aLEx

lying in bed, shrouded in darkness, i recollected the journey j would take with me in a cab to his place. the clasped hands, the white clammy palm, the silence that would at times weigh heavy on our hearts, the urge to say something sharp to break that silence, the suppression of that urge, the dog wagging its tail vigorously upon seeing its master as the cab pulled away, bearing me, into glassed solitude.

i want to use whatever remains of my heart and my life as shards of glass to mark out, circumscribe the gaps in language.

woke up at 4+am with a blocked nose and couldn't sleep, tossed and turned in bed. perpetually itchy throat. FUCK. it's fucking annoying. tempted to go for the nose operation but i've no fucking balls to let doctor pass electric currents through my nose.

i slept better last night, only woke up 3 times... i think i know what's affecting my sleep. it's the blocked nose and my anxiety about not being able to breathe properly which only causes me to become breathless in a vicious cycle. back in the office i have to try very hard to calm down and breathe. the air here causes nasal congestion. i always feel so lethargic especially in the morning and my boss keeps giving me work which makes me feel v stressed. i think i don't have the stamina to work, don't know why, just feel like lying down... i'm in a mist of lethargy and fatigue. my bf told me to be strong, that i should be my own pillar of strength, he would support me wherever possible but i must hold my own fort. i see where he's coming from and i'm trying very hard to be strong, it's just that sometimes it's so difficult to do that, to be not debilitated.

my insomnia worsened. i woke up on every hour last night. i told myself not to worry about my inability to sleep and went to read a book. i nodded off while reading but i woke up with a start an hour after i laid on the bed. i... don't know what's happening to me. in those darkest hours my mind was in a tumult. i wanted to fly out of the house and walk in the chilly air but i... didn't dare to. why do i live in fear and anxiety? i don't understand how things have come to this. nobody can help me.
this morning an auntie colleague called me. she was v nice to me when i was ill, she asked after me and advised me to see a specialist. but today she asked me not to tell people what she told me about learning to relax and not be stressed out by work. she said boss would think she's telling me to loaf on the job. i... was feeling too ill to say anything but that i will bear that in mind, i won't do anything to harm you. i was crushed by her words actually.
the lack of sleep makes me maudlin.

my nose is blocked half the time and i think it's the reason why i've difficulty sleeping at night. i don't understand why my nose is so severely blocked this time round. i've always had a sensitive nose, i suffer from nasal congestion quite often but i didn't have much trouble sleeping. i had gone to see an ear nose throat specialist at mount elizabeth hospital last friday. he scoped my nose and said the most effective way to eliminate the nasal congestion is to do a minor surgery which involves passing electric currents through the inside of my nose to shrink it. the surgery is supposedly painless with no downtime. but i'm not sure. the doc seems to be hardselling and i'm not sure if the surgery would really resolve the problem - what if the problem worsens instead? meanwhile i've to survive on 3 hours of sleep every day...

i had fallen very sick two weeks ago. what had been a simple cough and sore throat developed into an apparent chest infection. i had to go to A&E 3 times, as my low grade fever persisted and i started having rashes due to allergy to the antibiotics. last friday i went to an ear nose throat specialist who told me that i've a nose allergy which causes my nose to be blocked. i don't know whom to believe now, whether i have a nose allergy or a chest infection. i only know i still feel unwell, weak and lethargic. i hadn't been able to sleep at night, i would feel very warm inside or i would have heartburn/gastric reflux or i would have a blocked nose. sometimes i wonder if it's a psychological barrier that's preventing me from falling asleep, maybe i'm afraid that i wouldn't be able to wake up again if i fall asleep. last night was especially terrible, i couldn't sleep and i was having shivers after struggling very hard to sleep. i even tried exercising, doing pushups and situps to that i would feel tired enough to sleep. and yet i only managed to squeeze out a few hours of sleep. i'm so tired now, i'm in the office and my colleagues have commented on how pale and tired i look. i really have no freaking idea what's happening to me. i feel very down, my bf keeps telling me i'm going to be fine but why am i not feeling fine? what's wrong with my body? is there a point in going to the hospital again? gosh i just nodded off typing this entry. how how how? why is my health in such a mess?

through this illness i found so much love care and concern from my family my bf colleagues and friends. they were so supportive, they called me to ask how i am, advising me to go to see specialist etc. i love all of them. i really do want to get well soon. please god help me.

my bf and i went for a cello and erhu recital at the esplanade yesterday. it was so nice! the cello sounded amazing. there was a shimmering quality to the tone. i think the acoustics of the recital studio is great.

i was rather inspired yesterday and practised with even more fervour last night.

