Numb

"Are you listening?" The doctor remarked from behind his glistening, polished wooden desk. I wondered if doctors pick their own furniture and he chose this one in particular, or that he left the options for his newly-wed wife with an excitement towards interior design.

"Um, yes." I muttered, "No chiropractor."

"Yes. Let's hope it doesn't come to that." He wrote something incomprehensible on his medical record paper. I wondered, again, if the whole MD-scribbles was still kept alive because of some cybersecurity reason or the sentiment of authenticity.

"What are you going to prescribe me, then?" I asked.

He looked up from the paper and answered, "Nothing. But I'm going to give you a list of exercises you can do at home. You can come back again in a week if nothing changes."

The third consultation I had over the span of this week with different doctors, and none of them gave me what I wanted. The little white coins I could swallow and made my head spun a bit before shifting into focus. I sighed as I put on my jacket to walk outside, one hand stealthily crumpling the written list inside the sleeve. I passed a trash bin and tossed it quickly.

---
"Why are you such a drama queen?" She asked nonchalantly. She didn't mean to offend, I guess she was just curious and 'drama queen' happened to be the word she came up with to describe my situation in her head.

"Amplifying emotions seem to bode well for my writing," I continued brushing the blue hair dye on my fringe, "I wish I could explain it to you better, but you know, we're kinda different."

"Yeah, sometimes I find it hard to understand you-" She went back to scrolling her phone. I knew a few ways she could resume her sentence- 'not that I cared that much though', 'I didn't even want to know what you're talking about', 'but we can still hang out anyway'. Why did I even think of resuming her sentence, and why did it even matter anyway?

"Do you want bento takeout for tonight?" She asked again.

"Sure."

---
I suck at world building. Description, narration, coherent timeline, they're not really my strong suit. My specialization is in creating dialogue based on strong emotions and self-thought. There's no flow, no plot, just redundant exercise of interaction exchange, not supported by non-verbal gestures at all. I stick with writing because it's been easy. Only thirty percents of communication is deliberately delivered, so I thought I could get away with hiding the rest of it behind linguistic barrier.

I haven't even explained who I am, who she was, what situation I was in, and why it all happened. I tend to avoid these things because it meant objective assessment of myself, my roommate, my condition, and it's a pain to be honest. I'd rather present myself as a bundle of negativity with human physical embodiment, and leave it at that.

My relationship with my roommate isn't all that fabulous. We didn't exactly start up as some kind of dynamic duo with lifelong pledge to conquer the world or something equally touching. We just happened to be in the same thermodynamics class and she was looking for roommate while I was seeking new air. There was nothing remotely similar about us, be it appearance, music taste, or life principle, but she was eager, and I was willing to try.

Our roommate-ship is basically a business-only relationship.

I munched the sweet and spicy shrimp rice as I listened to her going on about her day at work. I nodded and responded only briefly, hiding my unemployed shameful face behind the chopstick and bento box.

---
I always thought of her as a straightforward, normal person. She always said what she wanted to say, did what she wanted to do, and so bright and cheery as far as I knew. She often avoided deep conversation, and wanted nothing to do with my negative talks.

Until I found a pack of these at the very bottom of her purse.

Prescribed for [redacted].

I took a couple and wrapped them underneath a tissue paper, stashing it in my stationery drawer. I wanted to see how these things might work for me. Just a little experiment.

"Here's your eyeliner." I handed her the only thing she asked, which she promptly responded with an expected 'thanks'.

That night I stayed at another friend's place. The night after, I stayed in a 24-hours cafe. And I took the wrapped pills with me.

"When are you coming home?" Her text gleamed from my phone screen. My surroundings were dark; I turned down the brightness. I couldn't answer. I put the device on the table, face down, and resumed typing. I never felt this calm and focused before.

I didn't know if she noticed or not, but she made no indication of confronting me upon the disappearance of her two pills. I brought her croissant and coffee for breakfast as I went home in the morning, ready to hit the hay. I reckoned she was still in the shower, so I wrote a note to put on the table.

Breakfast for you. Good luck with work today. -Tay

---
Back to the present, though. I didn't know how much I needed the pills, I just knew how badly I wanted the desired effect to work again to me. I sent my last manuscript three months ago and I still hadn't heard back from the publisher.

I haven't written in two months, and I didn't feel the urgency to do so.

I was already discouraged with my last piece. I knew deep down that I needed to get my gears going and come up with another writing if I still wanted to establish my self-actualisation, published or not. It was the only thing I wanted to do in life, and the only thing I knew how.

But my muse was gone. I barely left my room if not for piss or butter and toast, and a few household chores I agreed to do.

She didn't really intervene. Like I said, it was almost a business-only relationship. I got my secrets, and she got hers. She'd listen if I wanted to vent about my problem, but until then, she wouldn't try to breach my vault. I did the same.

---
I once asked her to go through one of my fiction writing. She commented something along the lines of 'using too many metaphors and big words that only makes sense for you', and that she found it difficult to follow the flow of my narration, jumping from one thought to a different one in a short period of time, without allowing the reader to get immersed first.

That was a lie, of course. That was my own criticism from her brief comment of 'this is difficult to read', which I was highly aware of. She didn't care much about fiction, per her life principle of 'more experience, less fret'. I was the drama queen, she was basically the go-getter prime minister. She bravely made decisions without much fuss, although not immune to annoyingly everchanging second-thoughts.

Maybe that's one reason I got so easily attached to her.

Not emotionally, but domestically. I could always wake up and rely on her being there. At the very least, I knew I wasn't alone at that moment. I hated to admit that I would dread the time she would decide to move out.

---
It was dark outside- inside too. Dusk had far from passed, and I still didn't think to turn on the lights in my room, save for the one study lamp I used to stare at the small box atop my desk. An early birthday present. A semi-parting gift. An unexpected one, at the very least. I took off the wrapping paper minutes ago.

She was going out of town for work for a few weeks.

"I want you to take care of yourself, okay?" I recalled our interaction a couple of hours ago. She stood before the doorway, suitcase packed and ready to haul near our shared shoeracks. Her face was made in a natural manner, fine plum-colored lipstick clung to her thin lips. I saw a hint of sadness in her smile as she faced me with an intense expression, but that might be just my imagination.

She took the small gift-wrapped box from her totebag, and handed it to me.

"I'm gonna miss your birthday, so here's an early present."

I was appalled she remembered at all, let alone getting a gift for me. Unsure, I received the box, "Thank you."

"Open it when I'm already away." She opened the door as she grabbed the handle of her suitcase, then turned to me for a brief moment. I felt her breath as her face leaned towards mine and landed her soft lips on my cheek.

"Wha-"

"See you." She walked out before I could respond the surprising interaction.

I looked at the open box once again, which was just the size of a newly purchased phone package. Instead of smartphone, inside was one tosca-yellow colored stress ball, mini chocolate bar of my favorite brand, and a sealed pack of white pills.

The same one I stole a few months ago. The same prescription. The same label.

Prescribed for [redacted].

With an additional note, a purple-ink curvy handwriting on an ivory card with a doodle of birthday cake and her face. Happy birthday! Take as prescribed and don't forget to eat. Love, [redacted].

I didn't know why I bother looking for muse anywhere else but here. She was staring right at me all along.

