For we must all learn to howl.

So tonight I attended my second Story Slam, and was so proud to present my first-ever story submitted for the night's theme. The audience was really cool and everything, but I was so nervous about the length of the story and what I was trying to say that I guess I couldn't really put across the points I wanted to make in my story. What I'm putting up here is the story itself, only cleaned up and rewritten for clarity and to help it flow better. I hope it reads well! Dear you, You don’t know it, but it started from primary school, when you thought boys were gross, and continued all the way into secondary school, when you started to think that hey, maybe boys were pretty alright after all. It continued into the crushes you had, whether on the boy in your class or the senior who would never look at you that way. You’d never really thought about it, but all your silly schoolgirl daydreams about being with someone only ever consisted of holding their hands or maybe,...

Life has a funny way of pushing you towards certain situations, in my opinion - take tonight, for example, when I was walking home and heard someone crying by the canal. In all honesty, "crying" was a bit of an understatement - when I heard it I thought someone had either just been broken up with, or was in the running for Argument of the Year with someone else. It was getting late, and I really needed to be home in half an hour or so (because curfew), but I was both a little curious and a little more than slightly concerned , which was what made me walk towards the source of the wailing instead of away from it like my gut was telling me to because hey , this was sounding a little too much like a horror movie for my liking . I really didn't want to walk alone , though , which was why I was grateful to be accompanied by a passing cyclist . The source of the wailing turned out to be a lady crumpled a...

A little throwback to a post I wrote before, titled " Late Nights ". Bring it all back to me, won't you darling the green, the green The bed is really quite comfortable, and it's soft If I could just... "11:30PM __________ is calling." !!! let me swipe right -quickly!- hello there, I've missed you How was your... I mean your... your... Heavy eyes, weighted down with sand Shh. Go to sleep. I'm not sleepy... A soft sigh, a tired smile - Yes, you are. You can barely keep your eyes open. Frowning; fussing. I want to stay awake.  I want to see you. I haven't seen you all day. Refusals to look at the clock, ticking away on the wall deafeningly quiet. And then comes the bargaining. You've had a long day- I can stay awake a little. I'm not tired. It's just six hours, it's not much. You balk when tired fondness melds into a hint of frustration. I'm sorry.  Sorry for? For - the moods, the silences, the c...

The smell of joss sticks always makes me think of too much. When I was younger, the smell was uncomfortable - it was smoky and burned my eyes, and I didn't like it because I felt like I was choking, like the tendrils of smoke were coiling around my throat and slowly but surely squeezing the life out of me. It didn't help that I had a fear of going to the temple when I was younger either - the bright-painted deities sitting on the shelves of the temple scared me, like they were watching my every movement and didn't welcome me because I didn't know what to do in front of them - and I soon learned to loathe and fear the smell of incense. Things tend to change as you grow older, though, and when I finally learnt to accept my Chinese heritage and culture I learned to get used to the smell of the smoke - it wasn't as though you could avoid it when you visited the temple, after all. Over time, I actually learned to like the smell of the smoke, and I used to think ...

It's true that this is a cliche picture (he laughed at me when I took the picture), but I felt it was appropriate. This is my view when I'm too tired, when the days and late nights and sickness have worn me down - this is when I'm too tired to keep up with him and choose instead to lag behind him, letting him pull me along with every step he takes.  This is the view I admire, the boy he is right now, the man he hopes he can and will be.  He's someone not everyone approves of - this is also true. But he's always here for me, and he's always so supportive, and he truly cares. I know of no one else who worries about me the way he does, or listens to me the way he does, or loves me the way he does. We may be young, but we know what we know, and I know that he makes me feel incredibly lucky sometimes, and he makes me wonder what on earth he ever saw in me that he thought was so special. It's sappy, but it's all true. Happy 7thsary, baby.

It's on hot, sticky lazy days like these when everything feels like it's all caving in, and there's too much to do in too little time. Fuck everything, I say. Fuck it all, and come join me in bed - wrap those warm arms around me and let me fall asleep to your breathing, your heartbeat, your safety. Come kiss me to sleep.

Tick Tock.