In No Great Hurry

I saw a post about Saul Leiter. I remembered how I discovered his works. It was a moment in time that I will remember forever.

Encounters and Reunions

I personally love meeting new people as long as they have something to contribute in expanding my views on different matters. Despite the restrictions that were in place on travelling, I still managed to meet quite a lot of new faces in my life. Some are expected as I started a new career, some are old friends who I have not seen for ages and a handful are total strangers that strike up a conversation with me.

Despite how people say technology keeps us apart, I find it somewhat comforting that it works the opposite way for me. I met new people online

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The preceding paragraph was written by me in 2021. It is now almost September 2023. I have met more strangers and befriended quite a lot of people along the way. I have said quite a few goodbyes, and I always hated that feeling. Things come and go, and I cannot control that. Despite all my attempts to say that I should not worry about the things that I cannot control; in truth, I do wish that I could’ve done better. I miss the people who are no longer in my life, I wish I could say just a bit more but even if I did, I doubt it will do any good. I am a bit burnt out from my day job and it seems that it’s harder for me to look forward to going to work nowadays. I am writing because I just had a weird attack where my breathing was shallow and I guess I’m just trying to make sense of things right now.

I have a friend who made it out of the country and manged to migrate out. Maybe I should hit her up and help me to get a fresh start somewhere else, with a new identity. Starting new will be good but I’m pretty sure my ghosts and the past mistakes will still haunt me. I might as well do the best with what is given to me here.

I think my mind is still messy, I thought it would be clearer once I post things but this post turned out to be as messy as my mind. Quite a disorganized one.

I had a few highlights these past few weeks though, made a friend who I can party with and share what is bothering us. Although I know this won’t last long, I’m thankful for this encounter because in this moment in time, I appreciate your presence.

Looking back at the paragraph written in 2021; I have now stopped making friends online, no idea why but I just stopped making friends online. People just introduced themselves to me in real life which is pretty interesting because at this moment in my life, I do not want to be approached. I guess the universe works in a strange way which I cannot fathom and maybe God is just showing me all the lives that I have touched.

A friend asked me how I was doing and I can’t even say how I feel. I just don’t have the words to describe how I feel or to put it into my perspective; I don’t even know what I am feeling. I just want to watch sunsets and ride my motorcycle. I don’t have things figured out but I don’t have to figure it out right now because I don’t know the answer or I don’t even know what the question is. All I know is that I will face things day by day, keeping moving forward like I always do. I don’t think I will do great things but I will do the small things with love as I always do. I will listen with all my heart and I will be back again.

Until then,

The Story So Far

So many stories to tell yet I don’t have the time to write anything. I’ve been catching flights every month, crossing paths again with people who I met a long time ago. I’ll be back to writing once I have settled in this crazy year.

N

That Elvis Chapel

Hey blog, sorry I haven’t written in a while. Life’s has been pretty tough with everything that’s going on. Where to start? I’m still working in the middle of the sea, someone close to me passed and I was supposed to be engaged. The last part? Oh, that happened last year but I had a dream and it felt like yesterday again.

Yeah I was supposed to be someone’s fiancé but that obvs did not happen. Hell, I was ready to settle down to this new life and I even sorted out the shit in my life. I was on track to settle down with one person but you know how the old saying goes; it takes two to tango. I guess I was so ready that I didn’t see that the other person isn’t ready. The engagement proposal came down quickly as it started. Sucks because that was the happiest I have ever been. I think accepting it was a slow realization, similar to the 5 stages of grief. I was in an all time high but when it was over I was keeping my composure. Then I started working in a remote location and that’s where the loneliness hits me, in the past I see myself coming back from the isolation to my fiancée but yeah that didn’t happen. The loneliness was crushing and I cried myself to sleep everyday (because I work in nights, I sleep in the day). Every time I lay in bed the thought if it came over and swallows me like a big rolling wave, drowning me in my sadness and the pain pierces through my chest. I told God to stop the pain but God had other plans for me I guess. This happened for a week or more and then I got tired of my emotions.

