sowing the seed

I had the most beautiful dream last night, but I somehow can't understand it.

Mr. K was undoubtedly my most important teacher. I was lucky to have met him in a difficult time in my life; he taught me to breathe and keep myself hydrated, and he taught me to look myself in the mirror every morning and understand that nobody could ever be the same as me. He taught me about love, and he taught me about trust. In this dream he was my teacher again, but he seemed to be either a professor or a master in some institute. I never saw him in the dream. I just knew that he was there, and that he was once again a part of my life.

Professor K had a very unique morning ritual, in which his students sowed seeds in a dry, yellow field of grass. Three students every morning, and each time it was a different group of 3. It began with a salutation to the earth; the student assigned this task bowed before the field, and I can't remember if the air was stale or balmy. He/she seemed to have a spiritual connection to the earth, and seemed to be asking for its blessing? But blessing to do what? The second student ran around the field, seemingly infinitely because he/she was more of an aura than a being. I didn't see the end of the field; I believe the second student just existed across the field, and he/she was most likely spreading seeds all around. I know this because the third student was the one to water the field. The second student was running, but it wasn't clear for what. The third student stood at the edge of the field (it had a beginning but no end), and expelled water (not sure if it was from the hands or from the chest or whatever), feeding the seeds. That's all I remember, but I was aware that this process happened every morning. And although the scene seems lifeless, it was actually very beautiful to experience. It felt like life was being created, and that something was being learned.

The song I immediately had in mind to go along with this visual was Ryuichi Sakamoto's "Sowing the Seed," from Nagisa Oshima's Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence. A close second was Joe Hisaishi's "Path of the Wind," from Studio Ghibli's My Neighbor Totoro. Both remind me of nature, growth, and cycles. They sound like they may never end, and they sound like this limitless quality has a purpose. I think of God, and of fate.

..connie..

cheesy line from a cheesy taiwanese rom-com

一個女生對你好是因為她關心你，絕對不是因為她認為你有什麼資格可以去愛她。不要讓她失望，好不好？

..connie..

Conversation with my 16 year old self

"Does it? Well, being in love today is probably completely different from being in love 40 years ago, you know, with technology and everything. Doesn't spending time face to face with another person seem so much more valuable nowadays?"

He thought for a moment. Or at least pretended to. I could tell already that he disagreed with me, from the way his eyebrows rose ever so slightly, smoothing out the crinkles at the corners of his eyes.

"Not really," he said at last. "Love isn't quantified by how much two people see of each other. If anything, it's defined by how long they can survive without seeing each other and still have the same feelings."

..connie..

flame.

Because this apparently wasn't even that bad

I am the most necessary form of destruction,
Given to man to overpower the gods yet
I can not deny my ability to decimate them all.
Layer by layer I peel back the onion that is this Earth,
Or is it an enduring gobstopper?
My role rotates between playing the hero to assuming the villain part,
And in this game I never settle.

I dance in the trees, rubber, plastic, oil, glass,
But never alone.
I dance in Michael Jackson’s hair but I can’t stand by myself.
Prometheus said I would be a hero,
But I am a reliant yet untamed lion --
No roar except when provoked, and in that situation I become
A monster. 

 

..connie..

An Unimaginable Other Plane of Existence

Call it overanalyzing The Flash, paying too much attention to my ACT practice tests, or the beginning of the next, most post-modern and abstract sci-fi-superhero comic series, anything you want... I know I rarely ever talk nonsense (Nonsense! Actually I always talk nonsense... Well, never something as nonsensical as this), but you've got to hear me out on this one:

Imagine a world we cannot see. Imagine a world we cannot hear, taste, touch, or smell, simply because it belongs on the fifth plane of existence (okay -- I know the fifth plane exists but I'm not smart enough to understand physics but as I've said this is nonsense). We know the three dimensions that make up what we see on a day-to-day basis, and then there's the concept of time, which is always running and running and running and running (out). That makes four dimensions "tangible" to us humans. But just think: What if the reason we are unable to find life on another planet is because we are not, and never will be able to imagine it? What I mean is, there must be another plane of existence apart from the one we know.

The reason this is so hard to describe is because this world I'm trying to imagine is so completely different from ours. No, you don't understand, it's different on a whole other level. I'm not just talking about your typical alien story, where they speak different languages and don't wear clothes and send out different waves we cannot receive. I mean to say that the way they do things are things we will never, ever even think of doing. I can't give an example because mankind will never achieve it, no matter how much we know.

Okay, how about this (how bout dat): Maybe you can't touch them. Maybe they perceive each other in a different way. Humans see each other with eyes, but perhaps those who live on the Second Existence (I'll just call it that for now) don't need to see to perceive one another. They don't need to touch, to smell, to hear, to taste. They sense one another in an unimaginable way, a way that I have no word for because it will forever be unknown. 

