I am the first astronaut to arrive on a new, uncharted planet and I get to leave a note to those who come after me.. There are a lot of ways I could go about this.. But this is possibly what I’d write..
Daily Post brings out the creepy side in me..
“Dear human,
The last one didn’t make it. What makes you think you will?
Good luck making it home..!
Forever looking at you,
You-know-who-darling“
If only I could also leave a camera there to record their faces as they read it..
I am the first astronaut to arrive on a new, uncharted planet and I get to leave a note to those who come after me.. There are a lot of ways I could go about this.. But this is possibly what I’d write..
Daily Post brings out the creepy side in me..
“Dear human,
The last one didn’t make it. What makes you think you will?
Good luck making it home..!
Forever looking at you,
You-know-who-darling“
If only I could also leave a camera there to record their faces as they read it..
Have you ever had that feeling where you’re so lost you have no idea what to do or where to look?
You’re trying to find an escape, but you feel like you’re in the middle of the ocean, surrounded by nothing but water .
Everything feels dull. No matter what you do, there’s a part of you that’s missing.
But here’s the problem, you don’t know what it is that you’re missing. At times, it feels like you’re missing everything.
At times, it feels like you’re not really missing anything. You’re, in fact, stuck with all the things one could imagine.
Except the things you want.
You’re surrounded by the people you love, who love you and yet you feel unloved.
You laugh and it feels like you’re doing it through someone else’s body.
Your life becomes a routine. You’re a machine that knows :
Get up. Brush. Shower. Eat. Watch TV. Go out. Look like you’re having fun. Change. Sleep.
Nothing stays in your head. Nothing except an empty feeling. A need to be somewhere else. To have something else.
But you don’t know where. If you know where, you don’t know how to get there.
It’s like getting to Neverland and meeting Peter Pan.
Yet it feels so realistic in your head. Like it’s right there. But you can’t touch it.
You want a particular someone, or rather just anyone, to walk up to you and pick you up.
To mend the broken pieces that only you can see.
To hold you close until you’re all fixed up and can stand on your feet again.
To tell you, no matter what, tomorrow will be a better day.
But even as you read this, you know, no matter what they say, you won’t believe it.
Waking up tomorrow is a pain you don’t want.
You stay awake all night and sleep all day because it’s your way of avoiding conversations during the day.
You push people away and they have no clue that it’s hurting you more to do that, than it’s hurting them.
But you can’t let them in. You can’t let them too close.. You can’t let them see..
That even if you look like you’re having fun.. Even if you’re smiling..
Deep inside, your heart is dying.
I don’t know about the rest of the world, but when I watched fairytales as a kid, I didn’t really melt over the concept of a man and woman getting together. I connected with the love that lasts happily ever after. That kind of love that saw no bounds. Like the love from a mother to her child, the love you feel for your first best friend, the love you have for someone that helped you when you were living your worst nightmare, the love you have for your father, your siblings..
Ultimately, the love you feel when you find that one person that fires up your heart. The person who makes your eyes shine with unknown emotions every time they walk in to the room. The person who brings you out of your shell and makes you feel comfortable in your own skin. Someone who accepts you for who you are instead of what they want you to be.
That’s how one feels about their hometown as well. It’s the place that saw you through your good times and bad. The place that lit you up when you felt low. The place where you grew up. The place where you learnt good from bad. The place where you figured out who you are.. The reason it holds that soft spot in your mind is because no matter where you go or who you become, if you ever forget yourself, you come back home and it’ll remind you..
But imagine not having the ability to be yourself at home? The place that’s supposed to support you is now asking you to retreat your steps until you’re back in that closet.. Now, shut the door and hide there. Because if you dare to walk out, you’ll be jailed.
I woke up this afternoon and did the first thing I do everyday. Facebook. The first post on my NewsFeed :-
“Homosexuality illegal : Supreme Court.”
