01'55

01'55 so it is named

I deleted all the i's in my story
I listen to Tom Waits for the first time in the early morning
The naked self writes

Tom Waits sings, “hope I don't fall in love with you because it makes me a little blue”
Doesn't it?
Have I not had the same thought?
I'd rather not love, so I declared, proud and loud
I'd hate to hurt and be hurt
Time and again

I looked for his presence
I wanted him to be right here right now
Miss right here right now
The joke was told
The night went on without sparkles in my eyes
The night dragged on

I needed water to survive
I needed not you

The door bell rings when I write
The very moments of vulnerability
I'd rather not answer
I've never answered, in the presence of the naked self
Couldn't you, my very own stranger at the door, not have understood?

My darling, my darling,
Tom Waits is singing
How do you scheme love?

我心中想的只有你

How is it that things don't always go the way we want them to?
How is it that the night went on the way neither of us understood what to do with it?
How is it that people love you without ever telling you?
How is it that the wonder of life frightens me at unimaginable times?

How is it that I could love you without having to know you by heart?
How is it that we walked across the city without a word exchanged between us?
How is it that the cats and dogs sleep in silence?
How is it that the cat waits by the veranda, overlooking the park and my lonely silhouette?
How is it that I had no choice but to imagine life in the absence of my very beloved?

How is it that you shall remain a mystery to me, for the rest of the times that we will meet and fall for each other?

How is it that the night continued to be special, without you by my side?

Why Act Three?

A month or two into our friendship, Leslie sat me down to tell me a story. "I don't tell this to many people," she prefaced.

It was a practiced story, I could tell, by the way she moved from plot point to plot point neatly and linearly – by the way she elaborated on the most distressing things as if she were reading from a moving, but familiar, book.

I was 21 then, and Leslie 20. If Leslie freaked when she found out I was a senior – I think her word was "immature" – I often stood in awe of the centeredness she possessed for her age.

In listening to her story, I learned that at the age of 20, she had already lost a mother and moved to another country, adopted a new culture. She had not only scrambled to survive, but worked hard to succeed. She seemed to have gone through more at that age than what some people will experience in a lifetime.

Leslie has an affinity for the literary, appropriately, because her life sometimes reads like a story. She asked me to think of a title for her blog. I thought, if her childhood in Taiwan was Act I of her life, and her maturation into adulthood in the U.S. was Act II, then her return to Taiwan and her search for a place to plant her feet makes a pretty compelling Act Three.


I can only say that I'll be here to read it.

—Andy

Incomplete

When life gets difficult, I forget what it means to be special. I forget the light and the gift people see in me. I forget how powerful language can be. I forget what I have in me that draw the extraordinaire to me.

The very truth is that I am terrified. I am scared out of my mind about what is to become of this life, about living a life with regrets, about going straight ahead without having the direction mesmerized.

I forget easily. Too easily. I forget to stride ahead, with my head tilted upward, with a fearless look, with undefeatable confidence. I forget life goes on, I forget people love, I forget to love.

But when life gets difficult, what do I know? What do I really know that will possibly make a difference in my life? Change me, move me, become the better part of me? What do I know about being distinguished? About being the one in control? About being powerful? About being strong?

But the truth no longer matters, the cold harsh truth. It no longer matters.

I have a story to tell. So that’s how the story began.
I may or may not give the whole of myself. To you. To a faithful reader as far as you.

I may not tell the truth. About myself. About how life works in wonder. About how they have changed me, about how I have been convinced that life isn’t always about just me.

I may or may not tell the truth. I may or may not give the whole of myself to you, to someone as far as you.

I have a story to tell. So I began the story, about the loves found and lost along the way, about the men and the women, about how the world was changed overnight, in an instant, about the grownups, the children, the father.

Were you entranced? Were you fascinated? Were you heartbroken?
Would you have understood?

I am not yet ready to speak with you, to speak to you as if nothing has happened, as if the hurtful conversation never took place, as if life really could go on this easily, as if the world has not yet crumbled beneath our feet.

I am not yet prepared to deal with the brokenness that you made me feel, the defense you had against me, the silence, the drama, the questionable infidelity.

I am not armed.
I am not teamed.
I am just me, alone, silent, feared.

I am not ready to apologize, to go away, to turn my back on you.
Nor am I ready to be healed, to love in spite of myself, to forgive.
I am not anyone else.

"She was just like everyone else, she endured her loneliness in silence, tried to justify everything she did, pretended to be strong when she was feeling weak or weak when she was feeling strong..."

- Paulo Coelho in the Eleven Minutes