hellooo

I stopped writing because I stopped taking pictures.

But that's a lame excuse.

My most pressing thought currently is that New Jersey's fickle weather has my sinuses doing somersaults.  And I am not an acrobatic person.

magic

Sandra’s seen a leprechaun,

Eddie touched a troll,

Laurie danced with witches once,

Charlie found some goblins’ gold.

Donald heard a mermaid sing,

Susy spied an elf,

But all the magic I have known

I’ve had to make myself.

- Shel Silverstein, Where the Sidewalk Ends

the long haul

Carriacou Island on a mini-vacation with S, A and D, 2011. After some rain, the sun was just beginning to peak out.

March 16, 2006; 2:15am

Anh called today and in the span of 20 minutes, the last 21 years flashed before me. And I cried. To Skot. For the years passed, for those to come, for those unfolding uncontrollably before me.

But things picked up; they always do.

Walking home I saw a single cloud feign as if it were swallowing the moon, the dying incandescence of the glow diffusing across the sky.

And I realized the beauty of life is in its abuse. Beating, kicking, waning, falling, life runs away and you chase down long, lonely corridors of endless memories. But now and then it lets you win; you catch life in all its intangibility and you spend the rest of your days searching for that high.

----------------------------

January 30, 2012

My own whining is starting to bother even me. At some point the whole world enveloped around me and I can see nothing beyond my own troubles. I forget the bigger truth and the bigger goal to be "a force of nature instead of a feverish clod of ailments and grievances complaining that the world will not devote itself to making you happy", to quote Shaw. Luckily it's never too late to learn and you're never too old to change; it is a leap year after all.

coming home

Wednesday, July 26, 2006; 1:06 p.m.

I sit at Northern Lights, finishing off Mildred Pierce and taking notes on a napkin. Between chapter turnings and the whir of nearby espresso machines, my mind wanders to last night, to my paper, to my messy schedule. I think of those deliciously comfortable sandals at DSW yesterday meanwhile knowing I should stop shopping. I thought the same then, before buying a pair of black, close-toed heels. I've got 29 perfectly good pairs of shoes at home. I've got about 11 pairs of sunglasses collecting dust on my bookshelf. I've got 15 or so hand and shoulder bags hanging languidly in my closet. I've got a problem.

I'm not a slave to brand names. I don't need expensive things, flashy things, class-conscious things. I just need things. New things. All the time. I've become desire driven and involuntarily self-indulgent.

I think of the disparities between monetarily delusional Westwood and barren, desperate Rialto/Colton. I'm carefree and comfortable in my parents' house, sleeping/dancing in my room and reading/chatting in the study. I lounge on the couch, watch tv and basically eat my parents out of a home. But once I step outside the house, soak in the town, soak in the people, I wonder how I ever lived there. I feel every street, every store, every house sucks the life out of me. I run errands for my parents when I'm home, leaving my neighborhood to pass dilapidated buildings and ratty metal fences. I pass apartments with broken windows and equally broken families. Dry, yellow grass half-heartedly pokes through the ground, hoping someone will think of them. Men pass by with sun-baked, orange skin and sweaty countenances while women stand in grocery lines in clothes too tight to conceal their post-pregnancy bellies. People drink to oblivion and devour STAR magazines, wishing their years had been different. Humidity waits to slap you around every corner as you make grandiose plans to save the deflating bubble of mighty dreams. I live in a town where you run for your life.

I'm afraid I don't belong there anymore. I've been tainted with bigger and better things. After living here, do we ever really go home?

the tango

Taken at Grand Anse Beach where Saurabh and I always go for massages. I like that the clouds were pregnant with rain (and it poured shortly after). Who says beaches are only beautiful on sunny days anyway.

Wednesday, August 02, 2006; 2:51 a.m.

Dear Reader,

How are you? I'm beat, and it's late again. It's been quite a day, partly good but mostly just plain long.

My stomach's in knots and lodged in my throat. I opted not to write a paper for my American Lit class but rather to write a parody. I'm parodying not one novel but rather, a transposition of two. I'm describing the character through the eyes and words of another character, as told by another author, as told by me. I'm calling it "Forty Two" (the next chapter in the book), as my mind thrashes to suppress memories of you. And her. You and her.

I built its framework at Literati Cafe tonight, drowning in the buzz of the people and noises around me. It's all I can recall as the people and conversations of the past 2 weeks blur together in my mind.