It took me a good two minutes to gather my thoughts and my emotions and I realized, I wasn’t just hurt or upset. I was outraged. This was by far the most ridiculous thing my country had ever done. Which was surprising considering how many they’ve been doing lately. Every time my mother left my country to go visit another one she would say, “Nothing like India. The friendliness, the hospitality, the love.. You can’t find it anywhere else.” Today, I had something to prove her wrong. Because, today, my country had chosen not to support love. Today, my country shut its doors on kids, adults that were not like them. Today, my country chose to say I will love you for what I want you to be, not for who you are. Today, my country decided to turn its back on the people that need its acceptance and love the most.
Remember that feeling I was talking about? That love that turns your world upside down? Making you look at things differently and feel things differently? Here’s the problem with that. Your emotions don’t see what the world and your brain asks you to. Your emotions don’t know caste, race, ethnicity or gender. Your emotions don’t understand the difference between a man, a woman and a transgender. Like the famous romantic-comedy movie title, Love Happens.. You can’t stop it and you can’t run away from it and you sure as hell cannot turn it off just because the people around you think it’s unnatural, immoral and “disease spreading.”
I would like to think that well-educated, well-knowledged people would have the ability to understand something this simple. LOVE IS LOVE. No matter who you are, where you’re from, what you do or how you look. Homosexuality is proof for that.
Someday, this decision will change. Someday, my country, like many others, will pick love over laws. Until that day, I will stand strong and fight for those people who deserve the chance to love and be loved. I will fight till those closet doors break open. I will fight till the people around me can turn those doors to wings and fly high, showing off who they are, with pride, for every one to see. Until that day..
When I was 15, my mother cursed me, “One day, you’ll have a daughter that’s just like you. Then you’ll realize how much we’ve suffered as your parents.” Back then I thought ‘Suffer? These people don’t realize what a blessing I am. I’ll be happy to be my parent!’
When I was in high school, I wanted to be the most popular girl in my class. I sort of was. But not for the reasons I wanted to be.
When I was 16, I wanted to be a singer. Now I know, instead of selling out Madison Square Garden, I’d have cleared it out.
Sometimes, who we are and what we want aren’t always in sync. For example,
The times when we want to be the life of the party but we can’t because we’re too shy.
The times when we look at someone drinking wine and enjoying modern art and wish we could do that but we can’t because we don’t understand “Modern Art.”
The times when we want to go bungee jumping, but we’re not brave enough.
The times when we want to just pack our bags and travel around the world, but we’re not adventurous enough.
The times when we want to be – the classy Audrey Hepburn type people, the ones that lead an organized life, the ones who know how to eat a Subway without spilling the vegetables on the tray – but we can’t because – we’re too messy, we pick comfort over looks and we enjoy our Subways too much to care about spilling.
Our lives have always been and will always be a battle of Who we are vs. What we want. But with time and life experiences, we grow wiser. We understand who we are and our wants become more realistic, more of who we are.
Today I can accept that I was wrong while I pray that my mother’s curse doesn’t come true. Because today I know..
A blessing to my parents isn’t who I am.. It’s what I want to be.
Five items I would need with me if I’m stranded on a deserted island. I’m starting to really like Daily Prompt‘s writing topics.
Well, I’d like to say phone and computer and tv and social media.. but let me be realistic.. I’m sure I’d lose interest and possibly, battery charge. Besides, I highly doubt I’d get good network there..
So here’s what I’d want :
A sketchbook and some artist supplies
A writing pad and a pen
A few lighters – I have no interest in rubbing stones together hoping I can create fire..
A recipe book
And a few months’ supply of curry powders
Just to add one more,
A BIG NEON HELP SIGN TO PUT OUT HOPING SOMEONE WOULD GET ME OUT OF THERE !
Cory Montieth, 31, died in July this year. Paul Walker, 40, died in a car crash on November 30. Someone else I know, 23, is battling for his life for over three months now. It’s sad. It’s depressing. It’s shocking, really. None of them ever thought this would happen to them… Their age makes me think “For all you know, it could be me..” What if it does end up being me?
