Confidence

I was on a bus going into Orchard Road. It was evening. The sky was edging from blue to light purple. The clouds were orange.

She came onboard. There weren't many seats left, and so, she sat opposite me. We were on one of those awkward 4-seaters. Two facing the front, and two facing the back (where you get to see the passengers and the passengers get to see you). I was facing the front; she was facing the back. We were facing each other directly and our knees almost touched.

She's in her 20s, I guess. Shoulder-length hair tinged red. A thin chiffon-like blue dress. Bare shoulders. The air-con was a little cold. But she was completely at ease.
Her dress was short. Distractingly short. Though her legs were crossed, the hem of the dress still ran high up her thighs. There might have been hints of her panties. I don’t know. I tried to look out the window as the bus sped over Nicoll Highway across Kallang River.
I peeked several times up the distance of her milky long legs. I knew she saw me looking. She didn’t move them. She didn't flinch when I stole a glance at her face. She smiled at me. A faint amusement. I quickly turned away.

The rest of the journey was uncomfortable. I was squirming inside. It was quite impossible not to see her, as she seemed rather nonchalant, occasionally checking her handphone. Several times our gaze met. Her eyes were always steady. Mine seemed probably shifty to her even if my body was rigid. There was no expression of disgust. No delight too. Just a faint amusement, and maybe some mild interest on her part (wondering why this man is behaving like a boy?).
She wasn't exactly a beauty. But she had presence. If I wasn't so nervous, I would have noticed that there were others staring at her too. This thought only came to me on hindsight.

She alighted at Stamford Road. Stood up, squeezed her way out to along the aisle, skimmed the crowd, brushed past me, and disappeared from my life. I heaved relief. I didn’t have to pretend anymore.

Yet, I wished I could be like her.

Resurrection

I can't even remember how many times the death and return. Still, the need to voice myself. Why? Why do I still want to write down my thoughts in this blog?
The disappointment I have with people; the intense desire to connect. One of the worst miseries in life is the inability to decide. The mind's consumed by the dilemma. And you are fixated in a hell of your own making. There's no exit.

I have since learnt that empathy is more powerful than providing solutions. We want to be understood. To know we are not alone. That for just one brief moment, there's someone who can feel what I feel. That's enough.
I wonder about Beethoven. 'Ode To Joy'. He's up on stage, at the front, looking at the orchestra. When the orchestra's finished with the symphony, he remained standing there, lost. The members of the orchestra looked at him. Looked at the crowd behind him. A rousing standing ovation. The citizens of Vienna were simply wild with enthusiasm. With this piece of music, they had forgiven him. But Beethoven didn't know yet. He couldn't hear. He's deaf. He couldn't hear the loud applause they were giving him.
He couldn't hear the music he had composed.
He just stood there, lost, staring at the orchestra staring back at him.
Why God would bless a man with such genius yet deny him the faculty of hearing his own composition? Nonetheless, Beethoven wrote music to 'Ode To Joy'.
Then, the moment, he turned around to face the audience. Perhaps the sight that greeted him's enough. Even if he can't hear himself. As long as others can.

I may be blind to the present yet I'm cursed with foresight. The things I could see, if only someone can see them too. My only consolation, fate has been fairly kind, I am often proven right. Though even as I have been successful in several of my endeavours, I wonder what's it all about.
The solitude of my existence. I didn't choose to be born. I am here by circumstances. There's no purpose; there's no meaning. The things I've touched. The people I've met.
The voices raging inside my head.

I am here.