void and expectancy

dedicated to shangjun (class of 2002) and aziz (class of 2005) who leave this month and next for uk to deepen their pursuit of law...also, to recent batches who are just beginning their term in uni. be not afraid to embrace the unknown. you've done your work and know what's coming. welcome this time of renewal and rebirth planned just for you :)someone once compared the long journey to life and growth to that of trapeze artists...their leap in faith mirror the same movements into the unknown, open to what it may bring while confident they have done enough work to know the risks and rewards that await them...

"One of the difficulties in moving out of the familiar is the temptation to close off the full drama of change before it ripens. The sense of being bereft of all that is familiar is a vacuum which threatens to suck up everything within its reach.

What is hard to appreciate, when terror shapes a catastrophic gap, is that this blankness can be a fertile void. The fertile void is an existential metaphor for giving up the familiar supports of the present and trusting the momentum of life to produce new opportunities and vistas.

The arcobat who swings from one trapeze to the next knows just when he must let go. He gauges his release exquisitely and for a moment, he has nothing going for him but his own momentum. Our hearts follow his arc and we love him for risking the unsupported moment...

Erving & Miriam Polster

Gestalt Therapy Integrated

another exhausted concept?

Work-life balance. Secular mantra. A slogan of the civil service. Religious infiltration as a means of tempering the sinful damning profit motives in work..... Its origins remain dense. Its effects...deeply seeded into Singapore's daily life.


An adage goes that 'Singaporeans live to work while others work to live'... a phrase often used to ascertain or to compare with the quality of life in other countries (like Finland or Australia) when work-life balance is valued above all else. One senses a premium placed on achieving integration between body, mind, relationships and soul. And not all of us will have the opportunity to attain this ideal life. Perhaps, we has to live long within these cultures to determine this truth for ourselves. Much is also dependent on the personalities, attitudes and even the type of job you hold. Poverty rate remains a masked concept in many states. For some, it will be lodged as an inner spiritual struggle for a lifetime.

I recall what it was like to miss the daily grind of work during my stay in hospital...learning what it means to experience an ascent of will; not to take the mobile life for granted again upon discharge. I missed the little things; the mad rush of wearing the shoes of an accountant, event organiser, tutor, counsellor, friend, gardener, dispatch rider, secretary, mentor, manager, policeman, social worker, advertiser all in a day. That's teaching for you these days, no longer a chalk and board (or rather whiteboard and marker) kind of single-stranded existence.

The superficial struggle in many able folks like us is to try and achieve an overt command of their lives while neglecting the intensities that shape the course of our inner outlook and the deep blueprint of our very existence. I willed never to lose sight of reality, to find congruence in what i think, say and do and to value the creative & generative space that healthy solitude and relationships bring amid the rich tussle between proximity and distance that life & living necesitates.

"Get up cheerfully on days you have to work, if you can. And if you can't what keeps you from doing so? Is there something heavy that blocks the way? What do you have against the heaviness and difficulty? That it can kill you?

So it is powerful and strong. This much you know about it. And what do you know about things that are light and easy? Nothing. We have no memory whatsoever of that which was easy and light. So even if you could choose, ought you not actually choose what is difficult? Don't you feel how it is related to you? And are you not in agreement when you make this choice? Don't you think a little sapling would have an easier time by staying in the soil? Things that are light and things that are heavy don't actually exist. Life itself is heavy and difficult. And you don't actually want to live? Then you are mistaken in calling it your duty to take on difficulties. It's your survival instinct that pushes you to do it. So, what is duty then? It is duty to love what is difficult...You have to be there when it needs you."

rainer maria rilke

06S11- finding home

we believed a bumboat would take us home. sat on the back where the thrill of wild winds and seaspray make us remember our first lessons all over again...the lost company we knew we missed but never said.
our lives are washed by the the soft fall of rain. something in us learns to live again. an unassuming truth revealed in the smiles that point to home. a second chance to listen and receive that rare peace again.

exodus

i fought hard to keep you within my sight. the years of distant wandering, the roads that walked me home to you. i struggled then to be conscious of the bigger picture you drew (are still drawing) for me, using the dust and ashes of my dreams, ideals and fantasies. lord, i guess i continue to believe even if i know not how or why...but i find a long-lost peace in this newfound place. amid the long desert that lies ahead, meister eckhart penned these lines to describe his own walk and relationship, in loving you...

"God is like a person who clears his throat while hiding

and so, gives himself away..."

