Friends

That night, it hailed on you and me, unexpectedly. We were quite vulnerable to the rocks of ice that the sky was hurling with inexplicable wrath on us--you, completely unprotected, and I, carrying only a notebook and a folder, with not a tree nor a building anywhere in sight. Not that we could see much anyway: it was late in the night, in a little mountain town with its early sunsets and no streetlights. I pulled out my notebook and folder when the raining rocks got big enough for us to start discussing concussions, and when I offered it to you as protection for your head, you exclaimed, (quite ridiculously, considering the situation): "But your notes! They'll be drenched!"

And in the midst of wondering at the strange twists of life that had brought me, from the hot southern city where we don't even have a proper word for snow, to this place of hailstones as big as my fist; in the midst of paranoid yet oddly calm contemplations about the irony of dying in this dark little hillside with only you for company; in the midst of cursing myself for having forgotten both umbrella and torch; in the midst of yelping at the stones that were assaulting our necks now; in the midst of all this, I could only think of your remark and barely contain an urge to burst out laughing.  And remember why we'd been friends once.

*crosses arms, sulks*

I refuse to allude to this silly little event today that everyone else is talking about, especially since it's such a non-event. Talk about humans getting all worked up over a human fabrication, created just to mark another human fabrication (time). Of course, it might be true that nobody but humans are going to get worked up over their own inventions... But still!

See, it's rarely that there is any internal unity in this so-called unit of time. Our life doesn't naturally fall into a pattern and fit into our units. Units are, after all, just arbitrary and if you get enough people to agree that "poop" is a new unit that measures the... er... quantity of bad writing in the world--wham! You have a brand new unit. You would have news reporters saying things like, "In this quarter (there's another annoying unit again!) we've seen at least 45 Poops being generated in one blog alone. That works out to a nearly 65% increase in Poop levels since the last quarter."

So really, what's all this hullabaloo over the-unit-that-shall-not-be-named? Is it really an occasion to be all be all happy and new? Our lives have changed in completely nonsensical ways in these 12... sub-units... (Damn, I'm really beginning to regret having made that dramatic statement in the beginning of this post--the one about not mentioning that thing I said I wouldn't mention!) with no respect for our attempts to order our existence. So you see, I refuse to allude to that silly little non-event.

I will, however, party.

Happy Human Fabrication!

P.S.: Whoever points out that I seem to have spent a considerable amount of time and space not-alluding to "it" will be studiously ignored.

'appy nooo earrr!

No, I'm not drunk. But have a nice one anyway.

2008, compared to the average year, may be described as humongously crappy. From Jan to December, June to... well, December. A few nice things happened of course. I became a graduate. I got into... well... a pretty cool institute for my M.A. (big grin). I've met some VERY nice people who I hope will remain in my life till--oh, ok, I won't be greedy, just till I'm 120 or so. But despite all this, I'm saying goodbye to the year with great relief and hoping I don't have to live through one like it for--again, being very restrained, 100-odd years.

I'm really tempted to write something philosophical about how life goes in unexpected ways but enough already!

Have a ball!

(Or a bat... Or even a hockey puck for that matter.)