Hungry Heart

...and that's the title of the song I heard by Bruce Springsteen first thing in the morn' when I turned on the telly. It's somewhat appropriate and kinda summed up how I was feelin' this morn' when I woke up. Feelin' tired and empty and hollow after a big weekend, with a jazz gig and a trip to Daylesford and scooting off to Geelong and the inevitable rounds of drinks and silly dancing and all. It's just one of those days that I feel that something's missin' and that I have absolutely no inspiration to do anything significant and major. Sorta cruised through the day doing a bit of housework and playin' with my guitar and an early Japanese dinner to round up this totally meaningless and dreamy day.

The events of last weeks and the workload have certainly taken a toll on my sense of balance. Getting caught up in too much conversations with too many people and working too hard may seem like a good way to forget about myself for a while, but it seems to work the reverse for me this time. I am more sober than ever and more in touch with my inner thoughts and emotions, and before I know what is happenin' or what to make out of them, I realised I am actually all alone in the crowd.

Meeting my friends for dinner I thought it will be a good way to yank myself away from my state of mind, but conversations were drained and I s'pose I was partly responsible for it. I wish I was more enthusiastic, but it's hard to find the strength to when I am caught up in this strange mood. I wish I don't have to write such a sombre entry too, it's not something glorious to make public at all.

I know not all sleep is wasted, but I just hope my dreams don't have to be alcohol inspired all the time.

Everybody’s Talkin’

Especially me, I have talked too damn much already; doing my demonstration work at uni for the practical classes and talking to all the parties involved in the little fiasco that happened last Fri. They have been wanting me to listen to their gripes and sorrows and at the same time give them advice at as well. Oh well, as if I am the best person around at the moment to actually dish out anything good for the soul. I shan’t go into details. To sum it all up, it’s a matter of A getting on with B after getting’ tipsy in C’s bed and C being the best friend of A and also having a thing for B. Meanwhile, D, who is the ex of A, is highly tormented and D and B happened to be pretty good friends too. E is the innocent bystander who had to witness the whole incident and F was in a totally cbf’ed mood that night and went home early but still have to deal with all the victims and villains since that episode. E and F also happened to part of this pretty close-knitted group of people who have been friends since undergraduate days. Yes, I am F. Like WTF indeed.

In the midst of it all, I managed to buy my guitar (yay!) and went for Machine Gun Fellatio’s gig, which was absolutely campy but hilarious as!

I don’t know, all these seem to be a learning experience for me, like actually realizing I am not too clear on a lot stuff that I thought I knew very well all along. You know how easy it is to always tell people who are caught up in situations all the neat stuff to make them see the bigger picture and to make them feel somewhat better, hey? But when it comes to my own affairs (especially of life and love), I am such a complete mess. I can even be labeled as hopeless! However, while I am listening to these people and telling them all those words of opinion (and of wisdom even), I sorta feel that I am more aware of the little episode I was so caught up in recently and to allow myself to feel a little bit more at ease with the outcome of things. Of course, there is always a downside to things, and in this case, it also makes me remember just how painful and difficult (relating to personal experiences) it is to play this game called love. I do admit I get reminded of the really bad moments and the agony I went through, which was all not too long ago.

As for my demonstrating work, even though it is just to 2nd year uni students, I have come to appreciate how hard it can be to actually impart your skills and knowledge to people, as opposed to just giving simple explanations of theories and principles to others that I am so used to at work (where everybody is more in the know and at pretty much the same level). It is also a most humbling experience as I come to realise (and admit) that I have either forgotten a lot of these stuff or I don’t even know them at all. Having an Hons Degree in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, I thought I knew it all. How wrong was I (not to mention complacent)!

I am working extra hard this week. In addition to ALL the talkin’ (it’s so nice to be typing this in silence giving my mouth and tongue a rest!), I have been grounding myself sort of (heading straight after dinner) for the past two nights to mark the students’ lab reports. Took a class yesterday and another one coming up tomorrow. I could either reward myself by pissing off sometime tomorrow to check out the sale at Myer or drink myself silly at South Yarra tomorrow evening. Either way, it is so damn tempting and I can’t hardly wait for the long weekend ahead!

