that's how i endured and came this far

one. i wonder what you see when you look at me now. when i look at you, i'm always amazed at how far you've come. we're always losing touch, but you seem like you have everything together and i wish you nothing but success.

two. the thing i admire most is your constant positivity and your unashamedness at being yourself. there are times when you're the only one who understands so i'm always grateful to have you around.

three. sometimes it's funny to think about how much you've grown since we first met. sometimes it's funny to think about how little you've grown. either way, thank you for being there for me in your own way, for showing me new things and always responding when i cry for help, and for trying your best.

four. even though we are so different now, living our own lives, i will always think of you fondly. when we do come back together, there's always nothing but love. here's to hoping that one day we will meet again. 

five. even though we haven't mended the gap that the years built between us, i'm so glad that we reconnected this year. you don't realise how much you miss until it's back. i truly hope that things get better for you. 

six. you always find a way to make me smile. i've always felt as though i can come to you about anything, big or small, serious or silly. 

seven. you exhaust me, but i'm thankful that we have things that we can share with each other, that we can talk about over and over again. you've showed me in different ways how much you care, even when i can't reciprocate. 

eight. you've (hard) carried me through all the difficult times. i know that i've not always been at my best, but you've always been there to support me. i'll do my best to make you proud. 

nine. you honestly seem like you're living your best life right now, and i'm so happy for you. i'm glad that we can still understand one another. 

ten. i hope you know that you'll always be special to me. thank you for your patience with me and for being by my side for as long as you were. thank you for loving me even when i didn't love myself. 

eleven. nobody promised that it was going to be easy, but i'm so proud of you for pushing through. i miss the days when we were closer, but i'll always be here for you if you need it. 

twelve. as time goes on, we're becoming more and more different, but i think that it's okay because the important things will remain. at the end of it, you're one of my favourites, even if i don't always understand you. 

thirteen. bfsfal. thank you for being in my life, for always holding my hand and being my cheerleader. there are so many memories between us. i hope you get everything that you wish for, because you deserve it all. 

fourteen. thank you for always making an effort and knowing that i'm not the best at being the first. i'm glad we're both still holding on and keeping this friendship alive because i love the person that you are growing into. 

fifteen. though i might question your thoughts and opinions a lot, they're always valid, and i'm proud that you're becoming someone strong enough to stand up and stick to what you believe. thank you for being the person for others that you wish you could have had for yourself. 

before you know it i'm lost at sea

I think that one of the hardest things to stop doing is overthinking, and I sometimes feel as though this is my biggest...problem? It seems to me that what makes it difficult to halt or prevent is the fact that thinking is, most of the time, not a conscious act. I catch myself overthinking things, situations, people, far too often, and even though I can recognise it, it isn't so easy as to just tell yourself to 'stop overthinking'. For me, that sparks a whole new set of questions: why am I overthinking this? Is it really such a big deal? Why does this upset/insert emotion of choice me? Maybe I should just get over myself? But why should I have to 'get over myself'? My feelings are still valid, even if they are irrational...

And so, you've become, once again,  lost in the torrential outpourings of your own mind.

Sometimes though, I wonder if C was right, when he told me those few years ago (though it feels like its been far longer since I was free of him) that my propensity for thinking, using qualifiers, and being too emotional made me difficult to talk to and get along with. Sometimes, looking at myself and my interactions with others objectively, I fear that he was right.

i start to part two halves of my heart in the dark

It's hard to feel like you're the only one being left behind. It's even harder to feel like nobody else even realises that they're leaving you behind.

I knew even before this year began that things would be hard. That I would be busy, that other people would be busy, that we would have to struggle to maintain at least some level of contact. It'll be okay, we said to each other. We'll work it out. We can't not. Because I can't imagine a life where we're not this close to one another. But sometimes now, it's like I'm the only one trying. It's as though, some time when I wasn't looking,  when I was too caught up in trying to make it through the every day, you moved on. Found something else, someone else. And they've filled up all the spaces that used to be me, filled up all the space and distance and everything between us and now. Now, do you even remember what we used to be? What I still want us to be. Do you even still want the same thing? Do you even still feel the same way? Would you even recognise me now?

