remembrance.

so this is Christmas
and what have you done

~ Happy Christmas (War Is Over) | John Lennon



this year, has been a/an (filled with an adjective I cannot find) one. 

so much has happened, yet so little.

I have learnt, that maybe faith is not so much a firm belief, but more so a continuous hoping.
I have seen, once again, that people are beautiful creatures.
I have awed, at how beautiful storms, and by this I refer to all kinds, can be. 
I have dabbled, in the ways of what it means to love. 
I have tasted, the bittersweet joys and pains of nostalgia.
I have felt, once again, the enigmatic folds and curls and lulls and rushes of time perceived.
I have realised, that simple joys like family and loved ones will always be more than you think is enough.

I have remembered that above all, life is beautiful.

no more words.

when the situation is so dire,
the emotions so heavy,
but there are just no more words.

no more bolognaise please.

army is like the grumpy italian maid who always cooks the crappy bolognaise pasta.

she comes up to you, serves you a big plate of the nasty stuff-

"EAT. IT'S GOOD FOR YOU."

but I can't.
I can't eat the big plate of growing up.

help me find.

this world has limited space for dreamers.

across a new sky.

I look for your face in the morning light,
Warm glow dances on your cheeks and eyes, eyes,
I can't forget, all those times that we spent,
Finding each piece of ourselves,
Couldn't stop our ascent, couldn't stop our ascent,
Across a new sky, making old friends,
Paths lead to places we'll find,
Here's where we begin.
Take everyday, make it something new,
With eyes wide watching everything we do,
And I can't forget, all those nights that we spent,
We moved with our feet never touching the ground,
Couldn't stop our ascent, couldn't stop our ascent.

into place.

there is an air of depression that's hanging overhead.
and for the life of me i can't figure out why.
like a shadow at the corner of my mind that's ever-visible,
but always just out of reach.


might be because life feels stagnant now,
it feels like something is not there now as it used to be before.
somewhere, there's an unrecognizable hole.

but at least some things have fallen nicely into place.

-

i feel like i've lost something precious.

great plains somewhere.

ambling along an unfamiliar road
not expecting anything
but then
at the corner of somewhere suburban
there is a field

rimmed with pine and coniferous
trees of all sorts
greens and yellows reminiscent of a countryside
like something out of a Lord of the Rings movie
fantasy-fiction, only dressed poorly in a gaudy suit of bungalows.

I walk in
simply because it's there and nowhere else
and there is nothing else.

It is because there was absolutely nothing there
that I found everything. Almost.
Christopher Boone might understand.

a parallel emptiness
it's almost like nature understood
and maybe even laughed over me
like a mother laughs over an unknowing child.

I will come back
and the next time
pretend like nothing else matters.

the desert.

caught in a no-land zone;

where you're too uncomfortable in the current place,

but escaping back to the past is just too...escapist.

yet it's hard to grasp for something in the present.

it feels shallow, to try and recreate the emotions, the moments - they will never come again.

was back in the art room today.

each time i go back to that place, it only feels more distant - like a movie scene where one goes to an old playground and can hear the children's laughter from years ago, ringing in their heads.

if we try too hard to recreate the beautiful hours, reincarnate them by painting there - i think it would taste sour, bitter; the disgusting, dry flavour of tryingtoomuchness.

i guess we should revisit only in nostalgia.

but now life feels like a mere discarded shell of what it was before.

there is no point, no purpose,

no beauty.

everything feels dry and distant.

a mark on a blank surface.

sometimes encouragement comes from the least expected places.

like extended family whom you'd usually think would discourage you from pursuing such a dangerous career choice. To take up the challenge of exploring beauty in life - and making a living out of that - getting approval for it really counts for something. I am blessed.

how satisfying it is to leave a mark on a blank surface.
To make a map of my movement-
no matter how temporary.

~ blankets. | craig thompson