Coming Around Again

Feeling too tired already, but just too full in the stomach to sleep either. Had a huge Greek dinner at this tavern that I have always wanted to check out, and the three of us went there after our weekly game of squash. The tab was a tad pricey, but the food was really good, and the ambience was simply wonderful.

It was also the first day of demonstration for me at uni today. Geez, did I have the most stressful three hours! I was completely lost initially, not knowing what to teach the students or how I should go about giving a comprehensive pre-lab talk. My mind went blank completely and I was in a state of panic. I can't believe I would actually feel that way! I was talking faster than I should and yet trying to explain all the theories and principles of the experiment that they were doing today. Fortunately, I still remember some of the biochemical formulae and stoichiometric calculations pretty well to actually make myself useful to the them. However, the fact that I used permanent markers on a whiteboard (and having a bitch of a time cleaning it later) and informing them of the wrong deadline didn't help to boost my confidence at all. Like seriously, how lousy was I? In addition to this demonstration work, I have a weekly meeting with the students to guide them through the writing of their laboratory reports. Suddenly, I feel like all the stress back in uni days is back to taunt me again.

I am actually more stressed out by this additional work I am taking on than my usual work at St Vincent's. The students were all serious and enthusiastic about their work, while I was having this cruisy mentality all this while (I mean, I was thinking how hard could 2nd year uni be? I was such a bastard!). No, I must make sure I will do a better job next week (and for the many weeks to come) and brush up on my pre and post lab talks. It was such a sloppy piece of work I displayed today. Shame on me!

On a lighter note, I intend to buy myself a guitar (even before I have actually touched one before in my life) and to start learning how to play it. I will probably not take any lessons but to learn from friends and to teach myself along the way as well. I s'pose at this point, I will have sufficient motivation to make it last, as most of my favourite singers are guitarist themselves and the melodies are made up mostly by guitars. As oppose to in the past when I was doing saxophone, it was simply because of a fluffy reason like wanting to look stylish and hip. I reckon I won't give up the guitar so easily.

The weekend brought upon a chance meeting with someone I was involved with a coupla years back. No, I wasn't nicely impressed at all. Some chapters in life are better left closed, I s'pose.

World Where I Live

Which is nothing more than a succession of events that lead to my recurring tendency to lose control. Another weekend gone and more innocence lost. Went shopping on Saturday and totally lost control, spending more than I should on things that I lead myself to believe that I need. Did that for virtually the entire afternoon and evening and thought that my day would end when I got home around ten-ish. One phonecall and was out again within halfa. One drink lead to another and was going from one dark, smokey joint to another making a total of three. There's really no necessity to go into details here. My liver somewhat regretted it the next day but someone else's bed sure did not.

It was a pretty cold day today and I was in a plain black sweater over a plain shirt, another shot at the preppy look which I working (dilligently) on now. Had a fleeting thought over a ciggie break today and wondered if my so-called new image is nothing but an attempt to whitewash my less-than-wholesome lifestyle and hiding a side of me that I am not willing to reveal too readily? Am I trying to put on a second skin to mask what's truly lying beneath? Or am I trying to fool myself here to make me love myself more, serving as a form of self-protecting mechanism?

And more importantly, is this a reaction or counter-action to the what I have been through the past few months?

To move away from my issues, I actually agreed to go to Elsternwick Park earlier this evening to take a look at the tree that Paul Hester hung himself from. It was difficult finding it cos it was too dark but still found it eventually. The tree is much smaller than I would have expected. It's nicely tucked away in a corner and it is unique to the rest as it has an odd shape (sorta curved and growing toward the ground, forming an arc of sorts). A couple of bouquet of flowers and five drumsticks planted into the ground, making it all pretty low-key but sombre at the same time.

I didn't think it was such a cool idea to go at first but I reckon I shouldn't make it too dramatic, and since I am here in Melbourne, I may as well just go. I have to admit it was all a tad surreal though. There wasn't any deep emotions or anything but it still feels pretty strange all the same, looking and getting under that tree.

A good Japanese dinner in a cosy little restaurant was a good way to round up the night.

What will the week ahead bring? Who will I meet and what will I do? Can I actually have a quiet one? Do I really want one to begin with?