I don't know.

Sometimes I feel like I'm not enough. Like I should have done more, made more opportunities for myself. It hurts to look at everyone else and know that they're going somewhere, doing something.

K and A and B and C have new work opportunities. O and M and V will be traveling before they settle down in their own dream jobs. M and S and K are all traveling because they can. C and T and S and A and L are enjoying all the perks of being on exchange. C and F are getting married. W and E are engaged. I don't remember when I last spoke to E, or N, or S, or G, all of whom used to--still are so close to my heart, even though I am (likely) not in theirs.

What am I doing?

cos i'm dreaming that i'm sinking again

it ain't easy you know, to leave the darkness behind

I feel sick every time I start working towards what's coming. There are too many things I still don't know, and not enough time to even begin to start learning. I shouldn't be so afraid, not when I knew this was what I was signing up for. But I am, and I was equally-but-probably-more terrified by it back then. I guess I thought that in the time leading up to it, I would learn to be okay. I'm not really sure why I thought that, not when even in the months leading up to that decision I was still bursting into tears in front of my class at having to stand up there. I've never been confident in any ability. 

Even just thinking about what I need to do makes my stomach constrict, makes me feel lightheaded, nausea creeping up in my throat and tears clouding my vision. 

At this point, it's basically just the fear of stopping that's keeping me going. There are ways to deal with just about anything. It's easier to not allow yourself to think beyond the next day, the next hour, the next minute, if that's what it takes. (It does.) Things will be okay. (But it's always hardest to believe.) 

Something else is that I'm tired. Tired of never having enough time for anything. For myself, for doing the things that I want or need to do, for seeing and spending time with the people that I want to see. I know that part of it is because this semester is structured so oddly, and I know that things will get better eventually, but it doesn't change how I feel. And I know that in these weeks to come, I'm just going to be more and more tired. Truth be told, I don't know if I'll be able to make it through without breaking down. I don't know if I can go for so long without a reprieve, without-- I'm a touch-dominant person, you know? And no matter what you can say to me, or how much I can tell myself that I believe it, believe you, these words are empty without the tangibility of you by my side. I need to be able to parcel away time where I can see you, take the time to remember who I am. 

I wish that I didn't feel like I'm falling apart in the first place. But I also wish that people wouldn't just believe me when I say I'm fine. This isn't to say that I want people doubting me all the time, or to think that I'm incapable of handling my own life, but when I think you know that I'm not going alright or that I'm lying to you and you don't make an effort, it hurts. More than it originally does. But nor do I want to be the type of person who is always falling on others; sometimes, it's felt as though they're secretly thinking, judging, wishing that I would just get over it (get over myself). 

I've never wanted to be needy, I've always wanted to be better than that, to be the type who is needed. But the fact remains that I am and I always have been not needed but needy. I'm sorry. 

don't try to hide, no need to lie

V and I haven't really spoken properly in about eight months or so. We used to be incredibly close but she moved away from Twitter, and even if I saw her on Skype, her name was always accompanied by the bright red sign of someone who was Busy and had Things To Do. I never wanted to feel like I was bothering her which is why it sort of came as a surprise the other day when I logged on and found a message waiting for me, asking if I was free on x date/time to video with her. I was, of course, because mostly my life revolves around activities that involve screaming on the internet and not on things in the outside world. 

