Posted in Thoughts

Academic uncertainties

Posted on by palebluefragment

Sometimes my anxiety feels light and manageable, other times it feels like a more serious troubling issue. I’m not ashamed or worried to talk about it. People take the difficulties you project in a conversation lightly as long as you look and function like a normal person. Maybe developing anxiety is an outcome of being a university student. You need to sacrifice part of yourself to gain something. I’m not selfish. I don’t think there’s a lesson to learn here. Maybe we’re all living different versions of the same battle, or whatever you want to call it. I’ve been choosing to dissociate my thoughts from my feelings. This mechanism helps me to somehow deal with daily tasks that require a high level of focus.

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Posted in Thoughts

Birthday

Posted on by palebluefragment

1- Went with friend X to Juliette & Chocolat, had delicious desserts and iced coffee. Friend X brought me a lovely gift.

2- Bought Matcha Latte from Starbucks. The employee asked for my name, for which I replied “happy birthday”.

3- Took a walk in the freezing cold while taking photos with my camera of sceneries that made me feel something.

4- Found a hidden geocache tied to a branch with a ribbon. Thought I was going to discover a valuable treasure for a hot minute. The geocache had a note that lead me to a wordpress page. No treasure was found.

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Posted in Stories

Ketchup Festival

Posted on by palebluefragment

September 5th 2018

I was sitting in the metro with a childhood friend from school and we were discussing the book Mad Shadows by Marie-Claire. I looked to the seat in front of me and saw that my French professor was sitting next to Vincent Van Gogh. I was not surprised because I thought that Vincent was just one of us. My teacher offered to gift me the original book that we were discussing earlier but I refused. I rented books and didn’t like accumulating them. Then I started noticing that Vincent’s ears were perfectly normal and he started looking more angel-like, as if he was taken right out a painting. The metro stopped in the middle of nowhere, doors wide opened and there were trampolines everywhere. Everyone was screaming “ketchup” so I told my friend, teacher, and Vincent not to worry cause it’s the Ketchup festival! We stepped outside of the metro where everyone seemed exceptionally happy! They looked loud but it sounded silent, as if someone put the volume on “mute”. A beautiful man with a nose piercing told me that he loved me and I told him that he’s an asshole because I knew him. I accepted his words anyway. Then we all went to a theatre that had round tables instead of theatre seats. We sat down and ate tuna with lemons.

Posted in Thoughts

Letters

Posted on by palebluefragment

Your worth as a human being and your academic success are directly correlated. The road to success is paved with anxiety and fear. Fear is becoming greater than your passion. Diminishing passion is killing your motivation. It is killing creativity. Who needs creativity when the only qualification you need is a letter on a transcript? Worry about creativity only as a subject of the future. The far far future. After you secure your future and your creativity dies. Who will die? You or it? Are you truly alive when you’re not doing what truly makes you feel alive? Are you sure that what you think makes you alive is what makes you alive? You need the fear. Maybe sacrifice a year. Your twenty first year. Your twenty second year. Get hypnotized. Wake up in your twenty forth or fifth year with a paper and a letter. A letter that will secure the future you killed for a number of years in your twenty something years. Do not look around and wonder like a foolish young person with a dreamer’s disease. Your symptoms are clear. One is the failure to separate reality from the illusion. Dreams are causing you confusion. Fear is getting bigger and it’s onto killing the dream. You talk to someone who “knows better”. They say it’s better to cure your disease before it spreads. They say the cure is the letter. They know better. Worry now and think later. Do the following steps: One. Two. Three. This is all you need to know. Leave now. Come back when you get better. And by better I mean, your worth printed in better letters.

Posted in Stories

Eight hours of void

Posted on by palebluefragment

On May the 7th, at 4 pm and after a long debate, my brother and I decided to turn our phones off, swap them, and hide them until the next morning. This meant that I had eight hours to kill. The first hour was the hardest. I was thinking about checking my online order, writing a blog, and aimlessly scrolling through Instagram. The hour after, I made myself a cup of tea and searched around the room looking for something productive to do. I found a magazine laying on my desk. It’s been there for months. I got two issues because I was intrigued by the title and the cover and also impressed by the dark mediocre-quality papers. You can tell they’re recycled. I opened it to realize it’s a collection of short stories, poems, and photographs. I read the first three stories. I thought to myself “I wish I had read English books earlier in my life”. “How will I ever be a good writer?” “I must read more often”. “My vocabulary range is so limited”. Then I reminded myself that I should never use yesterday as an excuse. I tidied my room. It’s so satisfying to make my material possessions lesser and lesser every day. Except for clothes, I always need clothes. I talked to my mother about my room in our hometown and what I want to pack from it when I’m able to travel back. “I hope a mortar doesn’t catch it before I do” I said. I sat on the balcony, ate a big bowl of ice cream. I couldn’t listen to music without my phone so I hummed the lyrics. I wrote a list of my dreams and all the things I want to achieve. I folded the paper two times then teared it into pieces. Made sure it was impossible to be assembled by anyone again. No one should ever know my late evening thoughts. I took a shower. I felt light as spring and I felt soft. I fell asleep around midnight and I had wonderful dreams. I kept closing my eyes in the morning trying to get myself back to sleep, to save as much dreams in my memory as I can. I woke up around nine, got my phone back, turned it on. I put it on the desk and sat in my bed for a while. It was calm and my head was clear. I picked my phone up, checked my online order, wrote a blog, and aimlessly scrolled through Instagram.