Tumultuous Tendency

"In quickness, there is truth." - Ray Bradbury

Tick. Tock. I desperately glanced at the digital clock on my computer screen. One hour.

Time? Passed. 

Mind? Blank.

Paper? Empty.

Hotel? Trivago.

One hour. My cognition still hasn't functioning properly.

The cup of coffee hasn't been much of a help, nor has everything else. I seemed to be in a state of disarray, where my brain just straight up refused to cooperate, to think, to even perform the most basic analysis of things.

Sighing, I got up of the chair and headed towards the bed, only dizzy. I laid down, looking at the ceiling above, heartbeat going faster. Eyes closed, breathing going manual. Inhale. Exhale. Five seconds. One at a time.

Zero. Eighty. Zero. Dim lights. Eyes still closed, ears perked to the sound of a familiar tune. My phone ringtone. I stayed still, breathing in and out. Ten seconds and it was over.

"OK Google," I called out, followed by a bleeping sound, "Who called?"

Amber voice spoke out. No names were mentioned, but she spelled a sequence of number I recognized immediately. Eyelids still shut, I muttered, "Thanks."

I have a friend who was dear to me. She was dear to everyone, in fact, that I sometimes don't feel I hold a place that special in her heart. I personally think keeping tabs of people is exhausting, so for someone to invest their time and energy for me is beyond my understanding. She called me twice already. I wanted to pick up. I wish I could pick up.

But I don't want to hurt her. Not anymore.

I can't answer the question. I don't even know the answer.

"Are you okay?"

I wish I could say I'm not, because it's easier to actually be diagnosed clinically with something wrong, than spending your whole life treading between the line of sanity and its counterpart.
I wish I could say I am, because I don't need her to worry about me and that she's burdened enough with her problems.

I could pick up the phone and send the text.

"Sure, why?"

But I didn't.

Sighing, I got up of the bed and headed towards the desk, still dizzy.

Tick.

Tock.

In this room, only time runs. In circles.

November Update

It's almost the end of the year. Hell, it's almost the end of the month of the second last month of the year. I just started getting my hands on a sheet of habit tracker when I looked at the date numbers... wait, it's already the 20th. Guess I'll start next month.

Nothing much had happened since my last update. I'm still living in the same old house, sporting the same old shoes, watching the same old youtube videos and eating the same old junk foods.

For the first time in years, though, I'm bailing.

Like a fish amongst its school captured by the large net, I swam away. I looked from afar at my friends. They're going to be processed into canned foods, which was morbid, but perhaps tad nice since it means they serve their usefulness. As I made my way through the vast blue of the sea, I began thinking, should I have not run away? And that's been the question since day one.

December is almost here. Christmas holiday is coming, so my book delivery is going to be postponed. The semester is almost ending, and my lazy ass still hasn't found its will to get up and fight.

I don't know where I'm going with this. Truth is, so much is going on in my mind, so many internal battles are held stalemate until further notice, yet so little is done by me as a person. I feel like I have lost touch with myself so much that I don't know how to express what's really inside. I had become to cowardly to even recognize my own thought and feeling, that I deny them all. It's no longer about what I really want, it's more like what I have to let go to find out what I really want.

Uh, yeah, so, November update. Tried bus tour. Wrote a new novel draft. Bought new jacket and books.

Cry a lot. Sleep well.

Cheers.

Toilet Thought

Aku tidak punya penderitaan untuk khusus dituliskan hari ini.

Jangan salah, aku masih mengutuki diri sendiri atas hal-hal buruk yang kurasakan dan ketidakbecusan untuk mengendalikan emosi secara dewasa. Hanya saja bukan hal itu yang ingin aku tulis pada kesempatan ini.

Aku sedang merenung di atas kloset duduk dan memikirkan hal-hal bodoh, mengkhayalkan apa yang mungkin dan tidak mungkin terjadi. Aku terpikirkan kala kesempatan jarang kulontarkan lelucon dan respons para pendengarnya. Aku teringat salah satu podcast yang pernah kudengarkan yang membahas bahwa banyak orang yang mendengarkan podcast ketika mereka mandi sehingga mereka sama sekali tidak punya waktu merenung dalam sehari. Terlintas dalam benakku kalau orang yang mengaku bisa membaca pikiran bisa jadi antara omong kosong atau sangat luar biasa, karena bahkan aku sendiri sering tidak tahu apa yang kupikirkan.

Dilanda khayalan tentang pikiran pun, aku mulai merenungkan betapa magisnya cara kerja otak manusia. Dia mampu membuatku memikirkan tentang berbagai macam hal yang rasanya mengawang amat jauh dari singgasana buang hajat tempatku berada. Dia membingungkan aku sendiri, punggawa jasmani yang merumahi dirinya. Dia menamai dirinya sendiri, pun teman-teman serumahnya. Oh ya, namakan saya 'otak'. Kamu 'jantung', dan kamu 'hati'. Biarlah para mat saleh itu bingung dengan terjemahan bebas antara kalian berdua.

Dulu aku sempat terpikir untuk mengambil jurusan neurosains, ilmu yang mempelajari otak manusia. Brosur sebuah perguruan tinggi swasta di tanganku, dan aku boleh memilih di antara jurusan-jurusan yang terdengar trendi itu. Neurosains, goda titel itu padaku yang akan lulus SMA beberapa bulan lagi. Keren. Agung. Mutakhir. Itu kesan yang kudapat. Masalah konsep akson dan neuron yang masih terbolak-balik di dalam kepalaku (ironis sekali), itu persoalan belakangan.

Kakiku mulai kesemutan dan aku menyadari sekali lagi di mana aku berada. Sial. Sudah melayang kemana-mana pikiranku, belum juga selesai urusan perut ini. Aku menggoyang-goyangkan kaki untuk menghilangkan sensasi mati rasa, masih hirau akan pikiran sebelumnya, bagaimana kalau ternyata aku akan lebih bahagia kalau seandainya aku memutuskan untuk mengambil jurusan neurosains?

Ah, runyam sudah kalau menyangkut perkara mengandai-andai. Andai saat itu aku cukup berani untuk menyatakan perasaanku. Andai saat itu aku tetap nekat ambil sekolah di Jogja. Andai aku lebih tinggi. Andai aku lebih rupawan... dsb dsb.

Aku cukup akrab dengan dunia fisika untuk mengenal prokem multiverse, yang terkenal dengan gagasannya bahwa setiap pilihan yang mungkin, ada dunianya sendiri. Misalnya saat ini aku berandai dulu masuk SMA Negeri 1 Yogyakarta, ada suatu dunia paralel dimana 'aku' mengenyam pendidikan menengah atas di Teladan Yogya, tapi kebetulan saja 'aku yang ini' hidup di dalam semesta yang menggariskan diriku sebagai lulusan SMA Balikpapan. Ini konsep tipikal usungan film sains fiksi picisan, yang bila digarap sutradara dengan kaliber di bawah Christopher Nolan akan dicecar habis-habisan oleh para pengkritik.

Aku katakan sains fiksi karena aku sendiri tidak mengerti intisari dari konsep itu secara nyata. Berhadapan dengan persoalan termodinamika saja aku masih terheran-heran; membayangkan solusi persamaan Schrödinger masih butuh representasi visual kotak-garis. Temanku yang berlatar belakang fisika teori hanya memandangku dengan aneh ketika aku menanyakannya tentang gagasan multiverse itu. "Ah, itu mah ngada-ngada." Ujarnya santai, lalu kembali memusatkan perhatiannya pada game Skyrim V The Elder Scrolls-nya yang saat itu sedang booming.