FUCK YOU WORK. FUCK YOU.

in other news, i went to night safari with my bf two weeks ago. oh it was quite fun. we took the tram ride and the guide had this radio quality voice and my bf was like oh she can do radio (like me) etc etc haha. my bf thinks he has a mellifluous voice. hm well true la my friend thought my bf has a really nice voice when he first heard him on radio. but i think my voice more sexy leh, like really gayyyyyyyy! a couple kept using flash photography on the tram ride despite repeated warnings from the tour guide. she got so fed up she actually stopped the tram beside a tiger's den and turned on all the lights. wah lau eh siao bo. i thought the tiger was going to pounce on all of us man. hmmm and yesterday my bf and i went to kallang leisure park where he had a surprise for me. it turned out to ice skating. i was like noooooo i sure fall on my face one lor. i can't even roller blade... so we decided to watch a movie instead. step up 2 which was quite ok. plot wise duh but nice moves la. after dinner we promenaded along kallang river. oh we were thinking how expensive the condo facing the river is. hmmm it was a nice and secluded place. v tranquil. but filled with ang mohs.

cello has been ok. i've been trying to be more focused in my practice? i tend to wander off like playing random pieces and notes when i actually should work on my scales and make them sound really consistent, in tune and musical etc. i think my left index finger is hurting which is alarming because it means something is wrong with my left hand position. so i've to consult my teacher when i see her this week. sometimes i find it hard to ask her stuff, it makes me look stupid. and sometimes she looks at me like my question is pretty duh haha

endless headaches. headache upon headache.

it has been raining intermittently. it has been really cold. i have to wear my jacket in the morning when i'm going to work because it's very cold inside the bus and the train. i feel i'm walking into a fridge when i step into the office. the weather reminds me of my hongkong trip last year. hk then was like this too, cold and wet. it was much more gusty though and my jacket could hardly keep me warm. a few people dropped their umbrella in the train and the bus this morning. when i opened my umbrella, raised it and stepped out of the train station i felt like a bird taking off. i had dreamt someone was pressing on me and strangling me in the morning. when i woke up i plunged an invisible dagger into the air. and then i went to the toilet. when i returned to bed i half-slept. before long the alarm clock rang and it was cold. it had been raining, the windows in the living room were shut but it was still cold. stepping into the shower i was reluctant to take off my clothes. i pretended i was playing the cello. my teacher had told me last night to use the whole bow because i tend to use only a small part of the bow. but wouldn't it be too loud if i use the whole bow? before she could explain her alarm clock rang and she said that's all for today.

work is tiring. v tiring. like, i come home and i would rush into the shower and then i would watch tv, eat some bread, then wash up, then lie on the bed, and all of a sudden it's morning. on weekends i watch lots of porn which gives me headaches and so i'm now trying to cut down on porn and up my intake of proust but i can't read for long without feeling bored. i feel rather drained on weekends, i don't know why. i go the gym in my office whenever i can but i'm still un-muscular and generally un-beautiful, i wish my pecs would grow expand cover my face, but i don't really want to take protein supplements leh. so i'm just small and tired and exhausted. oh yes my hunky colleague, he's muddleheaded but sweet, like a gentle giant. hmm and touches me sometimes haha. but he's just a friend, i've never fantasized about him though his pecs are bigger than my very head. i think i have a sore throat, it's the sudden change of weather, messes up my respiratory system. oh despite the fatigue i still feel horny, what's wrong with me. i want to do something productive and fruitful but i'm scared, afraid that it would cause me to overextend myself. maybe i should volunteer at afa? should come out of my hole, and face people, be normal for once.

