Friday, April 21, 2006 // 2:29 AM

so that was it

so that was it, that was the last trampoline competition i will ever go for. sigh. i cried myself dry two years ago and so i didn't think i'd be sad now, but i am, somehow, i really didn't expect this. today has been a really good day in just so many ways, seeing juniors and ex-juniors and ex-seniors and being a nanyang girl again, for those brief twenty shan ge seconds, the competition itself, the manic phototaking and hysterical laughter after competition, the hc team mates and all the endless frivolity. i love. i'm thinking back to nanyang days and how then the people i found myself the closest to at the end of the day were still team mates, team mates, team mates. the hanging out after lessons, talking to zixi and weeleng and whining about training. the sitting around, during training, more often than not not even talking, actively saying things. there. there must have been something ultimately valuable in all that time we spent side by side. at the end of the day i find myself back in my room, surrounded by the symbols and reminders of the rest of the many many things going on in my life, and all of a sudden they just feel so very far away. the pictures on my wall, the ones with me smiling, the ones with me happy. at least a good half of them are gym, gym related. and gym has given me some of the best memories, the happiest ones, the silliest ones, gym has made me feel young like nothing else in the world. it's not just the sport, it's the people, the experience, the entire package that it comes in. things really are simple, straightforward, on the trampoline.

i kept all my flowers, even though all throughout today i just kept thinking about how pointless they were. and how i was going to throw all but sean's lily bouquet away before i got home, i really was planning to, even as peihan lugged them all overthe place for me. but taking them out of the plastic bag at the end of the day i'm overcome by a hope, a yearning for them to live. and so. so there they are, propped up in water bottles all over my room; the brusied gerberas and the crooked sunflowers and the charmlessly nondescript roses. no one ever buy me roses again unless you're dating me, thank you. or unless they come gorgeous and in a bouquet, because otherwise roses are so utterly boring. though i appreciate thought behind it, not that i sound very appreciative about it right now. hurhur. i don't know. i'm astounded by my own... attitude to things sometimes. like how the guys didn't care for bobo's flowers; i only wanted those that had the time and the thought put into it (and often too, unfortunately, the money). i've become very utilitarian about flowers, and friends: the everpresent consciousness that they're going to die/leave/drift/etc convinces me to reject/distance them right from the start. that i might be in control. so, so tell me why i am so surprised to find myself alone, and far, far away. from all these people who i've just endlessly taken for granted, labelled dispensible.

i had always wanted to be invulnerable. the wanting to be soft, the yearning to be honest. those are relatively recently developments. that still find themselves endlessly underground, the greatest majority of the time.

i just can't helping thinking about how i have so much shit to shovel out, as a friend. i'm sorry for having been a horrible person, too much of the time, for inconsideration, for hypocriscy, for being condescending, for insensitivity. today on the way home i thought about how very dishonest i can be, or not dishonest, but rather. so little like the myself that i know. some day i will look you in the eye and be honest with you, some day when we don't have to react and take into account all the things that happen around us.

and i do think sports are a good thing for emotional well being. i think the training in shit swallowing is actually a very important skill. or not a skill, a sort of nerve, a sort of dogged reaction to the external. i should confess, i was not nervous for competition at all at all at all. there wasn't much competition, really, to be blunt about things, because an individual medal was never in my sights. but i don't think this is a good gauge of how i am, because stress in the other areas of my life just reduces me to a nervous wreck. have you seen me, have you seen me neurotic? i don't just throw things at people, i'm rabid, hysterical, ever determinedly self-destructive.

this is a reminder to myself to tell xinyi that i love her (and etc etc etc). six years of the most enjoyable slogging has got to mean something.

hc team mates i really do hope that things don't end here.