Betul memang, terdengar sungguh mengada-ngada kalau berharap seandainya semesta mengabulkan harapan muluk-mulukku untuk pindah ke Harajuku bersama Will Toledo dan membeli apartemen berbalkon satu yang menghadap pusat kota. Lagipula, apa bedanya kalaupun 'aku' di semesta lain benar melakukan hal itu? Tetap saja 'aku' yang ini masih bertandang di sebuah kamar mandi kosan uzur di suatu sudut kota Bandung, menghabiskan tenaga akal budiku untuk gagasan abstrak yang tak jelas juntrungannya alih-alih menyumbangkannya untuk bangsa dan negara.

Carl Sagan, seorang astrofisikawan dan novelis terkemuka pernah menulis bahwa "masyarakat tak pernah mengajari bagaimana membedakan sains sungguhan dari tiruan murahan". Tak bisa dipungkiri kalau aku tertarik mendalami fisika karena lebih dulu mengenal jargon abstrak seperti time travel, quantum field theory, standard model maupun teori relativitas, walaupun lebih terutama karena Pak Yo Surya. Tentu saja dengan alasan serapuh itu, aku merasa kecewa ketika mendapati kuliah dipenuhi persamaan-persamaan matematis dengan hieroglif alien, bukannya partikel warna-warni dalam balutan hadron collider.

Mungkin saja para fisikawan tulen itu lelah dengan masyarakat awam yang kesana kemari melempar istilah 'quantum' seenaknya mulai dari merk kompor hingga teknik penyembuhan alternatif. Penat dengan wajah Kakek Einstein yang kehadirannya tersaturasi lewat brosur bimbel dan kepustakaan populer berbahasan fisika. Para dosen sudah terlalu jemu untuk meluruskan miskonsepsi mahasiswa lugu sepertiku yang kebetulan terjebak dalam ranah keahlian mereka. Yang kusesalkan hanyalah betapa selama masa kuliahku aku hanya berhadapan dengan kekecewaan demi kekecewaan karena realita tak seindah pseudosains dalam benak. Aku lupa untuk mengambil hikmah, belajar tentang keindahan di dalam sains yang sejati. Yang ada hanya kegetiran dan pesimisme.

Aku merenung, berapa orang sepertiku yang punya ekspektasi tinggi untuk terjun ke dunia sains dan teknologi karena terpapar jargon-jargon emas, hanya demi dimentahkan perkuliahan yang membosankan dan situasi yang tak mendukung gairah? Apakah mereka sebodoh aku yang tidak mau mencari informasi terlebih dahulu sebelum mencemplungkan diri ke bidang itu selama beberapa tahun penuh? Apakah mereka termakan agresi istilah asing yang terdengar keren dari tim marketing universitas yang mencari wajah-wajah baru? Apakah mereka korban sistem penyebaran informasi yang kurang waras dan tidak merata? Apakah ini salah sinetron pukul tujuh malam atau menteri pendidikan yang baru?

Lagi-lagi aku merepet. Betul kan, keberadaan 'pembaca pikiran' itu hanya omong kosong. Aku sendiri saja membutuhkan waktu berjam-jam untuk menata isi kepalaku agar berbentuk suatu tulisan yang setidaknya bisa dibaca manusia dengan kognitif sehat walafiat. Kecuali mungkin kalau aku memusatkan perhatianku dan memikirkan sesuatu untuk 'dibaca' oleh para esper itu, seperti tolong aku. Aku tahu kau bisa mendengarku. Aku butuh tisu toilet sekarang.

Lalu suara pintu kamar mandi diketuk. Mungkinkah...?

"Maaf, di toiletnya masih lama?" Terdengar suara mungil perempuan dari luar pintu. Ah, betul juga. Toilet kost ini yakni sebuah properti sosialis, dikuasai komando pusat (ibu kost) dan digunakan bersama (anak kost). Sudah berapa lama aku merenung di sini?

"Oh ya, sebentar! Mungkin 5 menit lagi!" Jawabku, tak ingin menjelaskan panjang lebar tinggi volume. Kurasa lebih baik kusudahi saja hajatku di situ karena akal sudah tidak produktif dan usus tidak berkooperasi.

"OK, kak." Aku kenal suara itu, suara seorang adik tingkat satu kost. Jarang kami bercakap, tapi setidaknya kami paham keberadaan satu sama lain.

Hening sebentar.

"Tisu toiletnya aku taruh di luar ya, kak."

Terhenyaklah aku. 

Bitter

I dreamed of you again.

You were tracing the edges of my cuts, one hand holding my wrist in place with your fingers steady, unabated. Your mouth moved as if counting, one... two... eleven... Your eyes didn't meet mine, nor did I want to. They remained observing my lower arm, unbothered.

"Tell me why," You finally spoke. I stared blankly at the open flame of the fireplace.

"I wish I knew." I replied.

"I've heard things," Your eyes finally fixated on mine, piercing stare looking for truth without mercy. You knew I have no capability to lie whatsoever. "Things that I had hoped staying mere idle gossip."

"What are they saying?"

"That your arms are really hairy."

That caught me off guard. I chuckled instinctively, which you followed with a smile. "You always knew what to say."

"I wish I could do more than saying things." Your expression turned stern. You closed your eyes and traced the scars once more without looking. I turned towards the flame once again. I felt a slight sting when your lips touched the newer wounds. I shuddered with shock.

"You're too precious to be doing this." You retracted and rolled down my shirt sleeve, "Please take care of yourself, because I will too."

At what cost...?

I stifled on my tears, knowing full well it was all a dream, thinking how equally heartbreaking if it were to be true, and for feeling sorry for myself. It was not supposed to happen. You were not supposed to know.

It was a brief moment of chocolate marshmallow dipping that I had my sleeves rolled up a bit.
There was no loving stare of that dream, only shock and confusion.

You're broken, your eyes said.

I'm scared of you, your weeks of disconnectedness said.

I think I'm going to go now, and you did.

Some people have certain memories attached while listening to a particular music, or looking at a particular stuff. For me, it's chocolate marshmallow and Green Day's 'Good Riddance' faintly playing in the background from the Halloween party five years ago. Alone, they were nostalgic and painful. Together, they amplified the neurons of that moment's memory that I couldn't help but shake in disgust. Of myself. Of you. Of the whole unfortunate thing.

If only. If only you didn't see them. If only I wasn't stupid enough to do them. If only I was brave enough to barge in your door and ask for explanation.

I dismissed the thought as I mixed the rest of the batch. The marshmallows were roasted and ready to be layered with the melted chocolate. I folded the chocolate batch with rubber spatula. The portable speaker was blasting a familiar tune on repeat. My hands were trembling, but only slightly. That's good. That's streadier than I've ever done before. I made progress.

They said to face your fear, so I did. For four consecutive years now. Hybrid of bravery, stupidity, masochism, and obsession becoming one, like the chocolate mix on my bowl.

I wrapped the chocolate s'mores into a small plastic package, tying it up with a red ribbon before putting up the final touch of attaching a note to it. I grabbed the marker and wrote on the card I prepared.

