2 posts tagged “packing”
3 stops, 2 suitcases filled to the brim & on-the-border of overweight, 1 calendar day - and i am back in the us of a. it's actually been a full week since i've been back in texas. during this week, i've managed to unpack the suitcases that i struggled so long and tediously to stuff and zip, and i even found my way down to austin to see some missed-faces. the past two days, however, i have been embracing my typical home-habits.
every break, i tend to soak up a pinch too much enthusiasm from watching the food network excesisvely and end up actually aspiring to work the kitchen. today i purchased a variety of odd ingredients (can of black beans and nectar, both included in the cart of hodgepodge craving-satisfiers) to create some stellar concoction, whose recipe i envisioned myself penning down in a hippie-bound notebook with browned pages. unfortunately, the reality turn out was several-folds: `1) the brownies i attempted to bake from scratch and with all substituted ingredients (in a meager strive to be healthy sort of way) were awful, just purely awful. silver lining: my mom enjoyed them and has eaten half the pan. i worry for her taste buds, esp since i know she's not one of those "aw, honey, because you baked them, of course i'll eat them" type of mom who bothers to cushion my feelings. they really do taste like mexican food...mushed. i guess in the spirit of cinco de mayo...OLE. eat the brownies, mom, eat the brownies.
a few entries ago, i wrote a couple of absolute riveting [HA] paragraphs regarding my broken electronics. well, many $$$$ down later (sigh), i have replaced the broken with the new, including a blackberry. i am now an official crackberry head. however, having all of my life & its tech support sides synced has its down sides. for example, i used to be excited everytime i approached my computer to check my email. now, i know what emails i get instaneously. the brief excitement from before when i'd click on my gmail bookmark just is not there anymore. i guess the moments away from the internet made me realize how much i appreciate it; now that it's readily available, it's not too special anymore. it's true. i only want what i can't have.
with my suitcases finally empty from singapore, i've begun the process of refilling them for the summer. out come the trinkets & summer dresses and in go slacks, sweaters, and button ups. this entire past year, starting last may, has been filled with packing and unpacking, one after another. through it all, i feel like my head, my heart, and my body are usualy all in dfferent places, one failing to catch up with the others. trying to be and feel fully here, wherever i am, is quite a challenge.
i'm still in singapore, i'm still in austin, and i'm supposed to be in cincinnati in less than a week. maybe everything will piece together by august.
the past few days i've been spending a large portion of my time packing. while i personally think i've become quite a snazzy weekend-trip packer, these large packing jobs are still beyond my skillz. probably the worst case of this was moving out of my dorm room freshman year. i had no exams yet managed to not finish packing the entire room until my parents had already showed up at my door. furthermore, i rode for 3.5 hrs back to dallas in the same position, without moving - with my still-inflated yoga ball pressing me against my seat since the entire car was packed full. how? i know not.
two years later, and unfortunately, the story has not changed much [with the exception that i did not pack my yoga ball to singapore, although it is still inflated and has remained so all the various times i've moved it since freshman yr]. attempting to fit a semester's worth of stuff [used not b/c of a lack of a better term, but really just for the fact that it generalizes & accurately reflects all that i'm stuffing in. pure stuff] into two suitcases was impossible. i added on an additional backpack [80 oz] and a duffle...everything is BARELY fitting. should check-in stop me tomorrow morning and question how a duffle+huge backpack = personal item+small carry on, i'll have to pray/wink/cry [in that precise order] myself onto the plane, hopefully with all my bags in tact.
so, while sweating bullets [in my non-aced, extremely humid singaporean dorm room], i slowly realized how much the small things add up - the small knicknacks here and there that i'll collect/keep/pick up for the keepsake; a bit of this to remind me of that trip, a little of that to represent so-and-so. overtime [a semester to be exact], the little things collect and become excess baggage [or rather the 5kg that won't stay within the designated luggage].
with one suitcase down, i formulated one of those "only b/c my mind is going crazy" metaphors. my daily pack-rat/keep-it-all habits extend beyond southeast asian trinkets; the habit leads to a pile of back-tracking memories [not the fond ones, but the ones that stay past their welcome & hinder present/future judgments due to pure sentimentality] that cause present&future stuttering. maybe i've always subconsciously made this connection; maybe that's why it feels so good to get rid of things sometimes. or to pass them on. i'm not sure exactly how much i got from these past few months, but i'm sure that i've figured some things about letting go of things; it's not the receiving that's the problem, it's the ridding process. regardless, these months are done, the page is mid-turn, and the hand flipping through is slightly more steady and sure. only slightly though.
on a less personal note...
my british lovey from singapore is in love with this song; when we are listening to this song on the plane during departure/landing, she will ignore the flight attendant who signals/yells/pulls to get us to pause the ipod; when others speak during this song, she thinks they're disrespecting the music; whenever we heard this song on the streets on bangkok [which was quite frequenly], we'd stop until it finished. anyway, basically, i've listened to this song QUITE a bit since my first week here. HOWEVER. i didn't pay much attn to the lyrics until recently...and um, let's look at them shall we:
My heart’s crippled by the vein
That I keep on closing
You cut me open and I
Keep bleeding
... graphic much? seems in the middle of this british idol's pop hit, she decided to insert an extra dose of emo-licious-lyrics. i think the imagery is disguised behind the catchy tune, but now i can't listen to the song without imagining McDreamy & open-heart surgery.
heading back to america in t-8 hours.
adios-la, singapura
