A Violent Benevolence

They had long forecasted that it would come. They tried to warn us of the dangers of being caught in the wrong place at the wrong time. They tried to warn us of the viciousness of what is coming. They tried to warn us. They tried to warn us over the radio, the TV, the Internet. You see, they really did try to warn us.

However they still failed at convincing me that it would come. It was my own observation that convinced me that they are making it sound like a big deal, like they do most of the time. I had gone through the day without seeing a hint of what was coming when all the while I was expecting it. It was anticlimactic. It was disarming. It was, reassuring.

 It began with a blinding and deafening show of lightning and thunder. Like the July 4th fireworks, the sky was in constant state of illumination. Illuminated by a firework show that for a while, seemed to last forever. It was somewhat terrifying but mostly annoying. It interrupted the radio, forced it to highlight every flash and bang with a loud crackle of static. It woke me up from my sleep, kept me awake through the show. It went off just outside my house, almost destroyed the window in my room. I was startled. I was shaken. All of a sudden I was aware. Aware of what was happening, aware of my stupidity, aware of the darkness surrounding me.

 And then the heaven let loose. Let loose its benevolence on the earth below.

 For the entire night and morning the rain came down pouring, quenching the earth thirsty for the sweet waters from above. The earth rejoiced, grasses stood tall and unyielding, flowers bloomed vibrantly, and animals joined for drinks by the puddles. A deadly boring and oppressive summer scene was instantly shattered by this falling of water. This showing of mercy. This bringing of life.

So life it shall bring. Life it shall bring to all of us rendered lifeless long ago. Bring life back to us who have been waiting for something to break this heat. Bring life back to us who have been waiting for something to cleanse the gray ashes on every house. Bring life back to us who think life here has become dull and tiresome.

So wash our city clean! Wash our cars clean! Wash our spirits clean! I'll be grading your benevolence on the way our city shines, on the way my reflection looks, on the way all of us smile.

April Snow

April showers bring May flowers, but what about April snow?

I woke up this morning to an empty feeling. The house was quiet, cold, and the weekend sunlight that usually saturates my room wasn't there. The feeling made me shivered. I hurriedly put on my neon green jacket I got last year from a robotics team and stumbled out of my room and downstairs.

All the blinds in the house was shut and everything looked very still and peaceful. A strange feeling began to percolate within me, a feeling that hadn't bothered with me for a long time. Though the sudden emergence of a feeling so strange, yet so familiar had given me a mini heart attack. I gasped for air, but I welcomed it, for it had reminded me my first forbidden close encounter with a girl.

I sat down on a corner of the sofa, the same spot my mom noticed an imprint of my butt on, and savored the feeling. I sat there motionless with my eyes closed, and had let the feeling take me on a trip down my memory lane. All those careless, worry free and reckless days had all surfaced from deep underneath. Sometimes sad, sometimes happy and sometimes life changing. It all came back.

I felt relaxed, truly relaxed, like when I was sitting in that rusting chair in the back of the ferry. Not a muscles in my body twitched, not a nerve tensed, not a single thought troubled my mind. I wondered what had became of that chair, what had became of me. I opened my eyes and scanned the living room. The frog, the calender, the new speakers. And then I saw my guitar, covered by a layer of dust. I walked over and wiped the dust off with my sleeves and carried it back to where I was sitting.

A Fender Strat. It has a smooth blood red colored body with plain white tone knobs aligned in a diagonal fashion. Cheaply made, it was meant to be a starter guitar, but so badly made that the ends of the metal frets had once opened up a wound on my index finger. I strummed a few chords, not quite out of tune, but the feeling of metal strings cutting into my fingers had made me stop. I sighed, every time when I have the layer of callus on my fingers built up, I would lose it because Mr. School would come and devour all my free times.

I put my guitar down and prepared a hot cup of tea for myself. I opened up the blinds and noticed the strangest thing falling from the sky. Snow. Snow in April? The entire pass Winter was almost without snow, something we always have an abundant amount of when Winter comes around. But this year, no snow. No snow, no rain, the weather pattern was all but familiar (when I come to think of it now, maybe it's just a reflection on my life).

For a long while I just stood there, by the window, sipping my tea.

A Late New Year Resolution

I can't believe it has been 6 months since the last time I've published a post on my blog. The explanation was simple, I ran out of ideas of what to write like any other blogs I've maintained in the past.

This is one of those cases where past experiences does more harm than good. After years of the constant "new blog, ignore blog, new blog, ignore blog" cycle, I have developed a bad(??) habit of making an introductory post for everyone of my blogs. One way or another, I can't seem to break out of the jail I made for myself. A jail that traps my mind in the "you can't write anything else unless you have written an introductory type of posts" mentality. And as you have guessed it, this post is in a way an introductory post, in the sense that it reintroduces the blog back to all of you wonderful people after months of neglect. But hey, at least I'm coming back to the same blog after the "ignore blog" phase, that should count for something.

Anyway despite the fact that I have probably lost some of my readers, if not all, I'll try to do the best I can to gain back what I've lost. This time things are different, I can smell it in the air. No, I know for a fact that I won't be going back to the "ignore blog" phase that I have always fallen into. The times have change, even though it means a huge amount of stress for me, there are actually things happening in my life and I'm grateful of that. This time I won't let it slip through the cracks of time as I have in the past. They will become part of the written history, something for me to read on a warm sunny afternoon or a cold rainy day. Something to remind me of what life is all about. Something that would lead me to think that the world will turn out to be okay after all.


Hopefully, you will feel the same too.


Just saw the news that the tornado outbreak of March 2, 2012 killed at least 32 people in its path. My heart goes out to all who have lost a family member or something of great value in this deadly storm, hope all will be going well for you soon.


My 2 cents, for what it's worth, the tragic event was just one of those reminders nature uses to remind us of how futile we human-beings are. Have a present, it is just as important as having a future, if not more. For we can do nothing but to perish when the time comes.


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PS: By the way although not all 13 of the posts I made last year were of any actual value, but there are three that I really like and are really worthy of another read through(if you do, please ignore the occasional grammar mistakes), they are:

People - a post about me overcoming my most difficult challenge. It is something that I like to read from time to time to remind me of who I was and what I have become.

That Trip to Canada - I really believe this one should deserve more reads than the other crappy ones, my bad for burying it underneath all the junk posts.

The "Lady" in Red - this post is what really made me want to come back to my blog after six months of total neglect. This post makes me feel good about myself as a self claimed blogger. This might even end up being edited and republished for my first real post after the ignoring period.