I didn’t want the pain to feel numb because that’s what’s left of my supposed to be engagement. Weird isn’t it that I didn’t want to let go? This kept going on for quite a while and I wallowed in my sadness without letting others see it. When I got back on land, I saw the ring and I wore it. This was supposed to be a promise, no matter how far apart we are, we still belonged to each other and I will always return to her. Memories of us deciding on the ring came back but I always get pulled back to reality. It hurts every time I think about the Las Vegas trip that we were planning. At the time I got a girl who was crazy enough to go to Vegas with me and get hitched in an Elvis Chapel, man that Elvis Chapel. She had me when she agreed on the Elvis Chapel. I was literally on top of the world and nothing else mattered anymore.

The pain subsided and I did felt numb after, I naturally accepted the fact that I went through a failed engagement but that’s alright. She did asked for the ring back and paid for it, returned all my stuff (man, deja vu) but I guess that’s not the first time we had to do this and I’m sure we did it with someone else also. How did I carried forward after that? I took care of myself and listened to myself. I didn’t do any reckless thing because I want a fulfilling life and to have a fulfilling life is to have enough, not wanting for more. I didn’t sleep around because I don’t want to partake in anything that will fuck up my mind and even worse, fuck up another party. I quit drinking because I respected myself and I don’t want to abuse my body through those. I chose my tattoos carefully because I want an art gallery on my body and I want my body to be as beautiful and to tell a story like the Sistine Chapel. I hit the gym hard, pushed through my mental barrier until my body failed to see my physical capability (and I am also sculpted like what Michaelangelo worked on). I went to fulfill my promises and met my friends whom I said goodbye years ago. I spent time with my blood and not-blood cousins and we promised to take care of each other. My bank account is also filthy so I get to say things like “you forgot, I’m rich now” to my cousins when I take them out for dinner so that’s nice too.

Yeah, I went through a failed engagement. I didn’t hate her or anything though because she deserves to make her own decisions too. I realized I love her enough to know to let go. That love stayed the same and I didn’t asked her to come back. I guess that’s emotional maturity for ya. Sigh, I’ll just do it again. But this time, more carefully 🙂

Leader of Men

The thing about working in a hostile environment is that you have to make sure that you’ll make it home alive. In my case; I have a supervisory role which means not only I have to keep myself safe but also the people working under me safe. I thought that the conversation that I made with people under me on working safely is superficial but today it potentially saved a life.

I was raised by a father who had always worked hard his entire life, he was never in a supervisory role like me so I was raised with a mentality of “don’t just watch, do the job”. I came to the rig with the same mentality but eventually that mentality shifted once I have people asking me what to do and how to do it. These people depended on me to do their job well and they need me to remind them about the potential hazard and how we all play a part in keeping each other safe. We all want to go home safely to see our loved ones, our friends, the ones who we promised to see again. It is also my job to make sure my men return home safely. So if I’m doing the job also, it means that I am not supervising and that means no one is keeping an eye out for my men to stay safe.

I was used to working alone but now I have to step up to be a leader of men. There’s a mutual respect between them and myself, we keep an open conversation, listen to each other, watch each other’s back and when the right time comes, joke around. When I first came on to this job, I’m very sure they had little confidence on me to be their leader but day by day I managed to get better. There’s a big difference on how they greet me and address me and I guess that’s when they developed the sense of trust, that this geologist turned engineer can lead them. One of them even told me that my decisions are better than the person before me despite not having an engineering background. At least I am on the right track.

That decision today potentially saved a life, I intervened on a simple thing that how someone cannot put their item there and work on it offline as it is an active zone where you could be potentially struck. The next day an incident happened exactly where that place is. Fucking hell, this job is dangerous. You can get killed by moving objects, falling objects and process safety. There were times that my men asked me if they can do shortcuts but I have to say no because if one thing failed it could cause a chain of events. Time we can take, machines we can replace but individuals I cannot afford to lose.

Working here made me realize that you can’t take life for granted (even more so now). I’ve seen things that could kill and when you see it in front of your eyes, it shakes you in a different way. Other people that came before me told me this was supposed to be an easy time (because they had someone senior to accompany them) but in my case; I’m the standalone engineer. “Tough times makes great men” was what my friend told me. At this rate, by the end of my assignment here I’ll be a different man.

Sometimes I can’t believe how much I have grown in such a short time. I was a grad student just 4 years ago and now I am a geoscientist with the responsibility to keep the country’s economy running but at the same time working as an engineer, leading almost a hundred men on this rig. I have an apartment lined up for me and a car to pay off soon. Quite heavy for a 27 years old guy I guess. I’m very sure my young adult life phase is coming to an end and my adult phase is starting. When did I grew up? I have no answer for that but I do know that I grew up all over and I am more than thankful to myself for pulling through tough times and maturing more than I expected. After all, there’s no lotus without mud.