How's it going? I hope your Halloween this year is amazing as always- I crumpled the card and threw it away. I took another card from the pile.

No tricks, just treat- I considered for a moment, marker tip on my chin. A minute passed, then I wrote a little more.


Early morning of October 31st. Chilly. Wind swept away the dried up leaves in front of your house. I quickly slipped the homemade treats into your mailbox and went away without looking back.

I might be stubborn, but you were no less persistent.

I didn't know how to feel knowing that you didn't accept any of my gifts, because you knew precisely that it was me who sent it. Without me signing it. Without me giving clues that I did it. You knew me too well, yet you still didn't budge to once again have me in your life.

No tricks, just treat.

I knew you too well, and you were still willing to keep up with this sick game.

No more cuts, no more wounds.

I would definitely know if you actually eat the treats I sent.

Now would you look at me the same again?

Because I wanted you to know how it feels to bleed against your own will.

Captain O Captain

This uselessness... burdening.

No matter how much I think I was nurtured and sheltered, I'm ultimately still alone.

Only I know what's in the deepest of my mind. Only I know the secret buried underneath the darkest corner. Only I know how it feels to be weighted by my own thoughts and expectations. Only I know the bad things I feel and think of the mostly normal people, out of jealousy and false pretenses. Only I know what I dreamed about last night and how to put it into words.

Yet I still expect people to understand me and point me at the right direction, without even giving them a clue of where I'm trying to head to.

When will I realize my actions are my responsibility, and only mine?
When will I realize that I'm the only one qualified to steer this car?
When will I realize that I'm the captain of my ship, master of my fate?

What do captains do? They decide where to go, guide their underlings and ensure the correct way to go. Captains don't abandon their ship. Captains launch cannonballs at people who laugh at them, because who the fuck are they to think they could steer my ship?

I wish I could be that captain.

Right now instead of fixing the hole in the starboard, I'm writing my travel log.
I left a trace for historians to find me, but I lost sight of what I wanted to be remembered as.

Our vessel is stuck in this hurricane somewhere in the Pacific ocean. Wreck is almost inevitable. I drew another stroke with my quill pen. This is perhaps where we end our journey.

"Well captain, it's romantic and all, you might think," I could hear my crews complaining, "But we're mere workers and our instinct is not to die. Perhaps you could, you know, give us command to fix things around here and we just might survive."

How many people have I dragged down to the bottom of the ocean?

My brain might have convinced me to take the escape route, but my body resists. Just like the captain and their underlings (how dare they). And that indecisiveness has costed a lot of things from everyone. Me, my family, my friends, or strangers that happened to bump shoulders with me on the street. The intangibility of the most precious resources, strayed me away from sight of them.

Attention. Love. Affection.

Just a little human touch. A hug. A grab on the pulse. A feeling of bodily warmth.

Maybe that's all we need, to not be completely miserable.

After all, we are merely a really smart animal, and our primitive brain needs what it had always needed.

Sorry, Finish Line is The Other Way

What's the point? What's the point? What's the point? What's the point? What's the point? What's the point?
I'm never gonna make it, aren't I?

No. I will not back down. Ridiculed and alone, yet I'm still standing. I drew my breath sharper, letting the cool air fill my lungs. I readied my stance, preparing for an attack. The grip of my right hand on my ever loyal sword tightened. Although I am the only one in the world believing this, I will never back down.

Or so I thought. I put my pen down, exhaling slowly. Yet another fantasy, and then back to reality.

I keep avoiding things that I should take responsibility of. I dream of nightmare when the thought occurs, but only when I encounter its remnant or the trace of existence. It's an everlasting homework with prolonged deadline that I stack and leave rotten in the backyard, to be wet with rainfall and singed by the sunlight.

"What have you been doing this past year?" that question kept lingering and smacking the back of my head like a guilt sledgehammer.
I think, all I've been doing this past year is slacking off... but also acquainting myself with the cold reality beyond the classroom walls.

The question trailed off. My mind was a blur. My ears were ringing. My hands shaking.

Ah, I can't deal with this anymore... One question and I was already about to burst into tears. I'm weak.

And weaklings don't get to choose the way they die.

-

I know that the right thing to do now is to work on the stuff that I abandon, and starting now. Soon. Pronto.
I need to assembly the material before the end of this week.
I have to catch up with my task.
I ought to consult on my difficulties instead of bailing.
I should pick up that phone and book another psychologist consultation.
I got to grow up and get my shit together.

Easier said than done. Despite a hundred reasons to improve better as a person, I still can't get out of the bed.
I wonder how long it would take for me to realize this living model does not make any sense?
I wonder when will be my turning point in life to think, "hell, I should act now!"

I haven't been sober. I'm still resisting, refusing to see things clearly.
I wish I was sober.
Maybe, another cry.
Maybe, another cut.
Then I'll cope. Then I'll sober up.

That... never happens, does it?

When will I ever stop running the wrong direction?

Resistance Member of The Universal Cause

There's absolutely no rhyme or reason as to why I should be here. Not metaphorically. Not literally. Not essentially. Not existentially. Nothing.

I have had my doubts about future for quite some time now. The previously optimistic utopian soul, corrupted easily by a simple glance of reality. Not even the morbid ones, just ones not par to my expectation. I'm not who I think I am, and I don't think I will ever know who I really am.

In science there's this thing called model theory. It stated that model is how we collectively perceive the natural state of reality. Some philosophers might argue that our brain capability is limited, our senses easily fooled, and we might never perceive reality as it actually is given our limitations. As far as models are concerned, it doesn't matter if the explanation is ontologically 'objects as it is' or not; if it works, it works, and it is to be accepted. Unless there's a better model developed, of course.

An example of this is the model of atom. We all have probably seen illustration of an atom being a bunch of nuclei particles grouped together in the middle, then surrounded by electrons moving in orbits. This is Niels Bohr's atomic model, and as fun and easy it is to think of atoms this way, it had been discovered that it's not entirely precise. Theory of quantum physics came along and it had been established that atomic constituents - electron, proton, and neutron - don't retain the round, deterministic shape. Instead, they take form as both particle and waves - which are practically not visible to human eyes - making the previously conversation-friendly form of atom resembling that of our solar system becomes far more complicated, only sufficiently represented by intricate constants and fragile probability.

Of course, the real question now is: does model theory also work on perceiving people or only for tangible phenomena generally studied in natural science?

My personal answer is yes. If humankind had been having difficulties in comprehending the seemingly perceivable things such as the planets and atoms that they need to develop a mental model, why wouldn't they do it for even more complex phenomena concerning human and their extremely unpredictable behavior?

For the longest time, like it or not, I have been developing positivistic view towards life. I believe that everything is quantifiable to some extent. Laziness? Inertia. Personal opinion? Brain waves. Love? Chemical reaction. Chaos? Entropy. Rather than two sides of the same coin of human perspective, I treat this view as truth. But of course, this is misleading.

This thought only arise because I've been living as the golden pioneering child of the new milennia. Just like communism wouldn't have worked without technological advent in information that enabled centralization (spoiler alert - it's still not working), positive attitude towards the power of quantification wouldn't have been enabled without engineering advancement and rise of silicon brain. Right now each of us own a powerful gadget on the back of our pocket, capable of measuring the surrounding temperature, locating our precise coordinate, all the while sending signal waves to connect us with people from the other side of the world.