Before YOLO became the biggest thing on the internet. Before I knew anything about the internet, an incident.. or should I say disaster?.. changed my life, changed the way I live it.
December 26, 2004.. Earthquakes and a Tsunami destroyed lives, destroyed families, destroyed homes..
I was supposed to be at the beach with my father that morning, but I’d overslept. I woke up and jumped with joy about leaving and my parents told me there’d been a Tsunami. I had no idea what it meant but with time, I understood it and I wished I hadn’t..
I’ll never forget what it did to me. I remember the TV ads asking for help. I remember switching channels because I couldn’t listen to that music, couldn’t watch those images. I remember crying under my blankets praying for those lives and those children who just lost their parents.. I remember my mother telling me about this woman who’d killed herself out of depression, a child who’d had a heart attack because the ads were too depressing. I remember wanting to help those kids. I even took a bag of my clothes and went to the beach, to the families living in tents on the streets because their houses were gone. I gave them clothes and in minutes, my car was surrounded by kids asking for food and clothes.. I was terrified, depressed, pissed with the universe..
How many people woke up that day with plans? How many had had a fight the previous night and told themselves “Today, I’ll fix it..” but never got the chance to? For one second, forget the dead.. Imagine the ones sitting at home who never got to tell their loved ones “I love you” “I forgive you” “I need you” “I miss you”.. Praying they were the ones dead and not the other person.. Hoping that the people searching the waters find their loved ones’ body so they could go ahead and do what they had to? Imagine waking up late on a Sunday morning, turning on the TV and realizing, your friend, your family, someone you know was probably dead by now. I always imagine someone with a coffee cup turning on the TV and dropping that cup with shock..
I swore to myself, it doesn’t matter if the other person doesn’t want to hear it. I’ll always tell everyone – the ones I like, the ones I love, the ones I hate – how I feel about them. I will never miss an opportunity. I will make the most out of my life. As a teenager, all it did for me was get me into trouble. But with time, experience and a lot of mistakes, I’ve learnt to fine tune that attitude. I’ve learnt what LIVE NOW means to me. What SPEAK NOW means to me.
It may not always mean the same to everyone. But to me, Live Now means doing something with my life. Helping myself and everyone else around me. I’ve learnt that Live Now does not mean I have to go bungee jumping and skydiving as soon as possible. It means I need to help the ones in need. So even if I’m gone, I would’ve made a better life for someone who gets to live.
And as for Speak Now, it doesn’t matter whether it’s my parents, my siblings or just a crush, I have and will continue to tell them what they mean to me. I’ll tell them how much I care and how important they are to me. I’ve learnt to keep the hate to myself though – Because if you don’t have something nice to say, don’t say anything..
So here’s a piece of advise to anyone that’s reading.. Do you have a dying need to do something – for yourself or anyone around you? Do it today. If it’s a long-term plan, start working on it. Do you have a loved one? Tell them today. What if you never get another chance?
Funny how just this afternoon I was writing/ drawing fake tattoos with a black pen and hey ! Daily Prompt decides to pick my brain..
I don’t have a tattoo yet..
But I want to get a small infinity sign on the inner side of my left ankle .. maybe like a 2cm x 2cm in size..
And my dream tattoo would be on the side of my ribcage..
Something similar to this :
But with the words :
Thou shall not live
Should thou not believe in
Fairytales
Because.. .. ..well, it never hurts to believe in a little luck, a little romance, a little love and a lot of magic.. does it?
(Pic Courtesy : Google)
I always scroll through the different topics that Daily Prompt puts up, but today, this topic caught my attention.
http://dailypost.wordpress.com/2013/11/28/prompt-fear-factor/
I feel like a child as I say this, but my biggest fear – Movie Ghosts. Not the kind that comes covered in a white cloth from head to toe like in Caspar. Definitely not. But pretty much everything else.