+

To be commanded to love God at all, let alone in the wilderness, is like being commanded to be well when we are sick, to sing for joy when we are dying of thirst, to run when our legs are broken. But this is the first and great commandment nonetheless. Even in the wilderness - especially in the wilderness - you shall love him.

frederick buechner

sacred frontier

humanity & eternity

God weeps with us so that we may one day laugh with him...

jurgen moltmann






Those who have known pain profoundly are the ones most wary of uttering the cliches about suffering. Experience with the mystery takes one beyond the realm of ideas and produces finally a muteness or at least a reticence, to express in words, the solace that can only be expressed by an attitude of union with the sufferer.


john howard griffin

another day

Here dies another day

during which I have had eyes, ears and hands

and the great world around me

and tomorrow begins another.

Why am I allowed two?

g.k.chesterton

---------------------------------------------------

some colleagues offered to fetch me to school. without me asking. principal gave me a home class to teach so that i would not have to walk too far down the aisle. other teachers and students asked about my condition and helped me carry my books and files along to class. there was a handwritten note from another councillor who wished me well. another sent a mini-pot of plants to cheer my table...i could trust you lord with the care of my little life and have a chance to experience human care through each of them. it is hard to say goodbye to a place that has become a second home to me.

night is falling, lord...i am uncertain about the road ahead. but i rest tonight, knowing my life is held and supported by strong and assuring hands, not just yours' but the care and availability given by my loved ones and friends.

at the end of an intensively lived day, i am happy that i have this gift for even one day- your gift of life. of prayer and the relationships that bind us together. thank you for the love of family and friends. all whom you brought into my life...

soulspeak

it was my first trip to town in more than 3 months...took a taxi after my acupuncture at nuh...rekindled a lifelong delight in burrowing through the book shelves once more. i could spend an entire day at kinokuniya.

i picked a title entitled "IF - Questions for the Soul." it struck that i spend much of my waking time meddling and settling affairs which may not necessarily matter on my death-bed. what matters most perhaps are questions or directives i delay apprehending because i harbour a high degree of over-confidence towards my own mortality.

here are the 5 questions that tested my heart...

IF you could make certain that your parents knew one thing before they died, what would it be?

IF you were to choose your own pallbearers, who would they be?

IF you were to write your own epitaph today, what would it say?

If you died and could look back on your life, what is the one thing you think you will miss the most?

IF you could focus more energy on one part of your life, what would it be?

as much as many of these statements deal directly with death, any attempts made to work my response to answering them strangely gives me life.

a little note to the lord

you are beginning to whisper near the place
where i lay my head to sleep.
this language is new. a mix of invitations between my soul and you
a door is opened whenever a sharp and silent string
pulls

and swiftly makes taut the veins that nourish that bulb of pain.
there are strange days when i wanted to saw
my tender tendon nerves into 2.

lord, does pain engender greater trust in you?
once, your salvific acts brought me strength.
your bearing of cross, flagrum and hyssop were perfect metaphors
for my catholic depth. physicality was what i sought.
these consoling sacramental parts of gospel truth enabling
mere human handicaps to become extraordinary
long-suffering happy saints.
do you remember the naive volumes of notes i used to pen,
in memory of you?

i can now sit still and demolish in perfect peace
these old blocks of archaic theology.
i fold old (copious) diaries into paper boats and moor them away.
find delight in holy darkness as their white lights set
sail to indifferent seas.

saying this, i sense a storm would break and make me cold,
still nothing came forth. a somnolent sky stretches,
to stare on me.
i have become a subtle brute in the way i pray.
but i see your smile, lord.

and you return this evening

to carry me,

ruffle my hair

and kiss my cheek.

poem before bed

i saw an elegiac portrait of my(self) in these lines today...the transformation of what the two years have brought, not just the period of hospitalisation recently spent away from home...a placid read before bed.Nothing is Lost

Deep in our sub-conscious, we are told
Lie all our memories, lie all the notes
Of all the music we have ever heard
And all the phrases those we loved have spoken,
Sorrows and losses time has since consoled,
Family jokes, out-moded anecdotes
Each sentimental souvenir and token
Everything seen, experienced, each word
Addressed to us in infancy, before
Before we could even know or understand
The implications of our wonderland. There, they all are, the legendary lies
The birthday treats, the sights, the sounds, the tears
Forgotten debris of forgotten years
Waiting to be recalled, waiting to rise
Before our world dissolves before our eyes
Waiting for some small, intimate reminder,
A word, a tune, a known familiar scent
An echo from the past when innocent
We looked upon the present with delight
And doubted not the future would be kinder
And never knew the loneliness of night.

noel coward (1899-1973)

son, brother, soldier

it was coincidental that my previous entry was written days prior to the news published in the main papers. our words echoed the same mercy. it concerned the sentence melted out on the serviceman who took a rifle out of camp and intended to use it to attack his girlfriend and others. i don't know if any more severe strokes of the cane are going to 'help' him; already a damaged victim himself from years of domestic abuse and acute rejection within his own family, traced from childhood. all the people dave ever felt close to have either left him or passed away. a poignant account stated how he kept a picture of his younger brother, (whom he was close to but was killed in a road accident when they were children), inside his camp cupboard throughout his depression. sadly, not a single kin appeared in court to lend support to him. dave teo remained a lone soul till the end. he seemed to yearn for connection to the irrevocable loss sustained from childhood. i shall not speculate anymore.
The sentence was too harsh and could have been lighter in view of other mitigating or humane reasons even though the possession of live arms is itself a serious crime. the rare words spoken by the courts hold meaning beyond the prison...the same if not adapted version of what is found in scripture...justice tempered by mercy, if only and possibly healed, with words.

