She Blogs, She Blogs!

Ooh look, she blogs again!

I find that it's such a struggle to express myself now. I whine and moan and retell stories to my friends on a regular basis without any problems. But blogging, on the other hand, involves opening up to strangers AND attempting to sort through my thoughts - which thanks to recent events have become even more chaotic than usual.

I cannot even begin to describe the intense urge running through me now to just flee and close this post and let it stew as a draft (as I've done numerous times in the past few months; effectively explaining why I only have 8 posts for this entire year).

I've been told that even though I chatter about stuff a lot, I'm actually incredibly closed and reserved, particularly about stuff that bothers me. I should open myself up more, the person said, before effectively stabbing me straight through my still-wounded heart (but not consciously on purpose.)

I have sooooo many stories to tell, but I just CAN'T bring myself to actually TELL them here. Reason #1 is something I may have mentioned before; a creed that I forced upon myself when I was younger - 'leave no evidence behind!' It's something that I have tried to contradict throughout the years by starting diaries and journals... only to lose and stop writing in the end. I have quite a collection of unfinished diaries because of this. Diaries that were dutifully updated daily, before the gaps started appearing and the updates became more sparse, until the whole thing just ended abruptly. No formal goodbyes, no official 'this is the end of this diary'. Just a regular update that would turn out to be the last one, followed by blank pages.

That seems like quite a scary parallel to mortality, but I have no wish to dwell upon that train of thought.

Anyway, reason #2 would be the 'running from something'... thing. I dunno. There's *something* in my mind that scares me. Something buried that I don't want to uncover. It's like my mind is a library, and as of now the shelves are in disarray and lots of books are on the ground. Every time I try and sort them out; pick them up and put them back where they belong, I'm filled with an incredible sense of dread... like I'll discover something hiding beneath a pile of books, or something hiding behind a shelf. I'm pretty sure it's just my mind exaggerating... I'm actually willing to bet that if I do discover a monster, it'll turn out to be a fluffy little bunny rabbit. Like the one in Monty Python and The Holy Grail. Perfectly innocent.

Pain or no pain, though, I have decided that I will be blogging more on a regular basis. The main reason being that I don't want my writing skills to atrophy while I'm on my gap year. The other reason would be that I cannot let the library of my mind fall into decay. I have to start sorting shit out... can't postpone it any longer. I may feel like shards of glass are shooting through me every time I pick up a thought and try to sort it out... but one's got to do what one's got to do.

Maybe in a couple of month's time, I'll feel well enough to start telling stories again.

Before I leave for now though; here's an epiphany that came about while I was washing my face earlier (I know.. don't even start):

I'm atheist by choice. I put a great deal of thought into it a while back, and realized that it made much more sense than believing in something simply because my family said so. I've also stopped believing in a meaningful, orderly universe with a cosmic scale that dishes out good stuff for good people and bad stuff for bad people.

There is no god; we just like to think that. The universe is meaningless, as is our existence.

But I don't mind that at all.

There is no god that dictates what I should or should not do. There is no god that watches over every single thing that I do. My mistakes are my own, and I can fail as often as I need without having to fear punishment; my triumphs are my own.

There is no great plan; there is no meaning; there is just chaos. But it is up to me to create my own little bubble of order. It is up to me to create something out of this meaningless tumult.

I feel free. No, wait. I AM free. And I love that.

All human beings should try to learn before they die what they are running from, and to, and why.
- James Thurber

She Lives

I live!

So it's been a while. Lots of things have happened. Lots. Interesting things.

But I don't think I'll be blogging about them. Well, maybe I'll write about some minute events, but I don't think I'll be talking about the most relevant ones in the near future.

Two reasons for this;

a) It's not just *my* story alone. Granted, I'll be retelling it from my point of view, but that doesn't change the fact that there are other people involved in the story, and it might be seen as a breach of trust if I publish it on the interwebz.

b) I may have retold the story to my group of friends so many times that I can't be arsed to retell it again. I could end up just copy-pasting what I've sent to 3 different groups of people in 3 different languages. So there.