It becomes a problem when this perspective is treated as the mere truth to life. Scientists most probably will argue that empirical evidence and proper experiments are the way to the ultimate truth. Sadly, even the brightest of thinkers will still somehow drive towards a brick wall. What if we encounter this one thing we seemingly can't measure? Is it then proven as nonexistent? Or is it just that we haven't found a way to figure out how to measure it?

What is consciousness?

It's been the mystery at the bottom of science for quite a while now. As the consensus of human behavior can be explained through the tracing of chemical traits flow in the brain, consciousness seems to be closing in to something akin to a mere myth. There's no 'deeper meaning' to our existence; it's just chemical loss and gain. Consciousness does not exist. We have no 'central core' to our thoughts and beliefs.

This notion, just like relationship, requires compromise. I personally still deny this sudden accusation that we have no essence as a humankind; nothing that sets us apart from animals. My rigid belief on quantification that supposed to support this idea seems contradictory to my spiritual health. I'm at a crossroad. I compromise towards the concept that this 'consciousness' thing is inquantifiable. The 'symptom' is measurable, but the 'cause' itself is beyond our sensible explanation. I want to make peace with the notion that not everything is measurable - maybe not yet, maybe not ever. Maybe the time where it would make sense is not now, maybe not ever. Perhaps it's something beyond our organic brain's limitation - just like trying to imagine a 10th dimension or seeing electromagnetic waves outside the visible spectrum.

It's always such a blast to think about metaphysical wonders like this, but I'm afraid this is only a modern-time exercise in futility. The daydream of millenial culture. The masturbatory ego of cognitive exhibition. It's easy to point fingers at people who think like this (me) and remark to them (me), "Who cares?"

The answer, my friend, is "Nobody."

No one cares about this writing. No one cares about how I as a member of society spend my Monday night stargazing upon the pollution-ridden urban sky. No one cares about your pessimistic take on life unless they're your equally pathetic friend. No one cares about our future as humankind other than those who attempted to shape it. And the universe certainly doesn't give a damn about us.

There's no reason for any of us to be here. But who cares? You're still here anyway. Might as well make it fun and worthy while you're at it.

Last night before going to sleep I prayed to God to never wake me up.

But He did. Twice. Or three times. Before I fully opened my eyes at 8 AM and realize He didn’t give me what I want.

After my regular afternoon prayer, I broke down and curled up on the mat. I couldn’t concentrate on my prayer. I couldn’t think, only feel the irresistible urge to cry, and cry again. I laid down on the soft mat and faced my room ceiling. I prayed again, God, please do not wake me up again this time.

But I knew deep down, as I closed my eyes and another batch of tears rolled down my cheek, that it was not happening. It didn’t matter that I cried as hard as possible, or wished as willfully as I could, my eyes would soon open yet again without permission, without regard to what I want or what I didn’t want. Unless there was something remarkably wrong in my brain’s wire design, I would wake up and then find I’ve already wasted most of my day feeling sorry for myself.

It’s the way my body worked and had always been working. It’s the way my brain worked and had always been working. Without some extraordinary power to alter this situation, the miraculous yearning to never wake up is never going to happen. Which, it had never done, and wasn’t going to happen to me anytime soon.

There was absolutely no reason for God to fulfill this wish of mine. I wasn’t special in any way. In fact, the reality that I’m lying on other people’s bedroom floor crying is one evidence proving it. Shouldn’t I be out there and changing the world, as they pointed out, in my prime? Shouldn’t I not be feeling like a useless piece of trash all the time, all these years? Guilt-ridden, I still laid unmoving while a part of my brain pestered me with unreasonable thought and epic tales of adventure I would never accomplish.

Maybe this was the wrong request to wish upon. Maybe He just didn’t care about me. Maybe He just didn’t exist to fulfill my wish. Or maybe, this is not how He works?

Perhaps, instead of asking Him to do it for me, what I should do is to just do it myself and ask for forgiveness, right?

Monkey Business

Happy Saturday, folks! I hope your weekend is filled with joy and love and distractions that can reset your mood to prepare for another week of being a cog in the machine! Ah, that was grim. Excellent. Let's start.

I haven't written much nowadays. It's not that I don't write, it's just I can never seem to finish what I started (shocker). The ideas came and gone very briefly, like fireflies in the middle of the night. This was not new, but the amount of times this happened nowadays are distracting to the point it annoys me so much. It's like talking to someone who has a hushed voice you had difficulty hearing, and when you ask them to repeat it they just dropped the conversation right away.

It's a funny thing, human brain. The one organ that controls everything going on inside our body, and it couldn't even follow a simple plan it made for itself. All possible musings, inspiration, creation, empire, technology, industry, and it comes down to a frail little blog page. Sometimes I hate how contradictory my brain could be; it amused me with tales of humankind's accomplishment throughout the millenia thanks to its evolutionary trait, sprouting a bean of hope that I could achieve whatever I put my mind to it, and a few electric currents later it decided that getting out of bed isn't worth it.

Our brain has been what excels us as a species, a product of millions of years of evolution, but it's still a monkey brain. It has undergone a slow yet steady process that managed to get us where we are right now, but it's not pefect. No matter how much you trust your brain to make difficult decisions for you, it's not a place to store memory. That's why it helps to be organized. Keep physical (or digital, as in the norm of our age) copies of notes.

So now upon coming to the conclusion that the whole 'ah fuck I can't write' thing was not my failure as a civilized person but instead it's just the way our organ is, I've been starting a habit to take notes whenever an idea pops up. Fragments of sentences, ridiculous punchlines, inspirational quotes, silly questions, whatever. This might seem like common sense to you lot that it's inane to even talk about it, or suggest it, but it helps. Before, I usually dismissed ideas when they're just tiny unblossomed buds, ensuring myself they weren't ready to be written yet. Thus when the time (and mood) comes to sit down and face the blank canvas of word processing software, I had to rack my neurons running, scampering to find those ideas in hidden little mind shelves. Sometimes it worked, and some of my best (subjective, of course) writings were done this way, but I realized that it took a lot of energy, and I got burnt out pretty fast.

Of course, not saying this is the ultimate method to productive writing, but at least there was less effort in scouring through the mind shelves. As you see, so far I have listed 18 titles in the working, yet still no posts cooking in my blog dashboard kitchen. 

I'm trying my best to get them done, because even with this method my monkey brain still finds its way to get distracted, jumping from one topic to another, and mixing up my electrochemical productivity according to its whim. But that's just the way of progress. Once you find a solution to something, you will always find more problems waiting ahead.

My apology about the gloom intro. You might be a cog in the machine, but that's only because it's what the macro system is capable of seeing you. After all, one could argue that we're all just a tiny speck of dust in the universe, yet we could still knit our own jumper of meaning nevertheless.

Jolly weekend to you all!

My Human Pet

My human pet has been acting strange lately. She gets up at around 3 AM and goes straight to the kitchen downstairs to cook. She fills the water jug, eats and hydrates. She goes to sleep after some kind of religious ritual and wakes up at late noon. That's okay, I usually also wake up at late noon, but what's weird is that she doesn't brew us a cup of coffee, or order takeout for lunch as per usual. It seems like she's trying out a new diet fad..