So we Skyped, and had the lovely sort of conversation where you both catch up on each other's lives and talk about nothing at all at the same time. But at one point, she brought up how I come off as very nonchalant, perhaps even lackadaisical (her words) a lot of the time when it comes to school and the future. It's not the first time I've heard that kind of comment, and it kind of pulled me up short. I think it might be to do with my indecisiveness, but I do also think that I tend to try and project that sort of image at the same time. I want people to think that I can be so casual, so 随便 (as other V and J once put it) about these things because I am a capable, accomplished person. I don't want them seeing that I (like so many others, I know, I know) am struggling to hang on, that it is the fear of stopping that drives me onwards to finish. This isn't necessarily how they interpret it, but it's the way that I imagine they do.

The people who do know me know all too well how I need people to hold my hand through everything, how I can simultaneously tell someone not to worry about what I'm doing and cry to someone else about how I will never, ever be good enough, that I will never be enough for anyone. They know that I take pride in the fact that I'm keeping up despite being still younger than the rest of my cohort (because I do believe, to an extent, that age is not just a number) - as though it proves any assumptions they make that I am young and flighty from looking at me and seeing the way that I like cute clothes, the way that I'll always be passionate about cheesy Asian pop music, the way that I act silly, the way that I whine, wrong. 

It's easy to tell yourself not to validate yourself according to other people, that you are worth something and have accomplishments to be proud of, but it is not always so easy to carry out.

Also to note, dinnered with CCX on Friday night past at Le Citta on Degraves, complete with homemade chocolate from C, then met up with tlist on the Saturday for F4's birthday lunch at Kokoro Ramen and then for White Night. Brunched with D on Tuesday in the city, then went to touch all the people at O Week. Friends are good to have. 

21 love letters

♡ 01
I'm yours and I love you for who you are, for the ways that we are the same and yet different. I'll do what I can to make you proud and happy. I count myself lucky in so many ways, to not have to go through the same things that you have, but also to know you and your strength; I'm proud of you. There are very few times that I find myself irritated by you and I can't wait for the day that we come together again, this time as true friends who know each other.

♡ 02
We've drifted a fair bit, in recent months. But I think that's only to be expected, with the physical and time distances that separate us. I hope you know that no matter what happens to you, I love you, no matter what difference we may have in life or in perspective. We don't need to be in constant communication to care, but I'll always be here when you need me.

♡ 03
I love you for giving me so many memories, for helping me as a writer, for developing my sense of humor. I've told you everything I thought, good and bad, for a few years now. You listened. You talked. I listened. It'll be harder when you're far away, but I will always care. I feel incredibly myself around you, which is not true of all my friendships. I hope you feel the same way, and I hope it lasts forever.

♡ 04
You take care of me and you make me laugh; I feel so comfortable with you. I feel like I can talk to you about anything, joke with you about stupid things, trust you to guide me whenever things are difficult. To have you now makes me feel incredibly lucky. I'm so glad you're in my life, and I still hope to be whatever you need me to be. I hope that, as I grow up, as I mature, I come to truly appreciate you the way I should. Thank you for being you.

♡ 05
There are a lot of people in my life that I care for and give advice to, but somehow, you are more like a little sister than any of them. Thank you for trusting me enough to turn to me when you need someone. When you're down, remember that you're one of my most important people. I truly believe that things will get better. Let's work hard together.

♡ 06
I don't know if we'll ever be best friends, but  I like you a lot. I like spending time with you. I like joking with you and teasing each other. I think we share a lot of the same interests and values, and you're a lot of fun.

♡ 07
I love your intelligence and humor and elitism. I love you for spending time with me, for letting me get to know you. Your shoes are cute, your outfits are cute, YOU are cute. You always make me smile.

♡ 08
I don't always feel comfortable around you, but I know that's because I know you have so many qualities that I wish I had. I love you for always being thoughtful and concerned and sometimes, worrying too much, but always trying to look out for me. You're definitely one of the nicest people that I know.

♡ 09
You and I have a lot of memories. We have a lot of history and influence. We have a lot of empty space between us, but I don't think it changes the fact that we're important to each other. I hope not. Thank you for being there for me.