Mummy Returns (Or was it just Mummy?) with the cockroaches that came out of his mouth? I think I was about 8 or 9 when I saw that movie and I refused to take the elevator in fear that I would be trapped with no escape incase those cockroaches came out of no where.
Ring was my first scary movie ever ! For a very long time I could always imagine this innocent girl at the right bottom end of my bed with no desire to hurt me but always had a longing look on her face. Almost as if I had something she didn’t. Something she wished she had. As I grew into my teens, I got over it for a while.
Then came Paranormal Activity. “The fear is always of the unknown,” my father used to say. It did not help my case that not only did the movie not have a face for the ghost, but it sat at the bottom right corner of the bed like the ghost I’d imagined did.
Grudge (2, I think) had a scene where there were eyes in the walls. That night somehow I slept really well. I was surprised how I wasn’t scared anymore. Until a few days later, I was awake real late at night and I stared right into the glass bookshelf in my room and the edge of a shiny hard cover book shone from the moonlight and thought they were eyes staring at me and screamed.
I should know better by now, but I still cannot turn off the lights if my blankets aren’t covering my face. I cannot sleep in silence because even the smallest noises scare me.
Yet, I love scaring myself. I watch a lot of scary movies, but I still keep away from movies like The Conjuring. I cried with fear after I watched the trailer for that movie and somehow I still went on Google and searched for the real story. The real doll. I guess this is my way of hoping at some point I’ll snap out of it. That if I know the true story and I know that the doll or whatever ghost is locked up somewhere safe, I don’t have to be scared anymore. That maybe I’ll stop the loud music to kill the silence, rip the thick blanket away from my face and look at the dark without fearing that something might just pop up and say “Hello !”
And maybe with time, I will…
..who knows ?! 🙂
Are you a dreamer? Neverland? Wall Street? Unrealistic? Realistic? Do you lose yourself in those dreams and curse anything and anyone that wakes you up from them? You’re not alone. Peter Pan and Neverland have been my biggest dreams. Unrealistic and stupid for a grown up, some would say. But what do they know?
My inspirations, my role models and the people I look up to have always had one thing in common – they dreamt a dream and they chased it. It doesn’t matter if they caught it or not. It matters that they tried. If you know me, if you’ve trusted me with your dream, you know at some point in your life, I’ve pushed you to go after it. I’ve told you I’ll stand by you no matter what, as long as you’re trying to do something you love.
I was having a conversation with a man who looked to be in his 60’s, on an MRT, about dreams and he told me how his dream was to be an artist. He never pursued it. What kind of a career choice would that be? How would he provide for his wife and kids? “Don’t be an idiot that goes after silly things. Be smart. Have a secure future. Money in the bank, food on the plate. Nothing else matters,” he told me. Is that true? I think there’s more to life than money in the bank. What about waking up every morning and not wanting to whine about your shitty life? Imagine a life where you jump out of bed because you cannot wait to go live your life.. The racing heartbeat, the wide grin.. that feeling where you lose yourself while doing something you love that you forget the rest of the world? Imagine doing that everyday until you’ve had enough..
It’s never too early, it’s never too late. Dreams don’t care how old you are. Like I told him, “You don’t have to be 20 to chase your dreams. You can be 60 and still go join art school and pursue what you love.” And if for some reason your dream doesn’t work out, you can always go back to that secure future. In today’s world, age doesn’t matter. . You can be 49 and still start a secure life. But at least this time, you wont live your life wondering “What if..” You’ll know what happens. You’ll live with the satisfaction that you chased it, even if you didn’t catch it. And for all those who say “I can’t do what I want. It’s not what my parents/ spouse/ partner wants,” I’ve got ten words for you – People who love you will be happy that you’re happy.
So stop finding reasons. Stop finding excuses. Go dream a dream.. and chase it with all you’ve got. If you catch it, good for you.. If you don’t, it’s ok, there’s always the next one.. Just remember, you’ll never get there if you never try..
Loud Thoughts Voiced Out 