Wandering with the Wind...

Saturday, July 16, 2011

I've been reminiscing a lot lately, one of those little things one likes to do with the mind when it is not preoccupied with worldly affairs. When you stop thinking, your mind seems to open up to a whole new world of imagery, sounds, smells, tastes, stranger senses even, that don't exist in reality; the impossible comes when reality stands by, because when the hard facts are pushed aside, we suddenly realise that the impossible is also a possibility. You chance upon new things that will lead you to greater discoveries.

In my case, I've been lounging a lot along the lane of memory. Things small and big, loud and soft, bright and dull, all forms of comparisons you can think of...they would somehow fish out little pieces of my past whose existence I had sometimes forgotten. I would see a woman playing a harmonica and remember my childhood self being fascinated with the creation of a new timbre. I would see falling leaves and see an autumn I may have lived through but never remembered. I would buy soyabean ice-cream and taste that nostalgic twinge of China's yam ice-cream I used to eat with my friend when I was three, and along with it all those sweet memories of a faraway childhood, which now flows back like an exhuberant child running up the lane with a bundle of colourful balloons as if flying a kite. My child self proudly presents to me its experiences and wishes me to acknowledge them. Is it strange, then, if I say that when I look at that little beamy child self, I suddenly feel very much like a mother?

I have grown, and I now take care of my past self as if its a child in need of nurturing. It's ironic how the past seems fragile somehow, even though it's pretty much the only thing that's set in stone; when I behold my past self, what I see is a glass being, something that needs recognition, needs acknowledgement, or it would shatter, lie upon the ground in pieces and cease to exist. Sometimes I wish to walk to the future and never look back. The past is a painful thing, because even the happiness is never purely happy - it is tinged bittersweet. And yet, when I try to turn my back upon that fragile small child with those fanciful balloons, I see misery upon its face, a kind of heart-wrenching disappointment at having been rejected and deemed unworthy. My motherly instincts would take over, not quite fully, but still sufficient to keep me in check. I would remain where I was, watching it, our gazes interlocking as if each trying to explore the other's intentions and feelings that lie underneath that face.

Yet, yet, I can't tell just what that child is feeling.

When I enter a reverie of reminiscence, I hear the child speak, and let it speak as I take a seat and listen to that voice of innocence I have grown detached from over the years. It's not a sweet voice, nothing like honeysuckle or lollipop or strawberry jam and sugar. Yet it reminds me of all those sweet things I've missed: purple yam ice-cream at Chinese street stalls, fruit popsicles from my friend's fridge, large watery peaches and fresh watermelons in summer, white-rabbit milk candies, or those small bottles of yoghurt drinks whose name I never knew but didn't care anyway. These were icons of my childhood. They have the value of nostalgia, and the memories themselves make them sweeter, because they are no longer here. And as I listen to my own story, I watch my life flash past me, those little snippets that I subconsciously treasured close to myself. As much as I grew to dislike China in many aspects now, I guess it still has a place in my life which I can never bear to fill with something else.

Halcyon Days

I've always wished there was winter in the country I live, winter makes a lot of things very precious. The sun is warmer because of the cold, trees greener because of the white, shapes clearer because of the fogginess of everything else. Winter reminds us that you don't necessarily have to obtain better to enjoy more, you just have to unearth their true value.

Perhaps my childhood was like Seiran in this picture, and when I drew him, I might have been drawing my child self in a different body. I was never a very sociable kid; I lulled myself to sleep by telling myself little bedtime stories, observed rocks and pebbles when my family brought me to famous landmarks, climbed trees to catch cats, conquered the highest spots in the playground, and fooled under pine trees to pluck golden amber. I didn't have a lot of friends, but I had really good ones whose company I sincerely enjoy. I didn't love sports but fell in love with the art of creation. In those days, I was able to appreciate beauty for what it truly is, not what it's stipulated to be.

Maybe that's why I can't feel what my past self is feeling when we observe each other. I'm gazing at all the things I've lost, standing there, waiting to be retrieved, or to retrieve me.

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~~~*Played with the winds at 1.31pm*~~~

Aurinya blogged at 1:14 PM

Roaming the Winds