I've got this project. And a Milton final. And some meetings in between. But then it's a night out, a celebration of the end of it all. And then it really will be the end of it all. How bittersweet.

Dear Reader, I want you to savor this moment. And this. And this. And this. I want you to pull them off your clothesline of seconds and bottle them. Send them to me some years later so I'll remember you once cared what I thought, so I'll remember our lives crossed once. Even if just briefly. Like now. And now. And now ..

nostalgia

Taken in good ol' New York a couple weeks ago on a day trip with Loan, Saurabh and Thy. We paid homage to the Met, naturellement, and I went to my first Bodies Exhibit! We ended the evening with a lovely dinner, casual yet chic like only New York could do.

My days are winding down toward two finals this coming week so I haven't much to update about unless you want to know about tropical parasites and hereditary diseases. But I wanted to update. So instead, I think I will revisit some old Xanga posts for a while. It's always interesting to remember who you were.

September 2007

I went to a wedding a few weeks ago for a guy I grew up with and hadn't talked to for 12 years. I remember going to his house with a friend when I was 8. He sat on the floor hunched over the coffee table, shaggy haired and wearing a faded purple t-shirt. He was taping a jigsaw puzzle together to frame and was the first person I'd seen do that. I remember thinking how weird it was as I always did my puzzles again and again that I could finish my 1000 pieces before 2 episodes of "Doug" had ended. What a waste of a puzzle, I thought. I stood in front of the restaurant, waiting for my parents to finish gabbing with some people they'd run into. Outside was this giant picture of the couple on a beach, her running away in a giant white dress and him chasing after her in less of an "I love you forever" sort of way and more of a "please don't leave me on our wedding day" manner. Why on earth would you choose this pose? And then to blow it up and display at the entrance? Immediately inside was a table of skinny grinning girls wearing all the makeup they owned. Behind was a scurry of people, talking and walking around shaking this hand and that. I stood alone and somewhat overwhelmed that I'll ask the groom where the groom is. I don't even know what he looks like. In fact, I don't even remember his last name. Then a guy came out of my periphery and before I could even say anything, he hugged me and said, "her name's Phuong too".

I was touched that he even remembered me. We had several small conversations throughout the night as he nudged me playfully, but that was it. I left without saying goodbye. We never exchanged numbers, and I'll probably never see him again. For most of my life, I've been a surprisingly sentimental person. I keep people in my life and in my thoughts for the sake of once strong friendships, but I've accepted that sometimes people grow away and apart. And that's okay. It doesn't make you a bad friend or a bad person. You obviously didn't have some steel-forged friendship, but you still had a good one and in the long run, I think that's enough.

"Ships at a distance have every man's wish on board. For some they come in with the tide. For others they sail forever on the horizon, never out of sight, never landing until the watcher turns his eyes away in resignation, his dreams mocked to death by time" -- Zora Neale Hurston, Their Eyes Were Watching God. The picture was taken last year at Venice Beach with Chris.

I started the summer with the simple goal of reading 10 books and I'm proud to say that a few days ago, I finally met it. The list is:

1. The Kite Runner -- Khaled Hosseini
2. The Family Man -- Elinor Lipman
3. The Life of Pi -- Yann Martel
4. Catcher in the Rye -- J. D. Salinger
5. Crime and Punishment -- Fyodor Dostoyevsky
6. Eat, Pray, Love -- Elizabeth Gilbert
7. The Glass Castle -- Jeanette Walls
8. On The Road -- Jack Kerouac
9. Love The One You're With -- Emily Griffin
10. A Thousand Splendid Suns -- Khaled Hosseini

While I'm glad I met the goal, having one at all kind of sucked the purity out of reading, if that makes sense. I believe reading should be organic, should be for the soul and I suppose that's why being an English major became such a struggle. I wasn't doing it out of love anymore and how aimless my days are when I lose sight of that.

I was just talking - or rather hopelessly rambling - to someone about the wonders of LA, its nuance, its colors, its soul and while spilling on about all the things I miss about it, I had the gut wrenching realization that I never went back to any of it this summer. Two and half months at my disposal and nothing. I never saw a single play. Never went to a single museum. Saw a single jazz band. Took a single photo for myself. And what gets me is not that I never did any of this but that I never even THOUGHT about it! Who have I become? I refuse to let med school and its toxic people suck the personality and values out of me.