251. 何璟

It feels as if the identity associated with that name is simply a far-away memory implanted in my head. Was that person really me? I can no longer tell. When I walked her stomping grounds, with thirteen years of separation, I saw a pale scale model imitation of the locales I still sometimes dream in the interval between. When I had to greet people who knew only her, I could feel their expectation for a different person - not me - compressed down upon my shoulders as if willing me to shrink, or to speak.

Like her.

Somewhere between then and now, I had apparently lost the ability to speak. Instead of pouring endless words and conversation, I sit to observe their vitality. Too conscious of the moment, too awed by the fact of existence and act of speech.

This super-sensitive meta-awareness. Was it exponentially heightened only in the isolation of the last year? Or was it a slow, undetectably deepening phenomenon, brought to a highlight only by his strange colors this spring?

Threadbare.

250. Stagnation

Such a fine line between Heidegger's ontic and ontological. If only the idealism of one transfuses into living passion for the other. Let us reach out again.

Lest I forget.

249. Sangha

I want to be a nun.

248. Resurrection

I feel the throes of revival in this one. Stay tuned.

247. X HOURS IN WINDOWS MOVIE MAKER

Oh god goodbye time.

246. Expectation vs. delivery

The gap has never felt this insurmountably huge...to the point that I question whether I should even continue to draw/self-identify as one who draws--and hitting a note too close to depression as soon as I realize I'd even formed that thought in the first place.

Mini directional/identity crisis.

This guy, for instance, does not ever sit down to compose either melody or lyrics. During recording/production stage, he simply improvises tunes and words that come to him as he listens to the voiceless music the rest of the band has put together. In one interview, he says it pours from him as surely (and readily, and effortlessly) as blood flows from an open wound. This, especially on stage, is his sole mode of expression, conveyance...and general existence.

And then, this guy. Recent years have seen him always playing with the above weird vertical posture, but turns out it is not a stylistic choice. He suffers from a condition that makes it painfully impossible to continuously play any other way. They tow around a regular acupuncturist on tours to treat this guy between every show, just so he can pull through up to 120 lives per year. Yet, to him, "pulling through" is the definitely wrong way to put it. He lives for their music, too.

Let us also not forget this guy. At 5'7" and 96 pounds, his inability to gain weight and deliver enough power became an actual problem in recent years as the band's sound increasingly demanded it. The fix? He regularly wears 1kg (2.2 lb) weights on his limbs while he plays. As in, always in the studio, and during every single damned live. Between tours this past November, he was rushed to the ER for stress fractures in his ribs. He said: I can still play. And continued to play they did, until Kyo finally sunk in early 2012.


I repeat: I want to pour forth. I don't demand that I have a conviction in life as absolute as what these men have in what they do. I simply wish I could break my floodgate in self-expression. Since when have I become repressed-by-default to this degree?

There has to be a stronger word than "envy" in this vocabulary.

245. Mineral Show

Jing: Why does this look so edible?
Jimmyn: Scrambled eggs.