malam2 sedang santai2 di ruang keluarga sama kakak dan ibu.

SB: So, any solution for my aim problem? I'll have to get it sorted for the re-certification test tomorrow.
G: It's Brennan. You're in love with her, aren't you?
SB: What does it have to do with this?
G: When it comes to a man and a gun, it's always about woman. She's your partner, you want to protect her.
G: Take her to the re-certification test. Make her watch you. You won't fail in front of her.

I find this conversation really deep.

A strange case, when the life of someone completely strange and unknown to you intrigues you so much, that you start to read everything he/she posts, and try to read into his/her thoughts, despite the absence of relation you can find between their life and yours.
He/she's not even your friend's friend's friend, let alone yours.
Strange, right? Yet intriguing, very intriguing.

At some point in their life, people will go through a time when a question keeps nagging on their minds; "Who am I and what have I done in life, as opposed to  those successful people? Am I taking the right path to be the person I'd like to be?"

That question does nag my mind a lot lately, and apparently many of my friends feel the same, too.

One of my friend says that when we're well past our twenties, we won't think of this question as much as we do now. So I call all these life-anxiety and self-questions period, the twenties life crisis.

It's no coincidence that these questions are inclined to appear a lot more when we're approaching our twenties, or when we're at our twenties. During this crucial stage of our life, we experience many deciding moments. Career, achievements, love, self-fulfillments, so many important aspects in our lives depend on what we do at our twenties. It's a very determining stage of life. It pretty much shapes up how you live the rest of your life.

Before this stage of life, we can dream as much as we like. We can dream of our life, of the man we would become, of the things we would achieve, of the places we would go to. As we grow older, reality hits us harder and harder, and our dreams start to fade away. Whether or not we live up to our dream, it greatly depends on how we live our twenties. If it's spent in vain, once we're well past the twenties, it slowly becomes clear that the dream is just unreachable, improbable. That's when people give up their initial hope and living the life that's just there in front of their eyes.

Hence the importance of living our twenties to the fullest.
Hence the anxiety of approaching that stage of life.

Let's live it to the fullest, friends.

Semester lima, menjelang semester enam, and I fully comprehend the meaning of "GPA does not matter".
And no, unlike how I used to think it is, it's not an utterance of self-consolation when you've dropped your scores big time.
It's about the sense of relief. A relief and self-satisfaction of knowing that you've given your best, you've done your best, and whatever happens, you'd still feel proud of yourself because you knew that it was your best. It's about those feelings.
Those feelings I fail to get even after I have fully closed the last semester.
I didn't get such sense of relief. I knew I could do better, here and there. I knew it wasn't my best. I wasn't relieved. At all.
So I didn't really expect my scores to increase from last semester. Of course I was sure that at least I would get respectable grades, but other than that I really couldn't expect anything.
But then, it was better than what I expected. No, it's not an increase, but still really good. Most people would sigh in relief or even smile ear-to-ear. I initially thought I would myself, too.
Well, I didn't.
Of course there's some relief, but not that kind of relief. It's more like a relief of escaping some harm, maybe. Like a sense of relief of committing a crime and getting away with it, in a way you're relieved but you can never completely get rid of all the haunting feeling.

I really don't enjoy my off semester's holiday.

I just watched the rerun of HIMYM season 6 on Star World, the episode where Lily got a false alarm and thought that she was pregnant and the whole group, upon learning the *false* news, were intrigued to re-evaluate their respective life.

When we hear a news (be it good or bad) from one of our relatives and/or friends, of course what comes first in our mind is to celebrate (or mourn, depending of the news) for the one from whom we hear the news. What comes after? We are left with ourselves, left to re-evaluate, left to question our own life. Making comparison would be inevitable; it happened to someone else, how about me? What has happened to my life, what would probably happen?

Today, just this morning, I had to learn a very, very unpleasant news from one of my closest friend; the passing away of her father.
I have never encountered such an experience like death of a close relative, so everytime I hear news like this I'd just be taken aback. Totally clueless of what to do, totally strange to such feeling. But just hearing such a news, it's like taking a bitter pill. It leaves a really, really bitter taste in my mouth and never really disappear. It still feels bitter even right now.
To hear such an unexpected news, to be suddenly attacked with feelings I am still strange of, of course it really forces me to re-evaluate myself, my own life.

In a sense, aren't we really fortunate that every now and then, things that happen to people around us really do work like an alarm that gives us the opportunity to evaluate ourselves? 

Taking a really, really egocentric approach of life, it is really possible that all that happens around us is signs and clues that God has kindly given to us. Some obvious as day, some very subtle. Some come in a good way, some leave bitter taste in our mouth. But isn't God so forgiving to give us the opportunity to learn and to understand beforehand, and gives us just enough hints so we won't walk blindly in this life? Life is something big and largely unknown, but we have so many things, so many people to reflect upon, to whom we make comparisons, to which we do evaluation. In a sense, we are so, so fortunate, aren't we?

Selamat pagi, selamat satu per dua puluh empat hari.
Mengejutkan bukan betapa banyak kita berkawan di rentang waktu yang larut ini, sepertinya kesendirian masih enggan menjadi teman. Beberapa waktu lalu saat belum ada layar untuk dipandang lekat-lekat, waktu seperti ini bukankah kita sudah terlelap? Atau setidaknya, sendirian, sepenuhnya sendirian, yang menyenangkan.
Entah sejak kapan episode nokturnal melahirkan penggalan-penggalan percakapan, dan jika boleh aku agak menyalahkan saat-saat perbincangan dilakukan sambil mata setengah terpejam, untuk hal-hal yang kemudian terdengar seperti kesalahan dan tersesalkan.
Pada akhirnya mungkin tidak bijak untuk menyalahkan yang seharusnya dapat terhindarkan.
Pada akhirnya, segala yang tersesalkan itu adalah pilihan.

the spinning top made a sound/
like a train across the valley/
fading, oh so quiet/
but constant till it passed/
over the ridge into the distance/
written on your ticket/
to remind you where to stop/
and when to get off

2013, cuma bisa nyanyi do you have to let it linger, do you have to, do you have to, do you have to let it linger
buat detective conan.