"My heart hurts for you that so young a man will have to spend some of the best years of his life in prison and have to understand so many strokes of the cane, but i trust you understand a deterrent sentence is unavoidable in the circumstances.

dave, you have had a very hard life. i hope that this unfortunate and traumatic wrong turn in your life will make you much more mature and a whole lot wiser and that you will spend the next few years reconstructing your young life. I hope that you will pursue your studies, listen to good advice from counsellors and learn many skills while in prison and that, upon your release, you will have a life full of meaning and purpose to honour the memory of your grandmother and your beloved younger brother.

it has been written ' To everything there is a season.' There was a time when you loved, and there was a time when you hated. There was a time when you felt you wanted to kill, now is the time for you to heal. There was a time when you were broken down, now is the time to build yourself up. There was a time when you were at war in your being, now is the time to restore peace within."

seed of his word

lines from scripture which have stayed with me for a long time. they have been the stuff of my growing years...when simple ideals are tested by fire, a few becoming gold while others are charred away...exercising patience when plans do not go my way...letting go when it is easier to cling on...build a new window with God, when shards are all that remains...

Ecclesiastes




For everything there is a season,


And a time for every matter under heaven:







A time to be born, and a time to die;



A time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted;





A time to kill,
and a time to heal;




A time to break down,
and a time to build up;



A time to weep,
and a time to laugh;



A time to mourn,
and a time to dance;




A time to throw away stones,
and a time to gather stones together;



A time to embrace,
And a time to refrain from embracing;




A time to seek,
and a time to lose;




A time to keep,
and a time to throw away;




A time to tear,
and a time to sew;



A time to keep silence,
and a time to speak;


A time to love,
and a time to hate,



A time for war,
and a time for peace.



Ecclesiastes 3:1-8

knowledge of you

a text, a yes and you were here in less an an hour. we sped off to farm-mart and had the best wine and pork nuckle of our lives. on other days, it was your bawdy humour that kept my nerves alive. you make me laugh and the gloom mattered no more. you recognised the confinement of home and forced me out, kept me going even though my brace gingerly held up. nowhere really to go but i am to smile again amid the pain...

By Simone Weil :
Do not allow yourself to be imprisoned by any affection. Keep your solitude. The day, if it ever comes, when you are given true affection there will be no opposition between interior solitude and friendship, quite the reverse. It is even by this infallible sign that you will recognize it.

naboo, x wings and the great singapore idol

nothing, no one, not even tua pek kong (!) is spared in this clip...hossan leong's gratituous stand-up comedy chanced on u-tube...laughed till my spine ached itself back into shape...

enjoy-

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=flTqYYRTIZc&NR=1

recovery under wisdom trees

it was a picture taken in hamilton gardens, north island, new zealand. just a couple of months ago. it was easy to spot the tree lighting from a distance. winter was coming but that did not stop the drift of her autumn fragrance which summoned a small crowd from afar. her one last blaze by our watchful gaze.
fourteen degrees of cool marked that day. a wind toss came and the drama began. she strewn her yellow top and kept the rest of us running like children, eager to catch the linen leaves which flowed from sky to earth, now descending, trailing the magic seen whenever the last fires of sunset burned.

i like this pic. it encapsulates so much of what an undefined minute of happiness feels; under the thin shade of a shining tree (was it sweet chestnut, linden or hornbeam?). a season's death ushers the last dance to life... when the westwind moves, giving gold to every edge on the field...

from origen (ca 185- ca 254)

"We are what we do with our silence..."