The sun will rise as my night shift comes to an end. At this point, I am grateful that I get to see the sun rise along with my fellow men and women on this metal island. I will keep them safe so they can return to their loved ones, I will keep myself safe so I can return and keep my promises.

Until then,

The Dance of the Nocturnal Animal

Another year has gone by and I am somehow working in a hostile environment. I never liked working in a drilling rig simply because it’s so dangerous and there’s a lot of injuries associated with the work. But what do you do when life deals you these things; you have to make the best out of it, you have to keep moving and dance, dance, dance. Dance so that the world keeps moving, dance so that you won’t stay in one place, dance so that you’ll end up in a better place.

That’s exactly what I did, I pulled myself up and danced. The first few days was the toughest. New work scope, no prior experience as an engineer, night shift and I was emotionally not at my best. The thing about working graveyard shift is that everyone is asleep when you’re up so it’s difficult to not feel alone at times. There were times when I just lay down in bed and broke down, don’t feel bad for me because I found out that this is what I needed; an outlet for my emotions and feelings. It gets less painful with every-time I let it out, feelings doesn’t change but once all the emotions are out then things become clearer and you get to see the bigger picture. Wasn’t easy working at a new role while dealing with my emotions but I started dancing and I didn’t tripped.

Tattoos was a big conversation starter for me. People on the rig was generally surprised when they found out that this young office guy has quite a bit of tattoos on his body. There’s this guy who told me that one of his friend saw this guy walking around with a stairs tattoo and proceeded to take a photo of my tattoo and sent it to his friend. Lo and behold, Brunei is very small and turns out the friend really did saw me. A lot of people tried asking me what are the meaning of my tattoos but if you know me; I prefer to keep the meaning to myself. There’s only one person who knew the meanings of my tattoos (other than myself, ofcourse) that’s how intimate the meanings of my tattoos means to me.

Can you believe it that I found a significant mistake on my first week working as an engineer? It was overlooked by everyone but when I did the work, it was pretty concerning that this was overlooked. I guess there was a reason why I ended up working on that remote location. I don’t wanna think too much about it because I am not in the country right now. I am currently crashing on my friend’s couch right next to a rabbit cage. What a leech eh? It’s fine, I’ll return the favor one day. I am honestly grateful that I have friends like these.

I danced pretty well so far and I intend to keep on doing just that. Though my life took an unexpected turn; it remains beautiful. I said to myself back then; maybe the things that I’ve lost, they will come back when the time is right. But now, I’ll keep dancing.

Until then,

A Silent Devotion to Myself

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It’s always hard to start writing. Something about a blank page with no words is so daunting and scary. I know that today I want to write about how I felt the need to forgive myself for being too harsh on myself. I kept telling myself to stop thinking of the past and just move on but in reality, I realized that the things in the past were as real as the moment I am living in right now and I cannot just leave it just like that. I don’t look back in sadness anymore which is a good sign of growth. There’s this saying that you cannot live while thinking of the past because it will just cause you sadness and you cannot think about the future too often because you will be anxious all the time. So indeed the present is the best time to live but also to acknowledge the past and to look forward to the future. There are a few things that I acknowledge in my past that will affect my future;

The first thing is that I have decided to quit hard alcohol and drinking in general. While I do still enjoy wine with a good dinner and company, that’s about as much alcohol as I will consume. I acknowledge that in the past I had enjoyed alcohol but in the present, I respect my body and I get a better thrill (or serotonin boost) from lifting heavy weights and boxing. Fine-tuning my body in such a way that I am always the best version of myself every single day gives me the satisfaction that alcohol could not ever give me.

Secondly, I acknowledge that I am still learning in the school emotional maturity. In the past or even in the near past; I realized that I thought I was emotionally mature but in reality, I still have a lot to learn. But that’s okay because nobody ever thought us this right? I will learn to be more emotionally mature; I will have the capacity to explain myself in such a way that the other person can understand clearly what upsets me and why I was upset without feeling the need to sulk. I will have the capacity to stay calm and not to assume the worst every single time, this will take time as I have to unlearn a lot of things. Finally, I will have the capacity to be vulnerable as to love someone means to be open to being hurt. I will not be embarrassed by my vulnerability even though I have been hurt because there is nothing wrong with my tears but in turn, I acknowledge that the other party needs help hence why the actions they did. I will give myself months to learn this emotional literacy for no one taught me how to be emotionally literate, I did see glimpses of these emotional literacies but I do know that I will practice it every day to be a better person.

