Two

Looking Stupid: the mark of things worth doing.

“Well… swim.”

I stopped typing in mid dissent-diarrhoea, and stared at the two words in bold red fonts.

There is that, of course.

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I’m in my sixth month here. And I’m frustrated.

Every day, I wake up a nanny, and go to bed a zombie. The most fulfilling part of my day is, when circumstances decide to be kind, the precious moment I steal to dream. This is when Time melts away and Distance goes for a ride, creating a vacuum of isolation where dreamers can rent and be left alone to their romantic reverie.

These dreams – they sustain me. But deep down I know that I have to do more than that. I’m in friggin’ America, for crying out loud (no actually, don’t. I’ve got enough of that during the day as it is). There has got to be more to life than just drowning in little boys’ tantrums all day long.

The truth is, I haven’t been writing anything truly substantial these days. Okay, there was NaNoWriMo, but it was so fun that it practically didn’t count. Of course, I also padded so much that “writing” would be an overstatement. I wrote one article for my Stanford class, which garnered mixed reviews during the workshop session, but for some reason, I am just not happy with that piece. I blogged – though the more accurate description would be I spewed thoughts all over here without the decency to make sense, or to wipe my mouth afterwards, but brevity, you know.

Yesterday, as I stood in the shower, letting the rush of water dissolve the day’s lethargy and drown out the tantrum tornadoes outside that little boys reserve especially for mummy and daddy, I thought to myself, “I can’t do this anymore. I can’t just be a nanny, and nothing else.”

I have told myself that I would, like every other person struggling for their art out there, write after my work hours. I would send my articles to the publications here. I would pursue the Stories, write travel essays, analyse humanity, change the world and wossname.

The truth is, I’m so worn out every day that I can’t muster the energy to arrange my thoughts, let alone laying them out on paper. Whatever is left standing in my body would be trying to commit suicide, once they discover how to do that while dozing off.

Yes, I don’t have the stamina to be a struggling artist.

I do have the frustration, though. I know I have to get out of this rut of idle mindedness, but I don’t know how. There are a million avenues to try and break through, but I’m rooted on the spot.

I felt like I was fretting upon a fast-melting ice berg, knowing that if I don’t jump to another floating piece of ice, I would sink – into oblivion, into mindlessness, into complacency. But the floating ice pieces around me looked a little too far to leap to. I’m scared shitless. I could see the ice berg shrinking, but I could not bring myself to take the leap.

What if I miss?

“Well… swim.”

Two words.

The sage, who have words like “genuflect” and “ruminative” and “pervasive” and “rapple” and for some reason, “lobotomy” in his repertoire, just gave me two words.

And that two words was enough to push me from my shaky, dissolving, and self-pitiful refuge. I crashed into the water, and it was cold, as cold as Reality, and it woke me up.

It just totally made my whole situation with the melting iceberg and the floating ice things and the leaping anxiety a tad ridiculous, and very obnoxious. Like dressing in Edwardian ball gown to a casual house party.

My first thought was, “Damn. I took a while to think of that iceberg analogy too.”

My second thought was, “Why the heck didn’t I think about swimming?”

I was too caught up with the leap. I was too fixated upon landing at the right places. I forgot that there are other ways – practical, simple and straightforward ways – to reach your goals. I forgot that when it comes to writing, you need to get yourself wet, and you need to work those muscles.

Like my boy reminds me in the picture above, sometimes you just gotta clamber to reach for whatever lofty goals you have, even though you have to look a little stupid doing it. Especially if you look a little stupid doing it.

Because heck, stupidity is fun. And it makes the best pictures.