to think of nice melodies when you can't sing them to hear how they sound.

2) Some things can be left unsaid, and thinking before you speak is an excellent habit

Saying stuff that doesn't add value only wastes air-time and the limited vocal card HP. And talking less actually lets people around you talk more! One-liners that hit home are more memorable than 10 lines that mean nothing. Someone should quote me for class-part!

Yeah 2 lessons for 2 months of ego-torture. 

Time to get back to mugging lit so I can teach it tomorrow x

dragging on rock bottom recently. not being able to talk is taking everything from me.

i'm going crazy i'm waiting for something to happen.

bor-eein muh arsh uff

how can anyone bring themselves to plough through so much drivel? it's so boring my grandma would cry.

rarent

When you don't feel like letting any part of your private life out of your own mind, there is a problem. Either you're not fluent enough to manage phrasing what you feel into coherent language, or you're just not interesting anymore. Or you just need to maintain this perpetually happy, un-human image of yourself all the time. I'm not weak. I can't be.

Is this really doing me any good? What do I want out of this? What is in this for me? I bet you must have asked yourself those questions a million times. Now I know how you feel.

I tell myself I'm happy by myself. And I can keep telling myself that. But the truth is, I can't breathe every time I see someone like you. And it's been a year. 

My thoughts are all over the place. I should pick up a book.