♡ 10
We haven't talked as much this year, but I understand what life is like. I will always understand, so please never worry if time lapses into months before we catch up. I will happily listen to anecdotes about your life, or complaints, or anything, because you're - I don't know quite what you are. Good friend, practically sister, someone I trust and admire and love deeply.

♡ 11
I may not be enough, and I can't do everything, but I hope I can still do (be) something for you. You've had a lot of impact in my life, even though I think you remain largely unaware of it. You're enthusiastic and sweet and one of my favourite people. I hope we can become even closer. I'm so happy for the opportunities that you've received, even though I'll miss having you around in my every day life.

♡ 12
I don't know how many times or how many ways I can say this, but you are incredible. You're one of the people I admire most in the world because of the way you live your life: you're so intelligent and observant. You're thoughtful. You're creative. You can make something out of your life, and I will be glad to know you.

♡ 13
I love you for your hard work, for being smart and (mostly) level-headed. I think we share a lot of priorities and hopes. You will live your own life and I will live mine, but there will always be something that ties us together, and I'm grateful for that. It's this thing we call friendship.

♡ 14
I'm glad we're keeping in touch and I hope it will always be true; distance will never separate us, because I will make every effort to close those distances. You're another person I feel like I can tell almost everything, no matter how different we are (and we are quite different). I hope we will never lose this. I will not let us ever lose this.

♡ 15
I love the way you make me laugh. I love the way you make me smile. I love the way you're familiar and beautiful and a reminder of some of the best times of my life. I love you for showing me what some of the most important things in life are. Thank you.

♡ 16
For all that I talk about how much I dislike you, I know you have qualities I admire. I know people like you for a reason. Hell, I like you well enough, and there are reasons for that too. I think you try (maybe not hard enough), but at least you try. Remember what's important and what's not; remember that you need to take time off and enjoy life (make memories), but remember that the priorities need to be put first.

♡ 17
I don't know how to define how I feel about you. Sometimes I don't know what to do with you, sometimes I feel as though I could be so easily replaced with you, sometimes I don't know what advice I can give you, but I will always listen and care. Sometimes I feel like you don't have your priorities straight, so take care of yourself, okay?

♡ 18
You're a combination of young and old for me, maybe because you're at an age where you're teetering on the edge of society's conceptions of this. You haven't had all the life experiences yet, and you don't quite get the intricacies of relationships. I don't mean to be patronising at all, because I know I'm still much the same: sheltered and "innocent" to many aspects of life. I think you have the most important priorities right, which will guide your life. Grow up, learn, be successful; you know what's important.

♡ 19
You're passionate. You care. You're a friend. Sometimes I think you're wise beyond your years, even if you don't feel the same. I love being able to talk to you about so many things. You're smart and capable and you know what you want in life. Get out there and work for it. You'll be fine.

♡ 20
I want to feel your arms around me when we hug, without the distance of virtual silence and dead air. I want more than letters shaping words that I can't hear, more than emojis that I will never see, heart shapes that stand in for real emotion. I don't think you're useless or unlovable; you're far too human for that. You've been through so much and things are so hard for you, but you're trying as much as you can. I wish I could be there to hold your hand through it all.

♡ 21
You've helped me discover so many parts of myself. You've given me reasons and reminders to love life, to love myself. You've carved such deep impressions on me. We might not always agree or get along, but you're so precious to me. I hope that one day, I can do for someone what you've done for me.

walk right through me, i'm not really there

My biggest fear is and always has been, most likely always will be, that I am easily replaceable. (Forgettable? Discardable? My life is written in semantics.)

It's disgusting and a little pathetic, and I'm upset at myself for not seeing it before. But I'm also upset with you for allowing it anyway, despite the fact that we're both aware that we're unhappy about it. It should count that we've known each other longer and are really pretty close with each other. It's not wrong to think that we ought to value the friendship we have that spans years at least a little more than all our other relationships with other people, is it? 

A close second is failure. I don't like not being good at things. It's fear that drives me.

