peaks and valleys

When you're on Cloud 9, no valley is ever a low. You're on top of the world, regardless.

blessed bizarrenesss

2318 : 24082009

I set out on a narrow way
Many years ago
Hoping I would find true love
Along the broken road
But I got lost a time or two
Wiped my brow and kept
Pushin' through
I couldn't see how every sign
Pointed straight to you

That every long lost dream
Led me to where you are
Others who broke my heart
They were like northern stars
Pointing me on my way
Into your loving arms
This much I know is true
That God blessed the broken road
That led me straight to you

I think about the years I've spent
Just passin' through
I'd like to have the time I lost
And give it back to you
But you just smile and take my hand
You've been there, you understand
It's all part of a grander plan
That is comin' true

Now I'm just rollin' home
Into my lover's arms
This much I know is true
That God blessed the broken road
That led me straight to you
That God blessed the broken road
That led me straight to you

the stages of pinch

The first kind of pinch a person receives is, invariably, as an infant. As parents, relatives and admirers congregate around the bundle of unmitigated adorability, coos and funny faces are followed by affectionate pinches to the cheeks and various other fleshy parts of its miniature anatomy.

Later on in life, the same act evolves a decidedly more punitive significance. Pinches - sharp, lingering and painful - are applied by vexed parents to their recalcitrant offspring.

But even later on in life, if one should be lucky enough to find a partner so perfect their love seems almost surreal, the pinch finds another use. And when it fails to rouse the lovers from their perceived dream, that is when the pinch comes full circle and reassumes its original role.

So, pinch me. (And you did.)

starstruck

As I strolled along the canal, it was a single star that lit the night sky. It sparkled, commanding my attention with its singular brilliance. Stars, as you know, emit their own light, unlike the moon which draws its glow from the sun. And stars, as you know as well, are also suns in their own galaxies. Well, last night, I felt like a moon in that one star's sky.

If you had felt a warm glow about me, it is because I drew it from you.

wrappers and gifts

Even though I have abandoned its ideology, I cannot escape the spirituality that Christianity has imbued within me. Nor do I want to. It is a beautiful thing, spirituality. But it is a gift that can only be truly admired when the wrappings of religion have been torn off. No matter how brilliantly-designed the wrapper may be, it in itself is not the gift. It may be admired for the intricacy of its pattern and brilliance of its colour, but it should not detract from the gift that lies within. It is, perhaps, a divine Hand that creates the gift, but human ones that wrap it. But when the gift is finally unwrapped and its beauty enjoyed, the old wrapper, no matter how well-designed, lies creased and crumpled. Sometimes, bits of the tape stick to the gift. But that's okay - as long as it is the gift within that is treasured and shared, and not old, intricate wrappers.

This, is my favourite gift:

Love is patient, Love is kind,
It does not envy, it does not boast,
It is not proud, It is not rude,
It is not self-seeking,
It is not easily angered,
It keeps no record of wrongs.
Love does not delight in evil,
but rejoices with the truth.
Love always protects, always trusts,
always hopes, always perseveres.
Love never fails.

Wrapper: 1 Corinthians 13:4-8

a sea of humanity

One cannot choose a droplet from the sea. Each drop is as much of itself as it is of the ones around it, within it and without it. Some may have come from other seas, from the sky, or from melting peaks. But all become one and the same; each flows into every one else. Each becomes a diffused ingredient in The Source of Life. With your finger, touch the sea. Now see, that droplet that forms in the aftertouch, is you. (And me, too.)

revisited

Because you asked.

http://jouhl.blogspot.com/2007/05/rose-by-any-other-name.html

china unloved

The world's infatuation with China can hardly be described as a love affair - if love is to be understood as a force that inspires and forges ties that transcend the material. We have all read about pretty young things marrying wealthy but physically unappealing men with repugnant personalities. One could be forgiven in assuming theirs to be contracts based solely on mutual utility.

Such is the present relationship between cash-flooded China and its suitors. But a country is defined by more than just its economy or the wealth of its institutions. Other factors - culture, history, governmental philosophy, the demographic and ethos of its people - contribute in determining its national identity. While all these factors are, to varying extents interlinked, none of them in themselves form the reason for the world's interest in China. No, we are not interested in China, but China's economy. It is the utilitarian pursuit of material benefit that drives this fixation.

Contrast this with America, that other superpower which captured the imagination of the world in the second half of the last century. It was not merely the strength of its economy that attracted the world to its shores and invited it to theirs. More than that, it was the universally-accessible standards of personal freedoms which led to the prevailing culture of creativity and experimentation and entrenched it in the forefront of cultural, scientific and technological advancement. For all its economic clout, China can hardly be accused of having the same degree of cultural and technological influence globally. For as long as China holds on to the rigidity of its authoritarian political system and restricts the freedoms of its people to the extent that it continues to do, it is difficult to imagine the same spirit of ingenuity and experimentation taking root in China. At least, not to the extent that is has in America.

We may have invested our money in the Chinese economy, but we will probably never invest our love in China as a country the same way many of us have done so with America as an model of liberty and ingenuity. Of course, its merits have sometimes come at great societal costs. Crime, for one, is endemic because of a lax penal code. But one might also argue that it is precisely this perception of relative impunity that has also contributed to the spirit of risk-taking and consequent popular creative ethos already discussed. It is safe to say that the American believes himself to have a wider berth of running afoul of the law than the average Chinese. Where creativity is defined as a dissent from convention, such a belief frees one to experiment and take risks - creative or otherwise.

Where pop-culture, technology and marketing savvy meet, the products of American ingenuity have permeated the world.

While the Renminbi may encroach on the domain of the American Dollar, love is a harder thing to displace. Our love affair with America will last even as we find a new sugar daddy in China.

melancholy musings

His tapestries would be devoured by the moths of time, his trophies plundered by oblivion.

What for then toil for the things that are ephemeral, when Man himself is ephemeral? Does he who is impermanent also find his cause in that which is impermanent?

Humanity, that phenomenal quark, contained within a sliver of the faintest streak of Time, soon too must vanish. Even the greatest will eventually have only the grass and wind to commemorate them. History too, will be buried by the cosmic sands of time.

It is our lot to become the ghosts of shadows.