Posted in Stories

Silly seagull

Posted on by palebluefragment

I was standing by the bus stop eating from a bag of chips. Some seagulls started floating over me and I almost freaked out so I put the bag of chips in my backpack. Most of them flew away but there was this one seagull who stood few inches away from me and was making direct eye contact. I looked away but it persisted. I felt fascinated by its looks but also kinda intimidated. So I took a piece of chips from the bag and I put it on the ground. Seagull was shy at first but I wanted to make them feel at ease so I smiled and said “go ahead buddy, it’s all yours”. They approached, grabbed it by their peak and squawked (I believe it means thank you in seagull language). I nodded “my pleasure”. The piece was too big so seagull walked away and started shouting so loudly I covered my ears with both hands (I believe it was calling its seagull pals for help). Apparently seagull has some good pals cause they responded very quickly and looked excited and happy for their seagull pal! They even did some quirky moves (I believe it translates to a dance in seagull culture) Then they all flew away and seagull waved at me from above “bye good human, thanks for the treat” “bye seagull, have a nice journey” then we parted ways.

Posted in Thoughts

Prelab

Posted on by palebluefragment

Objective: correct release of unwanted sensations.

Introduction: Showing negative emotions is not cool. Tears are for the pathetic. Sadness must be locked in and hidden three layers under skin: enthusiasm, neutrality, and anguish.

Procedure:

When in solitude, follow the subsequent steps accordingly:

1- slowly peel layers one and two.

Layer one: cool positive outlook on life with an adequate level of mind clarity. Highly socially approved!

Layer two: cool neutral state. A resting bitch face is satisfactory. Mediocre social approval.

Layer three: uncool but true-to-self anguish. Dangerous and leads to social errors. Must remain fully intact for the purpose of this step.

2- activate natural body signals to control the use of layer three. Trust your gut feelings for optimal efficiency.

You’ll observe anguish gushing into tears: A clear soul-cleansing salty liquid. Mmm tastes anguishy!

Don’t calculate the percentage of error. Tear percentage will vary from experiment to another.

3- steadily get out of solitude, rearranging layers one to three. One laying on the surface, three deep underneath. Two in-between. One and two can alternate in case of emergency. Beware of maintaining third layer’s invisibility.

Hazards: tears can lead to a coughing response to clear throat from accumulated phlegm.

Don’t choke on your own tears. Breathe slowly.

References:

“Chemistry of the Uncool Feelings” lab manual, twenty first edition

Posted in Thoughts

10 winter simple pleasures

Posted on by palebluefragment

1- Holding a warm herbal teacup with both hands and breathing its vapors. Closing your eyes softly while doing so.

2- The gentle warmth that enters your body when you get onto the bus after freezing by the station and it’s -20 degrees outside.

3- Getting out of the shower all wet. Subtly directing the hair dryer inside your shirt and in your ears.

4- Feeling the Strepsils lozenge melt in your mouth, soothing your sore aching throat.

5- Putting a cream that smells delicious on your dry hands. Running your hand on your face and feeling your satin skin.

6- Placing your feet so close to the heater. Feeling it sending warm chills to your entire body.

7- Holding someone’s hands when you don’t have gloves on or putting your hands in someone else’s warm pocket AKA your personalized human heater.

8- Feeling like a fluffy stuffed animal with your full winter gear on and enjoying your chunkiness.

9- Cocooning in your bed, melting into your blanket. Being lazy but subtle, all with a hella good of an excuse.

10- Add yours.

Posted in Past

Beauty From Pain

Posted on by palebluefragment

I didn’t choose to be me

I didn’t choose having lived a life that numbed me

I didn’t choose to grow up in a fucked up society

absorbing toxic ideals that made me hate religions and traditions

and consider them the source of all evil things

I didn’t choose to let it shape my personality

so viciously

I didn’t choose to be me

feeling so intensely

putting my heart out and feeling empty

over and over

scared of the future

scared of my past scared of myself

I wanted a simple life

a life with no worry

a life where I love and be loved

but how can I be loved if I can’t even introduce myself without wearing my heart out on my sleeve

always been the happy girl the bubbly girl who’s positivity shines through

had I forgotten to be me?

how can I be me?

when I refuse to identify with this malicious part

that’s been unwillingly planted in me

how can I be me?

when I’ve been living in denial for years

and I’d live in denial for years to come

only if it was easy

only if I could sleep and let the sunrise cleanse my soul

let me be

a simple selfless care-free me

living her life without limits

so endlessly

this is who I wanna be

the person who’s emerging from scratch

not the one I buried

hoping one day it’ll turn into ash and dust

but the one who gleams when she speaks and acts and loves…

herself before anyone else

let me be

the one who works hard to inspire

the ones who never stops following her dreams

knowing that it is not too late to learn new things

the one who leads her life in confidence

and never backs down weighed by doubts and fears

the one who believes that it is possible

to grow beauty out of pain

Posted in Thoughts

Reborn

Posted on by palebluefragment

The great thing about moving to a new country other than escaping a terrible situation was the freedom of being reborn. Of being a complete stranger. Of not being expected to be anything. I could be anything. I could be anyone! I thought I wouldn’t have to worry about the past anymore, but memories remain vivid in my dreams. This is home. This is my home. But I know that one day I’ll have too many memories, know too many people, and want to be reborn again, somewhere new.