Thirdly and lastly, I acknowledge that I am loved. And I hope that no matter how unlovable you think you are or if you ever think that you do not even deserve love; you are wrong. Be kinder to yourself, I can say that to you and myself.

You made it to the end! Here’s a song for you. This will be the song I will sing to my wife every single day in my head (hell yeah your boy will be a dedicated husband one day, I just know that I will be dedicated and devoted and there’s no question about it!!!)

Until then,

Like Sunset In Our Eyes

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There are things that I have to do even though I do not want to do them. I don’t want to fade out of view just like that because that will not do any good. I will let things unfold but not leave them untold. As sure as I am that the sun will rise again, that’s how certain I am that things will be better as long as we try to do so. We’ll pull our weight as we always do.

On an unrelated note; I just realized that living alone is not the easiest thing because all my friends and the people that matter the most to me are in another district and hours away. I realized that all I did after working here were just chores, gym and cooking. Maybe that is why it is hard for me to live alone here, the lack of interaction. I am now recovering from two fresh tattoos, so that is a whole two weeks of not hitting the gym, giving me a lot of free time to overthink. I think this time I’ll do better, I have confidence and faith in myself. After all, if I don’t believe in myself then who will? In an ideal situation, I would love to spend my time with the people who matter the most but again life is a long lesson and I have to learn how to be comfortable in my own little world for now.

Things will get better. I just know it. Like the sunset in our eyes, one day the ray of sunshine will rise again and it will be there to stay.

Until then,

Silhouettes of What Was

Some wounds don’t heal themselves, so it’s a good thing you’re not alone. I need more time to mourn all the lives I could’ve had. Some things never change, but that’s okay.

Maybe things are how it is right now because it’s building up for my future. Uncertainties in the future does not mean it’s bleak, it could also mean brighter things might also happen. So maybe I don’t have to mourn all the lives I could’ve had because they are still possible. It’s still possible one day that I feel content with the things in my life, it’s possible to have a heart filled with love again, it’s possible to have a purpose in life again. Only thing I’m certain is that I still want to have a ring on my finger and it’s reserved with a name.

Markings and engravings on my body reminds me who of I am. A constant reminder for myself to live life unabridged; to make sure that I feel all the joy, pain, sorrow, excitement, sadness, happiness for myself.

Maybe I’m asleep and this is all a dream. Forever has to wait.

Until then,

Table for Two

My worst fear ever other than death is losing that one person. In fact, it is not the fear of losing that one person; rather the fear of never finding someone who can love you like she did, understand you like she did, comfort you like she did… there can never be another one. I fell in love and the love is the kind of love where you felt that she is your soulmate. I fell in love with the most beautiful girl who despite had showed me her pains and struggles, made me fell even deeper.

Whenever I go out, it’s always a table for two. Even when I’m alone, it’s a table for two as I carry your heart in my heart. You made my heart felt happy, sad, joyful, pain, passionate, loving, loved and most of all, alive. I have never loved anyone as much as I have and the fact that I am fearlessly writing my feelings in a public space like never before speaks volume about the love that I have. I still think about everyday, even back then when we were apart; you’ve never left. When I dream, I dreamt that I was in love and my dream is a reality. You made me want to be better, you made me have a sense of direction, you gave me a ray of sunshine in this otherwise bleak and confusing world.

When I love
I feel that I am the king of time
I possess the earth and everything on it
and ride into the sun upon my horse.

When I love
I become liquid light
invisible to the eye
and the poems in my notebooks
become fields of mimosa and poppy.

When I love
the water gushes from my fingers
grass grows on my tongue
when I love
I become time outside all time.

When I love a woman
all the trees
run barefoot toward me…

Nizar Qabbani

Did fate brought us together again? If so can we make this work? I’ll damn all the things that tries to keep us apart. You will know on my side I’ll love fearlessly and will never give up. If this life doesn’t give us a chance, then I pray to God to give us a better chance again be it in this life or the next and whatever may come after.

Yours,
Sincerely,
& Forever.