Suddenly, you’re in the future
I am trying to make a life out of reasoning reality, but I'm no where near there. It's like this: you're here where I am, knowing that things are different different. You look back, flip over the old pages and you saw the past: oh it was great, uniforms forced you to conform, to create equality, and equality is good, good.
I mean, it's a non-existent concept, but it is NECESSARY to make things happen.
Not that things are not happening now.
On the contrary, everything is just running all at the same time, and then you stand in your place, and watch the shadows rush past you, as you try to desperately grab a piece of the fabric that sweeps past the apples of your cheeks.
You hardly endeavour, because you know you're no where near anywhere.
…
You sit at a corner, and remember her. Who? Suddenly she's someone, amazing, famous, you see her face on TV, and you say, 'Hey, that girl's my senior. I knew her once.'
Or, it could be the other way around, you see him, someone you've snubbed, over five years ago, 'I'm sorry, you're not good enough.'
OK, you might have been kinder, 'I'm sorry but this is just not the time.'
You might have made him hope, 'I can't say yes now, but I don't know what will happen in the future.'
You shattered his dreams, you broke his heart.
Today, you find him again, photos. Connections. He's made it. Oh it's not just the qualifications, or the promising career that welcomes a brilliant future, it's also the lip-smacking six-pack abs he displays oh-so-proudly in the photos: you wonder, 'What if?'
But that 'what if' remains the invisible steps of a choice you could have taken over five years ago, except, it remains that just. A 'could-have' choice.
SO you try to stay where you are and move at your own pace, and you remind yourself, 'No. I wouldn't want it otherwise.'
December 16th, 2005 at 8:57 am
Beautiful.
Poignant.
Ironic.
Great stuff on a Friday morning.
December 16th, 2005 at 9:08 am
nods nods…. amen to that!!
December 16th, 2005 at 9:09 am
Personally, I try not to burn any bridges, lest it haunts me down the line.
“What ifs”… Everything is about “What ifs”… I just look ahead, not what’s past. Keeps it simple.
December 16th, 2005 at 9:59 am
Personally, I try not to burn any bridges, lest it haunts me down the line.
I agree with Vincent on that one, I try not to burn any bridges, but alas, some people you meet just torch them and make it impossible to go back.
Everything is about “What ifs”… I just look ahead, not what’s past.
And I disagree with Vincent on this one (Sorry Vincent). The ‘What if’ scenarios are often good things to contemplate. First of all, the old saying, ‘Those who do not learn from the past are doomed to repeat it,’ comes to mind. So looking back and contemplating the ‘What Ifs’ in life often prepares us for what lies ahead.
If I may though, I’ll try to twist what Vincent said into what I beleive he might have been saying (and Vincent might kick me in da nuts for putting words in his mouth … but like I said, I’m twisting it for my own convenience … so it’s not like I’m being covert or anything … just trying to find the happy medium), but, I think he might be suggesting that berating oneself over the past is not a healthy thing to do. So therefore, we should be watching what’s coming up ahead. (ie, watch the road ahead and you won’t drive onto the wrong side of the road. Watch where your coming from and have an accident).
Feelings of screwing up and missing out on something good are not the right thing to do to oneself.
Contemplation of what might have been in order to learn is good though. It teaches us to recognise signs as we approach them.
In this case - it’s also good to look at how different life is. The person who everyone thought was going to be ‘The Big Thing’ often never makes it, and the ‘Big Looser’ from school ends up being the next ‘Bill Gates’ … Like Vincent said, don’t burn your bridges.
But hey, i think we all knew that anyway.
Nice start to a Friday morning Minishorts.
December 16th, 2005 at 10:04 am
OH SO TRUE, but sometimes, we forget there’s the other possibility: what if it were the other side that burnt that bridge, do you rebuild it?
In the case above, no bridges were burnt, fortunately.
December 16th, 2005 at 10:28 am
Personally I would (rebuild the bridge), because I believe everyone deserves a second chance…
December 16th, 2005 at 2:58 pm
Dabido: Well, yeah… missed out the part where I should say “Don’t look back after you’ve learnt your mistake”. Thanks.
Minishorts: Well, if the other person burnt the bridge, I feel that if you have forgiven and come to be at peace with the matter, that’s what matters. Any bitterness or reconsiliation to be done from the other person’s side… that’s his/her own battle.
December 16th, 2005 at 5:05 pm
Can I have the Blue Pill now? Please?
December 16th, 2005 at 8:45 pm
announcements
there will be cyber-party organised to celebrate xiaxue’s winnings for all xiaxue voters (VIPs)……..the cyber party goes like dis……wat u do is u open tat chosen song and party in ur own room (tat y called cyber-party ma)………i have choose 1 party song for the cyber-party but the song name can only be revealed in 2006….
watch this space! stay tuned!
December 16th, 2005 at 9:12 pm
the what-ifs will make us burn in the end..
but we always yearn for them that maybe there would be a flicker of hope..
*sigh*
December 17th, 2005 at 9:01 am
god, all this xiaxue promoting here are starting to annoy the heck out of me.
ui! stop advertising her here la! u only make her look like a cheap attention craving *****
December 17th, 2005 at 12:41 pm
“What ifs” are one of the most dangerous words to say to yourself. Because even those who have “made it” wonder why they can’t have made it even more. Even a highly successful Hollywood actor wonders if he could have done anything different and be as successful as Tom Cruise, who wonders if he’ll ever be as popular as Tom Hanks, and so on…
December 17th, 2005 at 1:41 pm
OH SO TRUE, but sometimes, we forget there’s the other possibility: what if it were the other side that burnt that bridge, do you rebuild it?
Well, it depends, like I said, “I try not to burn any bridges, but alas, some people you meet just torch them and make it impossible to go back.”
So will depend on the situation.
For instance, my best friend from school had the record for being the only Prefect to put another year twelve on detention. Due to that, the guy he put on detention hated my best friend, and as such, I was sort of ‘disliked’ by the guy. Years later, I ended up sharing a house with the guy, and we got on really well.
So, was an easy bridge to build.
Other times, some people make it impossible.
They do you wrong, then they just keep doing it and somehow make you look like the culprit. Do you want them back in your life? Not normally, as they often don’t change (in fact, most people don’t change after 19 yo unless they have a ‘life changing experience’ - such as religious conversion - surviving an ordeal etc)
They might treat you right if they perceive you different too.
One of my old flatmates always used to tell me that she never let anyone be her friend unless she could get something from them … an attitude I always thought was rather stupid. Needless to say, once she decided I wa no longer useful to her, I was thrown away like so much garbage. Do I want to mend that bridge? No, never.
December 17th, 2005 at 3:40 pm
lol. but maybe u did the right thing, cos if u din snub him, he probably wouldnt feel motivated to go above the elitist (is that word too harsh?) so that years later he can wake up, rub his six-packs and go, “life is brilliant. life is wonderful. those naysayers? hah. guess who proved them wrong.”
December 17th, 2005 at 10:57 pm
everyone wish to turn back the time lah..but look forwards lah.. past let it past..okay:grin:
thinking “what if” alot is killing me!
December 29th, 2005 at 7:02 am
there r no wat if in this life…everything tat is done is done..i do believe everythg happens for a reason…
i will not burn brigdes nor build new 1…because experience tell me, walking bac de same way u come from might jus lead to a fall– A fall from a broken fragile brigde…