I don't know what you want from me. I don't know what I can do for you. I want, so much, to try, but it's so hard when I don't know where to start. 

I'm sorry.

let's step up

Happy November ! The weather skips between gorgeous and depressing; it's playing havoc with my moods though I really should be used to temperamental weather by now.

I know I said that I would backlog entries, and I will, I promise. I'm feeling a lot better than I was a week ago, so I actually have the time and energy to spend on doing all the things I was supposed to do last week. I should be grateful that my body chose last week to give off fighting my sickness. I'm surprised I lasted as long as I did - I've been feeling like I'm going to get sick for a good two months, at least. Anyway, I got knocked out for about five or six days where all I really did was just lie around in bed and alternate between complaining about being sick to people and just sleeping away the entire day.

I managed to Skype with A and E for the first time in a long while. I'm not particularly good friends with E - mostly I like her because A likes her so much - but she's always fun to talk to. She had to leave for work not long after, but I got to talk to A for an hour or so longer. A is still one of my favourite people, for all that we haven't talked much this year, being so caught up in our respective lives. She is the type where I know that if I reach out to her, she'll always respond. She demo'd something that she's been working on to me, which I really loved, even if it wasn't the best sound quality and I didn't quite understand all of it. She's always been able to find, to make the time for what makes her happiest. She compartmentalises in a way that I can only envy.

C and R left on Tuesday for Bali, so we've been charged, as always, with the responsibility for B, H and P. The more this happens, the less enthused I am about it. Although we did receive oranges and lemons and coriander from C and E prior to their leaving. I don't think I'd like to have pets. They're fun to play with but I think I am too concerned with being clean to be able to care for them and play with them on a regular basis.

I caught up with S on Friday for the first time in a while, mostly because we needed to trade items. Every time I see her, I'm reminded of how different we've become. It's strange to think about how just two years ago I would have counted her among one of my closest friends. Two years ago, we could spend at least six hours together and not run out of things to talk about. Now, it seems an accomplishment if we last 30 minutes without any awkward silences. PT was particularly terrible, so instead of the two or so hours that I'd allocated, I ended up being with her for something like four hours - accompanying her to the orthodontist, and then just sitting around in the city for a while.

I love my mother but, as most if not all of us do, I have a complicated relationship with her. Tonight, I just want to complain that she's driving me up the wall in a very shallow, standard mother kind of way. I understand that she says the things that she does because she cares about me, that she's just trying to look out for me, but sometimes it feels like she thinks I have the intelligence of a child under ten in the 1800's or something. I don't want to sound unappreciative, because it would suck if she just didn't care about what I was doing, but there is no enjoyment in being made to feel as though I am somewhat incompetent and reckless.

Now that it's November, it's officially NaNoWriMo. I'm nowhere near where I should be in terms of metrics though, which is depressing, since it is still early days. Does this herald how the rest of the month will pan out? I certainly hope not. I'll just have to work harder. At the very least, I don't have exams to worry about studying for simultaneously. I've (tentatively) planned a TC session with S and L in ten days, just to talk about how we're all doing. Hopefully I'll have something of substance by then.

ETA: This entry is all over the place. I apologise to anyone and everyone who actually read it. The saddest part about it is that I really don't have any excuse as to why it was so...disorganised? Well, I'll try and do better in the future.

living life hard until we die

SAMA Social Night last Friday. C's birthday on Saturday. Skype with my favourite 姐姐 K on Sunday afternoon, and dinner/dessert with a combination of the C4 and VR6 on Sunday night. Frantic last minute house cleaning today. Relatives arriving on Tuesday. Taking D out on Wednesday and possibly Thursday morning. Potentially seeing K on Saturday afternoon, and then M's birthday on Saturday night. I'm still feeling like I'm on the way to getting sick so if I don't collapse at the end of this week, it'll be a miracle. I've been sleeping a bit earlier than usual and taking tablets though, so hopefully that helps somewhat.