convalescence

written while warded... we do not ask to be warded in hospital on most ordinary days. i took mine as a near-privilege, to be exposed to a hinterto unknown social setting, with a group of people i would otherwise be sheltered from. now i know how prisoners in wartime are able to bond in such powerful moving ways- a new patient walks in and others are eager to show him around the place...how to operate THAT bed, buttons not to press, meal rotations...just basic orientation but it does wonders to a bored and ailing physique-i find simple offers to help with lifting a chair even though my fellow patient was all tubed up and walking (!), sharing of daily papers (never mind your language proficiency), extra crackers, political gossip and minute news of each others' treatment process.
all nurses deserve a place in heaven. they embody the kind of qualities that heal people and make this progressive society a far better place. it's sad that doctors are still bestowed with more esteem somewhat...a regional staff of caregivers work here...myanmar, china, malaysia, philippines. they are multi-lingual, persuasive, humourous, instinctual, persistent, alert...each good soul bantered with patients in their own special way; one filipino teasing a stubborn patient with hokkien while the staff nurse shared her sadness about what her despotic government is doing to people in yangon. the only disturbance we felt were nights punctuated with quarterly measurements of temperature and blood pressure. we put up well with this small inconvenience. there is more than sufficient cheer and daily sunlight placed in an avenue (occasionally) visited by glum doctors.
am otherwise 'basking' gratefully with daily visits and care received...from my doc friends right from the first few hours of admission to kind and caring individuals from my family, 5th canticle, pioneer, and uncle philip who arranged for communion. am nourished in more ways than one - too distracted and moved by all these lightstreams of care to feel pity or worry about my lifelong condition or future. one of my neighbours, a sage-like uncle even came by and prayed for me in mandarin, sensing we both knew christ. there is a caring note sent via sms each day and delightfully-shocking gifts from friends: from a ta-pau version of crab bee hoon (john-check how the legs are split and sprawled..pun izzit?!?), to crayons (mee yoo), newsweek (gp colleagues), a collection of fresh and synthetic sunflowers (norien and ig) and playing cards from one strange uncle. i am still at a loss as to how some of this news reached the ears of my present batch of students, way before i was discharged even...thank u, people for your kind regards and care...i know everything is given in good faith.

discharged- 27 june 08

6.45am. 21 june 2008. saturday morning. a typical sneeze and my body convulsed into a strained state of chill and stillness. it seems every strand of nerve in my limbs tuned themselves into muffled silence. couldn't get up to open my door. crawled on floor using the tips of my shoulders and whatever movement left on my ankles and knees to reach the phone. skin leeched on marbled ceremic. had to roll pillows under to make more movements possible. to my mobile-phone. every inch hurt like hell. can't quite pray when a pragmatic crisis-laden mind just wanted to make the shortest domestic call possible. to home. outside my own door. family unlocked it and found me lying like an orphaned handicap. blanked out. eyes wide open. alert. steady but can't quite decipher what was happening to my body. call the ambulance. something isn't right. i calmly said. it came minutes later. drama. am dragged and lifted on stretcher in the tight confines of my room. felt as if my back was snapping. sped away. my first time in a screaming ambulance. embarassed if not for the wee hours when residents have yet to pop their curious heads out of their estates. to NUH. ER. 3 painkiller jabs to my arms and butt. needed to pee. but couldn't walk. they gave me a bottle. i froze coz my brain and urethra wouldn't cooperate (they did, later).for once, i knew how a fellow handicap felt on the bed. pain. painful. pained.

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hi folks

i am well and coming to terms that i may been unable to engage in gym and my faved running or kayaking in a long while. parents brought me to invest in a good bed and an ortho-friendly mattress today...we invested in 1k and it ought to last 10 years.

apart from that i am in good spirits...somewhat bored at home as i cannot sit, lie down or stand for too long to avoid strain on my legs and spinal nerves. MRI reports a degenerative lumbar structure but the bone mass is fine except for the large protrusion of prolapsed disc on L4 and L5. scheduled for acupuncture, heat treatment and physio 3 times a week. recovery is expected to take about a month. if not maybe surgery. am covered on mc till 11 july. my principal popped into the ward and visited me today. i was too shocked to greet her as i was still in the process of waking up...dishevelled, from clumps of tousled hair to an unbrushed set of teeth, mildly greasy face as i laid flatly arrested on a pile of squashed bedsheets and over-sized ward garments. she wants to rearrange my classes to be on ground floor when i return to school. these are the thoughtful gestures i will always remember her for.

thanks for your calls from nz and firm blessings that i should and would recover in due course...will keep u posted of my recovery status

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dear colleagues,

a personal note of thanks for being there to cheer and encourage me in more ways than one during my hospitalisation. the whole mishap began with a sneeze, looked like a cruel joke and i was really unprepared for the challenges & changes in lifestyle to come. your ready understanding, empathy, presence, generous sms, quality time and personal companionship did wonders to bring me cheer in a rather sterile and clinical ward. these healing experiences within that one week in hospital leaves me much to reflect on.

it is in times like these that i (we?) walk away and live in the knowledge that i do not work in a mere professional setting with rank and file concerns. i live and move on, privileged to receive your friendship and kindness beyond work, beyond school, beyond duty and place.I will get well in due course and look forward to seeing you again.

rest assured that i will remain in close touch with matters in school and duties gratefully covered in my absence: Thank u people...

In thanksgiving,

eddie