..Or being brainwashed into an automaton. Because aside from the out-of-place eating period, she also develops brand new habits she follows to a T. She takes a long walk and sometimes stays out until the morning comes. She keeps a journal and writes important dates. She smiles at people and engages in small talks. Just not to me. She ignored me in a way that if we were social media mutuals, I'm getting blocked.

I'm starting to see a pattern where she's trying to transform into a sensible, functional human being. It started not so long ago, but the progress is uncanny. She does it well, too well I might say, that if I still have a shroud of idea left of who she was, I'd say this was just a phase in which she would eventually come back to me running.

I would like to be ecstatic to learn that she's turning into a 'better person', or so the term dictated. I just wish she would consult to me first, so that I'm not feeling left in the dark, especially concerning the sudden coffee cutback. She barely talks to me in the past week that I get no vote in deciding what to do.

Don't get me wrong; the long walks are fun, the talks with people are pleasant, and the cooking is.. uh.. interesting (spoiler: it's bad but at least it's edible). But I miss spending hours with her just staring at the ceiling and start a revolution from our bedroom, a cup of hot anxiety juice by our side. I miss singing sad lofi rock songs to the top of our lungs. I miss vaguely talking to her about our pie-in-the-sky dreams that may or may not happen, yet it's amusing to entertain the notion anyway. And this was only after she left me in a week or so.

But right now if she decides to take a more realistic approach to her life and habits, I would try my best to support her in any way I can. I just... probably need a few moments, days (or months?) to adjust myself to her. I wish her luck in proceeding onto this new journey, and I sincerely hope this is not only a phase, because if she's going to run, I want her to run forward, not back to me. 

This time, I'm running to her. And we'll march on together.

I Bought Her A Cake

Happy birthday to me! Usually I don't celebrate personal anniversary like this, but yesterday was an absolute exception. After brewing my morning coffee, I was preparing to write a blog update, when I look at the message in my close friends' group chat. They were planning to meet up in the evening after they're finished with work, so I joined since I had nothing planned anyway. Little did I know it was a surprise party, damn. We had good dinner in a barbeque joint, although they forced me to pay the bill, as was the custom in this cursed country -_- Afterwards though, we went to a karaoke place which I joined upon their promise not to make me pay everything again. I sang a few Fall Out Boy songs before they handed me a present and a cake, and sang me a karaoke version of Happy Birthday! Holy. Crap. Then we sang some more until very late at night. When I got home, I opened the box to see that they gifted me a copy of Haruki Murakami's latest book, signed by the author himself. 

Best birthday ever.

-

But of course, it didn't happen. 

None of it was real. I don't have a close friends group chat anymore. I woke up at 10 and felt useless, as is the custom in this cursed personal room. I had a headache and sore throat. I ordered a takeout for both lunch and dinner. I never left the house that day. I didn't meet anyone. No barbeque restaurant. No karaoke bar. No friends.

When I was still in school (not college), birthdays were pretty exciting. It's just like any other day where I go to classes and get homework, but afterwards I get to hang out with my friends at a pizza place, and occasionally get gifts (although it's not heavily expected). Pizza birthday party was kind of a regular thing in my school years.

When I reached a certain age, though, birthdays become sort of an introspection day. With a pinch of denials. I get a few birthday wishes, reminding me of how I'm turning older. My inspector brain scolded me because I haven't done anything remotely impressive in the past couple of years, nagging me for being lazy (which, come to think of it, also partially its fault) and underachieving. I curl up in bed at night reminiscing my regrets and mistakes, and how the golden years seem to have passed me by and I'm only left with this rotten corpse with hollow interior.

But of course, it didn't happen.

Or did it?

So Long and Goodbye

Just recently, I came across a blog post written by one of my favorite internet persona, CGP Grey, titled “I Have Died Many Times”. Now, if you’re a bit like me and your YouTube home page is representative of your interest, then you might have known or watched one of his videos. He makes educational – maybe stretching a little, more like informative – stick-figure-based videos, the most popular one titled “The Difference Between UK, GB,and England Explained”, which was coincidentally also his first video that I watched. I really like his explanation of things in simple manner, while trying to be as precise as possible, and his insight of our today world, and I just have to say that many his views resonate with mine. 

But I digress.

He also writes blog, and as I mentioned previously, one which titled “I Have Died Many Times”. Of course my first thought was “reincarnation?” but no, it’s not in-the-ground dead. The death of no longer existing. Our past selves? They died, along with faded memory and gradually replaced mind. He wrote how our past selves are like Peloponnesian War, necessary to shape who we are today, yet irrelevant.

This is why we so often look back at the thoughts and actions of our younger selves with incomprehension. Who was that person? Just who did all those stupid things? Just who had those foreign thoughts? Someone else did.

On several occasion I’m recalled of something ridiculous or awkward I had done or said (or wrote) a few years back, and it’s a relief to have this idea of it wasn’t me. We all know that period in our teenage years we don’t want to acknowledge. It’s not necessarily denial, or running away, but it’s much more liberating to address those imprudent moments in third person’s point of view instead of carrying the burden of your former self.

I don’t know why the idea of “my past selves are dead” is much more appealing to my mind than “let the bygones be bygones”. I reflect a lot on my past, frequently in regret, and I have to say… it’s not pretty. I long for a chance to go back and undo my bad decisions, cherish more of the wonderful moments, pursue for further and better opportunities; anything to get me off this… present void. Perhaps due to my diligently-fostered procrastination habit, I lost an important concept of time; a miscalculated prediction that I can always delay stuff because one opportunity may come again another day. Spoiler, past me: it’s not always the case.

The concept of death, on the other hand, I can imagine better. It’s more final, and easier to let go. You’re free from the sins of your stupid childhood smoking self. You’re dismissed from people’s expectation of your overachiever high school self. You’re no longer responsible for the cookie-stealing and wrist-cutting edgy teenage you. Because they’re not you. Not anymore, they’re dead.

With this newfound perspective, I find myself sometimes reflect with a smile, I’m so glad she died. Some death was swift and peaceful, some was hard and long; some didn’t go without a fight and left marks, but they all died. Some will be missed, though.

Of course this is not to say that you will never be held accountable for whatever wrong you’ve done to people in the past. Personally, I think this is one great perspective to make peace with my history and minimalize regrets.

And the person writing this post? She too, will be dead in several spans of time, or maybe tomorrow, whether it’s literal or existential is up for discussion, but dead nonetheless. Right now she hasn’t thought much of her future, even doubting the possibility of her existence, but conceptualizing her death gives her a new pair of shoes to tread with. Change is death; and an essential one, that is.

It's too easy to view others as monolithic, unchanging.

But that's not our nature: we are all the phoenix.

I have died many times, and so have you.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m gonna go get that quote tattooed on my arm.

Did I just make a blog post talking about a blog post? Yes. Yes, I did.

Morris

Morris is about to reach his 24th birthday

and like Blink-182 lyrics said "nobody likes you when you're 24"

and Morris is just like "well no shit, I don't like me either."

"I like you," said him but he forgot he just turned 24

"Maybe cut your hair first." She retorted.

"I guess my hair's also 24, then." He remarked, she just looked at him funny.

"And you're too short," and Morris for once was grateful he was not actually a male.

"Am I valid?" He looked at himself in the mirror, going weary.

"I'm..."

"I'm growing my hair then."