I feel like there's not much to say about Friday's and Saturday's events. Got my younger sister to braid my hair before she had to leave for cheerleading practice. Formal events are always a delight to me; there are some people who clean up incredibly well when they try and it's nice to be reminded of that. Attendance was low at Social Night which made the percentage of people that I actually knew/liked significantly higher; that still wasn't exactly a lot of people. There were quite a few people that I'm certain I have never seen before there too. I still had a reasonably good time, though.

C's birthday was a pretty small affair. Part of me is still convinced that it would've been a better idea to postpone it, since half of tlist ended up not being able to attend and because pretty much all of us who ended up showing up (C, T, V, L and I) weren't exactly feeling all that great either. Met up with T earlier though still later than we originally planned (why am I so terrible at being on time nowadays ;;) and then ran into V while we were hanging out at Chatime. C was late, which wasn't exactly a surprise. Dumplings and tea for lunch and then L showed up for NRB until 7. I could literally feel my throat dying over the course of the afternoon but it was still pretty fun. The only downside was being stuck on a train afterwards that was full of people coming back from the AFL grand final and from the Royal Melbourne Show.

I cried a lot on Saturday night, but then, what else is new? Ever since That Era, it's like I cry at everything. Everything. It's not exactly ideal but it's definitely better that I'm able to express emotions now. I am also pretty sure I'm turning into some kind of stress baker, which is also not necessarily a good thing.

Skype with K was wonderful. It's been around three weeks since the last time that we both had the time to have a conversation. Even though this one wasn't particularly long it was still lovely to be able to talk to her properly again. It was a conversation full of capslock and catching up on life and other ridiculous things.
K: idk how i'd explain that to my mother. "yeah wen told me to start collecting hedgehogs so here we are"
Me: shhh they're small she wouldn't have to find out

Dinner last night was a standard affair. V picked me up and we met up with K2 at WG's for dinner, before seeing C, F and J afterwards for dessert. I still sounded awful though, but it was worth it. I don't know when we'll next be able to line up our schedules with free time. It's been months since I've seen them. I was initially pretty worried despite everything that K2 have been telling me. It's sort of strange to think about; I met C when she was so young and she's so grown up now. She'll be amazing though, and I think I'm okay with entrusting F with her. I'll learn to be.

L and D and S spoke to me about their potential plans for NaNo on Saturday night/Sunday morning. Sometimes I despair, because I wonder about how can I ever measure up beside them. I can't imagine ever being able to stop trying, though. I'm considering either the post-apocalypse or the mutants/superpowers 'verses, though the latter is similar to what L has planned. Government agents will probably be my last resort, though it is not at all intended for 50k. At least there's still a month to think about it.

I'm a little terrified, but I'm happy. I am. That's what matters.

let your hair down

There's not a lot that I love about my body, but my hair comes closest to being my vanity. It's strong, thin, fine, soft and, when at a manageable length like it has been in recent years, healthy. I trimmed and glossed my hair yesterday and while it'll most likely wear out soon, for the moment my future back-up plan is set. I can do shampoo commercials! I can scrub shampoo through my hair and swish it around and make orgasmic noises with the best of them!

T and I also made chocolate peanut butter no bake dessert last night. It's, perhaps, a little too creamy but we guessed at the amount of cream anyway, we didn't have peanut butter cups and we ran out of Oreos so we substituted grated chocolate on top, but I'm still pretty happy with the result! Today I'm seeing the KP girls for a picnic at C's house, for which I'm baking vanilla cupcakes with Ferrero Rocher and peanut butter cups in the middle. I plan for cheesecake later this week, too. I think it's pretty obvious that "healthy eating" is no longer one of my top concerns.