But anyway, I think I shall blog again. I am taking a gap year, and I don't want my writing skills to atrophy during that time. Besides, I really liked how even just typing about random stuff helped maintain order in the chaos that is my mind.

I think that shall be all, for today. I'll be back again soon. Maybe next time I shall speak in coded messages about what happened since the last time I updated.

Life Walks On And Music Tags Along

The world is ever-changing. What matters today might not matter tomorrow. That which causes heartbreak today might turn out to be a source of laughter two years from now. Nothing is permanent, except change. Does that mean that Obama will be here forever?? No, it does not.

But I digress.

Everything changes. But the one thing, apart from change, that will not ever go away is the need for music. We all need music to accompany our daily lives. Music is what feelings sound like.

So dear reader(s), without further ado, here's an update on my iTunes playlists:

(well... that was a fecking long-winded way to introduce this post, huh? Apparently there's still some blood left in my coffee!

...wait...)

MY PLAYLISTS (OLD):

Smart Playlists:

• All Japanese 133 songs
• Evanescence 32 songs
• Most Played* 79 songs
• Recently Added still varies every week
• Remioromen* 11 songs

* I changed the criteria. Most Played now only includes songs with a play count greater than 100.

** In my old post, I wondered why Remioromen had their own playlist. Now I know. It's because this band's music puts a smile on my face - that's why!

Regular Playlists:

• Angst Mode 55 songs
• Anime 103 songs
• Brother of Death 34 songs
• Classical 96 songs
• Complete Serenity 28 songs
• Desultory 23 songs
• Faves 60 songs
• J-Pop + J-Rock 34 songs
• Mozart: Requiem 15 songs
• MuggleCast 3 songs
• Offbeat 55 songs
• Opera 11 songs
• OPM 15 songs
• Rainy Night 58 songs
• Rock 178 songs
• Rocky Horror Picture Show 7 songs
• Sleepy Hollows 70 songs
• The Dark of The Bleeding Moon deleted
• The Phantom of The Opera 20 songs
• Tranquility 29 songs
• Tranquility II 18 songs
• Upbeat 68 songs
• Warm and Fuzzy 80 songs

NEW PLAYLISTS:

Smart Playlists:

- Highest Rated 69 songs
(Songs with a 5-star rating...)

- Ajikan 9 songs
(Asian Kung-Fu Generation finally got their own well-deserved playlist)

Regular Playlists:

- <./.3 26 songs *
(As the 'name' implies, this is the remedy for a broken heart. It starts out with sad, angsty, 'woe-be-me' songs, like And All That Could Have Been by Nine Inch Nails, and then gradually progresses to angry, 'good riddance' songs such as My Happy Ending by Avril Lavigne and Over You by Chris Daughtry.)

* The playlist name is actually straight out heart emoticon with a slash in the middle. But somehow, it causes Blogger's coding to go haywire, so I had to put periods in between the symbols...

- B.A.M.F. 10 songs
(Simply put, this playlist makes me feel like a Bad Ass Mother F***er. Songs include Thoughtless by Evanescence, Ich Will by Rammstein, and so on)

- Comedy 4 songs
(Sound bites from stand-up comedians. Perfect for some smiles.)

- Dreary Overcast 5 songs
(Includes songs that make me quite sick to my stomach... Sick with a dreary, smothering feeling, that is. The Cure's One Hundred Years is here.)

- Pensive 12 songs
(The perfect playlist for when I'm pondering my existence once again. Gives me that chilly, peaceful feeling.)

- Soothe the Rage 28 songs
(I had to create this when a ***** **** **** in my English class infuriated me to the point that I actually considered homicide... This playlist is designed to calm me down - hence, soothe the rage.)


And that's that!

Music is what life sounds like.
- Eric Olson

Music is the medicine of the breaking heart.
- Leigh Hunt