(Fuck who's watching) everyone in the coffee shop. Morris wears his baseball cap to hide it, nobody seems to care.

"Your coffee.." the barista put a cup on the counter and smiled, "Morris."

"I just wish you don't remember my name so much." He thinks. Professionalism is a real thing.

Strum once. Strum twice.

"We can be together," he sang out, "if you want to."

"I don't wanna leave," his voice cracked, "if you don't wanna."

Why is it so hard to hear your own voice?

"I got another five years," Morris showed her the card, "I'd give it to you."

"Why?"

"Got no use for it anyway."

"Morris," she held his hands on the table, "it's never personal."

Morris was never really into amusement park, but the crowd gave him a false sense of comfort.

And concert is another thing. Someone taller accidentally knocked his cap off.

"Sorry," the stranger mumbled. He smiled apologetically, picked up his cap and return it.

"It's fine," Morris said.

"I'm Neil." and Morris for the second time was grateful that he was not actually a male.

March Update

What's up fellas, how do you do? I'm still alive! And writing an update! At the start of the month! By golly, is it going to snow tomorrow? I remember the last time I did something really out of habit, it didn't rain for three days straight (and Bandung rains daily, believe me). It seems superstitious to believe in such thing, but I like to joke about it. I have friends whom whenever we plan hangouts with, it would rain. I also have friends who don't bring rain. In Japan this person (assuming it's female) is called ame-onna, I guess? I read it in comics; whenever you invite that person it will almost certainly rain. I love that despite this silly urban legend, Japan still has one of the most accurate weather forecast in the world. (just take my word for it)

Since February was short, it took me a while to realize that it's March already. I didn't have any expectations, or target, or... anything, really. Anway, what do I write then? I figured I was just too excited to write, that I didn't realize that "March Update" supposedly contains update of my March, not just a quarter of the month, so it would be probably better to write at the end of the month? Probably, but while I'm in the mood to type, I wouldn't put this to waste.

Achievement update: I (almost) successfully refrain from social media for a whole February, especially twitter. I said almost, because a friend mentioned me at the end of the month and it appeared in my notification, so on GP I gotta reply, right? I still can't stay away from YouTube, though, only for the background noise. I used to think it's fine until I stumbled upon this article on medium about descending into YouTube addiction. I do realize that it's always the "oh, it's only for background noise" mindset at the beginning, but before long it's lost hours I could never get back. So I guess my end-of-March target would be less YouTube?

Music update: I've been listening to a lot of Car Seat Headrest in the past month. American-based band, began as a solo project by the lead vocalist Will Toledo. A few handpicked tracks that I repeat over and over and somehow I still don't get tired of them. The lyrics speak volumes to me; it's like something that my another soul from another reality would scream. Not subliminal, not political, very personal. It makes me want to hug Will and tell him that everything would be okay, but it seems like his lyrics already did that to me first. Perhaps that's why even their latest album art made perfect sense to me.

Twin Fantasy (Face to Face) artwork - Car Seat Headrest

Food (?) update: Last week I went to this hip coffee shop near the Bandung landmark Gedung Sate, named Sejiwa. A dear friend of mine kept recommending me that but only then I had the will to actually check out something new (heh), so there we went. I did expect good coffee, of course, and good amount of people in the cafe, since it was weekend and it had good reviews. What I didn't expect was their wide variety in western and oriental cuisine. They had sandwiches and toast, but not your usual sariroti-bread sandwich, they used sourdough (!!) according to the menu. They had omurice as well, and apple pie, holy shit.

I wanted to try everything on the menu, but they were... uh... quite pricey for me, even though my friend said they're all recommended. Everything is 35k and up, and I already ate before going there, so I just settled with truffle french fries for light snack to go with my iced caramel macchiato (wanted affogato but they were out of it, dang), and by golly was it the best fries I've ever had in ages. Somehow it tasted familiar (I mean, it's fries), but it's just.. subtly different. The menu suggested the fries used truffle oil, and they did look shiny drenched in oily substance, but it didn't taste greasy at all. I was appalled that french fries could taste this good, and I was so taken aback that I don't even remember how my coffee tasted, lol. I mean the coffee's good, but maybe too much caramel for me, and I kinda expected it to be served in a glass instead of plastic cup. Not a fan of the plastic cup; we would be here until the coffee's finished, anyway.

I also bought their sacheted drip coffee to brew at home (the Bali Kintamani kind), quite pricey too, but pretty good. 5/5 for the fries, 3/5 for caramel macchiato, and 4/5 for the drip coffee.

Truffle French Fries with Cheese

I forgot to introduce you guys to my new cat in 'da koz', since Ibeng left many many months ago. He came.. well, many many months ago. This one has fur pattern that's a bit like him, but this one is bigger and more aggressive; whenever I tried feeding him he would try to snatch the foods before I finish pouring it out for him. I didn't give him a particular name, though. I tried naming him Leo, but there had been no occasion that I had to call him by name, so that one's kinda forgotten.

Leo- or whoever this is

Well, that's enough update for the first half of March, I guess. I hope I can keep the enthusiasm throughout the month and the year afterwards. Hope your Marchs go well, too.

Cheers.

OK Computer and Average Architecture

I still remember when Radiohead’s third studio album took the rock music scene by storm. A diverse take from their previous album, The Bends, which tastes a lot like Britpop-genre flavor—I’m sorry, since we’re talking about a British band, flavour— containing singles that are more radio-friendly, and already proven more popular. Sure, it added variety to the mainstream music, but instead of continuing the formula, the band decided they would grind their musical gear and produce something far bolder. Appropriately titled OK Computer, it experimented on sounds and thematic effects on a whole different level, combining intrepid guitar riffs with an orgy of xylophones, mellotrone, synthesizers, digitally mixed samples, basically pushing the boundaries of instrumental madness, engulf them in rich lyrical masterpieces. Every track on the album flows with such coherence, that each transition takes you to another step in this journey to the center of the universe. Some may describe this as a concept album, but I recall an interview where Thom (vocalist) didn’t think of it as such.

Now, I'm not here to do a full-on review of said album, but I gotta say that... because it was released in 1997, just two years after I was born, the first sentence of the previous paragraph is questionable. I just wanted an excuse to praise one of my (and possibly a lot of people’s) favorite albums of all time. I particularly like the fact that this album was released in the 90s and grazed the topic of technology, which was kind of ahead of its time.

A few months ago, my class watched a documentary movie about the internet. We’ve seen a lot of ‘internet movies’, right? Hackers, security breaches, furious typing and coding sessions. But it was not that exciting. Emphasizing the documentary part, it was made exactly in 1990, when internet was not as widespread as the present. I forgot the title (and my former classmates forgot too, all 40 of them holy shit), but I remember what was in the movie: a group of computer scientists describing how the internet is going to change our lives in the 20 years’ time, and actors’ enactment of people’s daily lives using the internet.

They explained how it would be very practical in the future; if you want to go to a romantic getaway with your partner you can just book tickets via internet. At this explanation the two supposedly couple acts were relaxing in a backyard garden of a castle-like building, sitting on rattan outdoor chairs as the man was sliding his index finger on a touchscreen monitor, on a small table between them, showing a picture of Eiffel tower – which I assume where they wanted to book a travel ticket to. The monitor wasn’t attached to any devices like computer or TV, as if it’s inherently part of the table.