You know how we need oxygen to survive? Maybe they have no concept of air. Maybe they have no concept of the four planes I've mentioned before. Maybe there's no concept of space or time to them, and they will never be able to imagine them just as we cannot imagine their concepts. I'm not sure if I'm getting my point across, or if some scientists have a better way of explaining this concept/it's already common sense to them. But I just find it so intriguing -- something so inexplicable! This Second Existence... My mom told me to write a novel about it but it's nearly impossible unless I start making up words like gulyak and enris (hey, I used to be pretty good at making up words for my fantasy stories) without being able to explain what they are. Nobody would ever get it, and I guess that's okay. Even if there's a whole other universe of opportunities, I think the world is already big enough. 

Okay. I'm pretty sure you didn't read/comprehend all of that, but if you did, sorry for wasting your time xD I probably sound like an idiot now.

BYE

..connie..

靜心湖

It is past noon. A cool breeze sends shivers down the green water’s surface, different ripples criss-crossing in infinite directions. On one side of the lake the sun reflects itself, dancing like a fire at night. The birds sing, hidden away in the trees that have yet to shrivel and shy away from winter’s touch. Only a single one of these winged creatures makes its way across the sky, flying alongside the wind on this cloudless day. I’ve come to realize that this this lake is completely man-made: we’d dug the lake, filled it with water, and planted trees around them, thus attracting the wildlife that makes the music here. The only exception is the wind -- the trees still sing with each gust, and the water still rocks itself in unrest. The wind is the spirit of this lake, the one that brings here action. When the leaves scratch one another and the water splashes against itself, propelling the mallards to the vastness of this place… I see that the wind brings new oxygen to the lake and keeps the cycle of life here fresh and eternal. In a nearly controlled environment, wind is capriciousness, the reason for the differences we see each and every day. Without it, stillness will show its man’s vulnerability without nature: the same, the same, the same.

..connie..

Mightier

The words of a wise diplomat echo in my head that the pen is mightier than the sword, and the way I see it is that your mind shouldn’t be going to war with itself. Yes, some of today’s pens have adapted to have flashlight functions -- to emit their own light -- yet swords can only capture the rays from the Sun and reflect them outwards -- taking unoriginal ideals and being forced to stand for them. The moment I first held a pen I felt frustration. You couldn’t erase the marks… What would others say of my mistakes? For the longest time I resorted to the magic that was white-out, but realized how ugly it made my work: ripped, bumpy, and deliberate. But over time, I got over the fear of judgement and discovered its possibilities: the freedom of expression and peace of mind it induced, despite a period of unremitting doubt -- an internal battle in the process.

Of all the stories, a family favorite is one of me writing about a particular Chinese idiom: two characters on the beach fight over a toy, only to have it taken by a third. Before my perception of the world became as tainted as it is today, I penned freely, and one peculiarity was that the story mentioned above, as well as those about an enchanted forest, running away, and digging holes, were all children of my own mind -- and not reinventions of them after being girded by a bracelet of glass that shattered my impression of creativity and wonder. Never thinking the time would actually come, I sank to an especially low point when I was made to believe the only purpose of the pen was to please and satisfy others.

4th grade began, and every afternoon for three months was spent wracking my brain for ideas: what I’d do with a million dollars, a person who changed my life, why I thought Barack Obama would be re-elected… These “daily essays” were meant to foster innovation and critical thinking, but for me they turned into dread lingering in the back of my mind. It became a chore, these classes, and I quickly lost interest in the one thing that brought me solace in times of metaphorical recession and drought. Slowly, I began to accept this notion on writing: that it was a learned skill with a specific formula. Drained from the inhibiting and forced imagination, I searched for a way out, trashing pens regardless of their value, and resorting to violent quakes inside my brain that I refused to let escape.

I found years later that running away and giving in to the controlling sword was a solution for the cowardly, and the accumulated feelings from hiding were the most hindering of them all. Like a dammed river, my natural beauty was stripped away, but the moment I opened my eyes and saw the man-made construct that held my inborn faculties back, I knew my freedom had to be retrieved. I took up the pen once again after giving up on myself for so long, and it didn't matter to me anymore who was reading and what their opinions were. 

A realization and sudden impetus made the world stop shaking; a pencil case full of new colors and possibilities made me turn around and press on. Because I'd chosen to come through rocks lodged in Mount Everest, the permanence of pen marks no longer bothered me. They depict my journey from naive to expressive creativity, from a child who spilled her jumbled mind on paper to the girl who now realizes its importance at the time. They were the embodiment of my ambition, my potential, and now finally my perseverance. I can now say I am persistent in reaching my goals, and in changing myself because I have the power to. The sloping letters I make with what can't be dissolved are the heights I can reach and all the things I hope to do; they are a fortune of gold, and worth more than external forces ever will be. The pen is mightier than the sword: it's a rather satisfying sensation to not have to fight yourself for what you believe. I realized my writing, my pen, was mine, and at last I let the swords dull and the voices fade away.

..connie..