原谅我没有说

I bitch and moan about people in the world so often that sometimes, I tend to forget that there are really amazing people around me. Sometimes, I worry about whether they know how much I honestly appreciate everything that they do for me. Most of the time though, I fear that they think that I'm ungrateful. It should be easy to say - after all, these are words and words and words that are used on a daily basis; but sometimes they're used so much that they lose all meaning. The people around me don't rely on me for anything, and I rely on others so much that it hurts to know how weak I am on my own, and if I could only work out how to say the words, I would thank them with everything that I have. The fears that they don't know the value, the importance they represent to me can get so overwhelming. Sometimes, I think that they'll become sick of putting up with everything that I am and just walk away, and it's easy to admit that that's why I am the way I am sometimes; better to give them a reason to leave me behind. Sometimes, it's easy to tell myself I'm being stupid, think that of course they must know, or else they wouldn't smile at me like that, treat me the way that they do. Most of the time though, it's not.

august is the cruelest month

August has, since entering uni, typically heralded the beginning of the new semester and also a multitude of unpleasant feelings within me. At least I can pinpoint what it is that incites these feelings.

The weather, for one. Since it's coming to the end of Winter, the weather becomes increasingly temperamental and more often than not, I end up feeling bitterly cold and underdressed for the day. Though, let's face it, I am never appropriately dressed in Winter - my wardrobe has always been geared towards the delightfully warmer seasons. Of all the months of Winter, I feel the cold the most in August. I suppose this can be attributed towards the fact that I'm actually out of the house again on a fairly regular basis for class, as opposed to spending all of my time curled up under my blankets inside.

People, is the other main reason. Sometimes, but not always, circumstances force proximity and that proximity lends itself to an impression of closeness that does not always last. I normally try not to see my friends from uni during weekends and holidays. I see them so often during the week that it seems a waste to see them more when I have the time to catch up with those who I don't catch up with often. Perhaps this is where I'm going wrong.

I spend three months building up a certain rapport with those people around me, so I guess it's not unreasonable to see that that camaraderie has dissipated over the two months that we don't see one another. Not that it makes it hurt any less to come back and feel almost as if you're starting over again.

Things will get better; things are getting better. Sometimes, all you need to do is give things time, put in a little effort and have faith :).

pathetic

You're like the fucking ex that I never fucking had. The one who's fucked me up so badly that I can't do anything without remembering how we used to go there and eat something, and hate this or like that, or talk and argue about whatever. There's so much that surrounds me that is tied up in memories that remind me of you. It pisses me off because it's so fucking unfair that I'm suffering from the consequences of a relationship that never actually existed, especially when you were the one who fucking chose that break-up; you were the one who fucking forced that rift.

The best part of all of this is that it probably didn't even affect you at all; it didn't seem like you even gave it a second thought. Evidently, it was just that easy of a decision to let me go. You never wanted to make the first move as friends, so I can't ever expect you to apologise and make amends, can I? Even if you are sorry about the way that you fucked this all up, which I highly doubt since you seem to be plenty happy. I guess the relationship we had just didn't mean all that much to you.

I don't really wish you anything bad, because I liked you a lot when we were friends. But I'm not mature, so I'll keep myself happy with the thought that, at the very least, you're not going anywhere in life.

Still, congratulations.

You're honestly the worst break up that I've ever had, and the only one who's fucked me up for this long afterwards. Incredible, really, considering we never dated.

I fucking miss you and you don't even care.

departures

Part of graduations is the significance that you're done with this part of your life. It hurts to think about, even if you're not the one who is graduating. Watching the people you know graduate just hones in the fact that there's only a limited time left.

You know that one day the person graduating is going to be you, and you're going to have to wake up and look around and tell yourself that you're really not a child any more. That you have to start thinking about other things, prioritise, that you can't just sit around and let blissful waves of a fantasy world wash over you any more. People disappear from that world you created together, replaced by new ones that you don't know. People leave and move on and disappear, leaving virtually nothing behind. And one of these days, that's going to be you. You just won't be able to afford that world any more, time-wise, money-wise, emotion-wise.