i shake my head. i think it's gone but my friend points at my glasses; it is still there. i shake my head more forcefully, it pops back into my field of vision. i remove my glasses and shake it; the fly stays put. it takes off when i touch it with my finger. my friend and i continue our conversation, we are laughing our heads off. my piercing laughter make a few heads turn. as usual, i am beating the table as i laugh. mirthfully my friend wraps his hands around his head and bends his head as if in embarassment. i cannot remember when i last laughed so hard. i reach for my water bottle and there it is, the fly is on the cap. i try to brush it away but it stays put. i crush it with my finger. it is flattened, a black dot on the cap of my waterbottle. i cannot rub it away.

the handrail of the escalator kisses every day hundreds of palms. when you place your hand on the handrail feeling its warm sometimes hot body do you remember this encounter lasting all but one minute.

is it ironic that i feel most manly when i'm shaving my armpits

i don't get it. why am i sad when i see pictures of his friends? did they remind me of anything? maybe some snippet. we were at a party, his friends were there too. i only remember sitting beside him and laughing until i teared. through my teary eyes i saw his hand resting on the sofa. so why am i sad. breaking up was the right thing to do. i wasn't sure of my feelings for him and he hadn't gotten over his ex. it was perfectly logical. i was in love with being loved more than anything. that's it. i miss being loved, not him. he's just an embodiment of my desire for love. yeah it's like a concept, an abstraction. i think i feel better already.

i've not blogged for a long time. mostly because of the persistent headache which prevented me from using the computer. though it didn't stop me from wanking haha. i can't tell u what i went through ever since the headache began, more than a month ago after i came back from an xmas party. at one point it hurt so bad i couldn't sleep at all. it wasn't like throbbing pain but a dull pain which refused to go away, the whole region extending from my left temple to the back of my neck would be like painful and stiff. my head would feel so heavy and i wouldn't be able to quite bend my head and had to lie down. painkillers didn't help, and i took so many of them i wondered if i would get addicted or if my liver would be damaged and malfunction. i consulted a number of doctors and a few chinese physicians, each of which gave a different diagnosis. some said it's induced by stress, some suggested i had a tumour (and ordered a brain scan which turned out to be normal), others said i caught a chill, that my spine is crooked the vertebrae pressing on the blood vessels supplying my brain blah blah blah. i'm feeling better now, though not totally pain-free. i saw another chinese physician on thursday. my mum took me in the evening to a nearby carpark where there was a van which says 'public free clinic.' the patients, a few middle-aged men and women, were sitting around the van and some of them were undergoing acupuncture. a woman was talking to her friend with needles sticking out of her face. one of the doctors was hmm quite cute. he has buck teeth though. i liked his back, V-shaped and manly. i know what it's like kissing people with buck teeth. it requires a certain agility of one's tongue, which i sadly lack. it's also like kissing a maw, quite dangerous actually. speaking of teeth i went to the dentist a few weeks ago and was told to my surprise that several of my teeth were decayed. i had been brushing my teeth faithfully. i was too lazy to floss but i didn't know my teeth for which i once came in 2nd in some primary school's dental health competition, could actually decay. the dentist said (rather flippantly i thought) that one of the cavities was so huge i may have to go for root canal treatment which costs a few hundred dollars. he later gave me a pamphlet which explained the treatment and i was horrified. it consisted of drilling a deep hole in my tooth and sucking out all its contents and then filling it with i-know-not-what. the dentist managed though to plug the cavity after screwing and drilling and sawing my teeth and using a number of malicious-looking metal contraptions which forced my mouth open for like the longest time and i thought i was going to choke on the saliva collecting in my mouth. the dental assistant had to use a hose to suck out my saliva, which wasn't very effective. it was a harrowing experience. after rinsing my mouth i spat out a few bits of teeth which looked like corroded blood-stained seashells. in the end the dentist could only plug that one cavity and told me to go back another time to 'patch up' the rest. i've made an appointment with the dentist at yih whose services are i hope far more affordable.
my bf and i are fine i guess. i think the honeymoon period is over. he doesn't sms me as often as i think appropriate. maybe he's tired of me. maybe he's tired from schoolwork. i think i actually love him more than he does me, which is disturbing. it used to be the other way round and there was a time where i took him for granted. i go to his hostel room at least once every week. we've decided or rather he's decided not to go to the lounge at his hostel anymore because people would keep popping in when we were necking or something. we would start or even jump in our seat and the intruders would look at us askance, not daring to suspect perhaps of what actually was going on in the room amidst the loud music. his room isn't convenient for lovemaking either because of the open-door policy and because he has a roommate. all we can do is watching youtube on his laptop while holding hands on the sly, constantly alert to the slightest noise from the corridor. we can't cuddle for more than 5 seconds.
my thesis is driving me crazy.