Another scene illustrated a family gathering in a living room with the individual sofas facing a mere blank wall, and as the father adjusted the control panel, the whole wall turned into a television screen. This is just a greenscreen technique any YT content creator can make nowadays, but back in the days it might be a tad impressive to have in your house. After all, we still get adverts for huge flat-screen TVs even though there hasn’t been one as large as your living room’s wall. There was also one scene on robotic innovation, where they tried making a robot as human as possible, giving it a skin face, a name, and programming conversations for it. Nowadays, no engineer nametags necessary to access it in a restricted lab; you can easily find it in a YT creator’s “Let’s Play”. There's a lot on Eviebot years ago already.

My point is, as someone who’s grown up in an analog-to-digital environment transition, it’s fascinating to see how people in the 90s tried to predict how technology, in particular the internet, would develop the future – which is to say, now. What I found most interesting is, even though the scientists’ predictions are mostly true – things are far more practical, connectivity at the touch of your fingertips, artificial intelligence closing in to human’s – it’s the miscellaneous things that set the decades apart. It’s the website interface, the interior design, the cybernetic algorithm, the camera works, and the economic and social implication of technology.

I mentioned about the rattan furniture in the documentary, because I felt it was a little out of place and old-fashioned in the face of a touchscreen era. Sure, we could easily go to a website (or even mobile app) to order a plane ticket fast now, but it would be via a desktop computer or a smartphone, not a darn wooden endtable in the backyard. The wall-into-cinema screen façade? Basically home theater, with outdated leather sofa. Now that I think about it, I don’t see a lot of present day families who gather around a television for a scheduled show, since everyone in the household can get their own devices and watch everything on-demand. This may be one of the social implications the documentary failed to predict (or just didn’t want to). It reminds me of the viral video of a family demonstrating how to use the internet.

It's amazing to see the technical aspects in technology progress, and the little accompanying things evolving around with it. We used to have a large desktop computer in our house, with fat CRT monitors and CPU that still has diskette slot in it, no bluetooth, no internet. I think I remember playing The Sims 2 in it, but it was near before said computer was retired and we switched to a laptop. Right now, no current desktop computer comes without internet and bluetooth hardware (unless it’s for business purpose I guess). CD drive was still a requirement because USB drives used to have 128 MB capacity, not 128 GB.

I remember when communication was done only through phone call or text in a sliding feature phone; I got to call my mother with prepaid balance, counted per every second I talk. Now, I can video call via internet with my whole family on my touchscreen smartphone all at once, using mobile data costing me far cheaper than the voice call used to. Economy!

Even when I got my first Android phone, touchscreen I might add, mobile internet wasn’t as pervasive. I still mainly used text for communication, and multimedia messages were fairly hard to send because the provider didn’t really support it without another subscription first. If you wanted to surf the internet, you browse in a computer, and connect LAN cable because WiFi hotspots were also scarce. Somehow, though, it didn’t stop my (mainly male) classmates from competing in online games. I, on the other hand, competed with strangers in an all-text internet forum debate (I’m glad they shut down my Yahoo! Answers account). Now internet webpages use more interactive elements instead of just a wall of text (like this blog; wow am I old fashioned).

I don’t think any of the scientists in the documentary could ever predict how massive social networks would grow up to be. I mean, it’s one thing to say that we’re going to be easily connected to people from all around the world but it’s another thing to forecast the sheer influence of a single internet persona that it transcends the supposedly virtual platform. To be fair, he has been a contributor in the platform for quite a long time, so it’s kind of justified. YT had been widely known as a video-sharing website ever since I was in junior high, and it’s still dominating. But of course, things change; the community expands, the website format evolves to simpler, modern interface, contents massively grow, and… well, the privacy policy changes. So if you’re a late aspiring YT content creator (like me), you should probably check thoroughly, because your lipsyncing video might get a copyright strike.

The internet… it’s a strange thing. It’s like a fertile soil you can plant your seeds in, if you decide to carefully nurture it. Online business flourishes, online community grows, and online influence escalates. During my freshman year, I had to walk or hitch a ride from my friend if I had to go home past 8 PM because it’s the most economically feasible route. After two years of staying in a boarding house, I had to move because I wanted a location more accessible to my campus, especially one I could walk home to at night. Now, online bike rides are available 24 hours (at least in the central part of this city), safer and (relatively) cheap. If it was a thing when I was a freshman, I would probably never had moved. This business had only been widely known in over the course of three years, and it already advanced so much it’s established its status as a unicorn startup. Business!

In retrospect, I just want to say that it’s been exhilarating to experience this shift, this lifestyle transformation, for better or worse. To see something that once was deemed so alien and restricted, becoming an extensive part of our daily life that we just undergo without second thought. When we’re waiting in a queue, we could always pull out our smartphones and immerse ourselves in a whole different, yet adjacent world. It’s polarizing, but it’s here. The soil just keeps on fertilizing.

“I don’t think we’ve seen the tip of the iceberg. I think the potential of what the internet is going to do to society, both good and bad, is unimaginable. I think we’re on the cusp of something exhilarating and terrifying. It’s an alien life form.” - David Bowie predicting the internet in 1999.

February Update

Uh, well, yeah, happy new year I guess?

I haven't been updating in quite a while, I know. February is almost ending and I still haven't written anything since the start of 2019. For a regular blogging activity, new years are supposed to be a good time to be writing year flashbacks, updates, resolutions, and stuff. At least for me. I'm aware of this, but somehow I just couldn't bring myself to write anything. This is dangerous stuff.

Back then, I used this blog to facilitate my writing skill, as well as an exercise to warm my brain up before doing something more productive. Even when they're just rants or random fiction. It also serves as a way to reminiscence; how I used to phrase things, how I used to think about things; a memory lane, if you will.

I could write paragraphs about my morning coffee, as tacky as it may seem. I could picture fictional, cheesy situations and put it down in a short story. I could rant on and on about homework and deadlines. Small things, but it's just for me, and at least I could write, you know.

I've been stashing a ton of prompts to write, but somehow I just can't finish it. There has been a lot of things going on, since my last post in this blog months ago, that I want to share; small events, new habits, new experiences, new music I listen to, a few fictional narratives as well. If you follow my personal twitter account you probably had seen my poll on which blog post I should work on first -- which was in January -- and that time, I was certain that I would write about those. I already had 5 post titles in the making, had the start and ending figured out, but somehow... in the middle, I gave up. Not 'give up' give up, I just felt it didn't come naturally, so I tried waiting until the inspiration strikes again. Apparently it just decided not to show up.

In a sense, I know darn well that I should be doing something else. This... something (not blogging, btw), it's been holding me idle for so long, keeping me in a stalemate with myself. I keep postponing doing it, and that's... bad, because whenever I'm not doing that 'something', I feel guilty and restless, thinking "oh man, I should totally be doing that", but when I try to do it, it's... difficult? It's like there's no guideline so I don't really know how to start and I end up avoiding to do it.

You could probably say that I'm in a state of constant battle with myself. This isn't a call for help, per se, but if you could advise me on anything that would be great thanks.

Maybe this whole update is just an excuse, but it gives an upfront explanation that I could hold responsibly. Maybe, just maybe, as I finish writing this, I would get my brain in the mood to type what I've stashed away.

Cheers.