Sometimes, there are people who are fortunate enough to have a few people who will carry that world forward for a few years, to be able to indulge in with the people they know who are in the same situation, unwilling to let go. But it isn't, it won't be long before you feel an overwhelming wave of patheticness. And that's the last thing you want to feel or to call others. But the problem is that there is no support out there in the world of "I need to find a career".

A career. A family, perhaps. A life outside that little bubble that you managed to encapsulate yourself in. A life that other people will approve of. Because while you were so busy not caring about what people thought when we had the beautiful, dorky, amazing parts of our fantasy world, they moved on without us.

And life afterwards can get very, very lonely.

In life afterwards, you feel like you've lost some of your best friends. In a way, everything in that world was your best friend - always smiling at you, encouraging you, doing silly things with and for you, telling you they love you; you spent all your time in the world together, even if sometimes it all made you cry. And then it's gone and you only have a few people left who understand, and you have to go through the jarring transition together, holding on for, and onto, dear life.

You have to make that transition from your fantasy world and all the happiness that came from it to everything else. Everything real. Everything that isn't what you spent all your waking time on for the past however many years. It felt like forever, but it wasn't.

Sometimes, you hate that you ever found that world. Because even though it made you so indescribably happy, you know that leaving it will hurt so much more, will be so much worse, so much more sad and painful than it was happy. Is that world, has that world been, will that world be worth it? Sometimes, you don't know. When you think about it, you're not sure that you will always be able to say that, "Yes, it was worth it."

All you can do is wait to find out.

would you lend me some of your time?

After a prolonged period of time away from a certain group of people, I always overestimate my ability to socialise with them. Either that, or I somehow seem to convince myself that I was better friends with them than I was, and that they will actually make concerted efforts to talk to me and include me in the conversation. It's kind of a vicious cycle, wherein everyone else seems to have fun and I am left feeling stupid and ridiculous for ever entertaining the notion that people actually enjoy my company.

The thing is, I value everyone that has passed through my life, regardless of how fleeting. Unless you've done something monumentally stupid to make me dislike, I usually think of you fondly and will want to go out of my way to see you and talk to you and find out how your life has been, provided there's been a suitable amount of time since the last time I happened to go out or run into you. Except that, of course, not everyone feels like this. Particularly when they're closer to everyone else who is not you and happens to be in attendance.

It's a little disappointing to go to an event and end up talking to less than half the attendees. I guess it could have been worse. At least H didn't really know anyone else there either, so once she arrived I almost exclusively talked to her. Out of all the others who attended, the only one I semi-regularly speak to was S, and that only because we share a unit together this semester. It got slightly better once we sat down for dinner though, if only by virtue of the fact that everyone concentrates at least a little more on eating than on talking.

The food was delicious and it was a lovely place to be, I have to give N that. We booked out the back room, and ended up re-arranging the tables to make it a little easier to talk. There was also a man stationed in the alcove singing intermittenly during the night. If I'm remembering correctly, there were pasta dishes with chips, salad and calamari rings for starters; a steak dish or chicken parmigiana alternated as the main, while dessert was vanilla ice cream, blueberry and marshmallow pizza and nutella spread between toasted pita. There was also ice cream birthday cake!

It was a pretty subdued affair on my end, although I suppose some of the others would beg to differ. It was pretty fun to see M and V interacting with the children who kept running through the room, anyway. I've always been the type to sit back and let everything happen around me though; provided others are enjoying themselves, I can sort of forget how excluded I am. That sounds pretty bad, but it doesn't upset me that much, I think. Most of the time, I just watch and think about all the different ways I could write this slice of life. I still ended up staying longer than originally planned, if only because I always feel guilty on skipping out on birthdays before cake, even if I know it's not my fault. Living a ridiculous distance from everyone else has its distinct disadvantages.

I enjoyed being able to see everyone who attended (V, M, J, L, I, S, H, N, A, D, T, are all that I can remember though) even if I didn't talk to most of them. It was a nice reminder of a time of the past.