it's nice holding your bf's hand in the bus while talking to your mum over the mobile phone :)

not so nice when seeing a guy walk up the aisle your bf withdraws his hand immediately

fuck you stranger. fuck you world. fuck you bf :P

we never come during sex. hurtling along the asymptote of love, we forever approach but never reach a climax. our lovemaking reminds me of shiva whose penis is said to be perpetually erect; an epitome of virility he never ejaculates. we, mere mortals, never feel more spent than when we make love stripped to our underwear, our dicks straining against the intervening fabric.

why is it that when i feel the ridges and folds of your ears, my heart almost aches?

you are my date, my dear but never do i call you my boyfriend, my bf. for if a rose is a rose is a rose, a bf is a bf is not a bf.

some say the notion that the heart is the seat of emotion, even the notion of love, is a construct. that to feel as i do when i bend down to smell your neck and cover it with kisses (you have a distinctive scent and you are almost always sticky with sweat) is to commit yet another binary. i find myself at the intersection of two perhaps not very distinct desires: the desire to subvert a reified illusion and the desire to embalm myself in a dream that dreams of its existence and thus its termination.

i recall a brain-teaser that requires one to insert the appropriate mathematical signs (the multiplication, addition, division, and the subtraction) in between a series of numbers so as to obtain a given result. perhaps the issue i have in mind can be translated into a similar problem: love love love love = love, the numbers substituted by the ubiquitous word, and the matter. perhaps one needs to consider too the question of whether one can love without being loving.

it has been raining non-stop. it's getting chilly. at one time i had to wear my jacket, which smells like a vagina, not that i have ever smelled one but because anything that smells bad smells like a vagina. i've finished reading eco's foucault's pendulum. well, it's edifying considering i've to refer at every other word to wikipedia's list of esoteric terms used in the said book. but i've forgotten most of them already. the book is enthralling; sometimes i felt as though i was personally involved in the Plan and was pursued by some fanatic sect because i possessed a 'secret' which holds the key to controlling the telluric currents running underneath Earth's crust haha i'm delirious. i don't think i actually 'read' the book though. most of the time i was just like scanning the pages, getting a sense of what's happening, which is quite deficient, except when i felt i was a game under pursuit. perhaps i will dream about it tonight. i don't remember dreaming for a long time.
in other news, i've found a thesis supervisor. he's nice, he gave me a stack of readings to go through so that i can narrow down my area of interest and finalise my thesis topic. i've decided to do something theoretical like mathematical modelling rather than experimental or empirical stuff. hope it turns out well.
my date is coming back this weekend. i think declarations like 'i miss you dear' which we exchange almost every day are beginning to sound a little mechanical. but it's me i guess. to me the physical side of a relationship - not necessarily sex - is requisite for its survival. i need my loved one to be physically around me or rather there must be physical contact; a long-distance relationship is like sensory deprivation i.e. torture.

we were nearing the end of the conversation. actually, i thought it had ended and was just about to hang up when he said, eh give me a goodbye kiss leh. huh, i hesitated, then after whining a bit gave him a flippant muah muah. wah lau what is that? do it properly lah, he said, sounding slightly annoyed. u demonstrate lor, i said, chuckling, wondering if he would really do it since he was in the public, talking to me at a telephone booth in yih.


woah that's a very loud goodbye kiss, i laughed. ah ber then, now your turn. i had never given a goodbye kiss and i was embarassed. sucking in deeply and drawing my lips together like i was pouting, all the time thinking how ridiculous this all was, i contrived a proper ... labial fricative.

he wasn't fully satisified; ok better. but very soft leh! but my mum is just outside my room, i cried, she might hear me. he laughed, ok ok, then bye bye la. as i walked away from the window in the darkness - i thought it'd be better to not turn on the lights when he called - and replaced my mobile, i couldn't stop smiling.