ten thousand reasons for my heart to find.

Wow. I haven't felt this crappy for a long time. It's amazing what PMS can do to oneself. Too lazy or indifferent to argue with Jet about things that matter. Too insecure to say what I really feel. Too tired to fight for anything. Too hazed to see clearly what I'm doing here. Too nonchalant to identify with people. Too blank to conjure empathy/sympathy. Too frustrated at everything and nothing. Too much caro.

Because God is good, because He is infinite, because He is perfect, because He is ultimate and no standard exists above Him, evil is that which displeases Him. Evil is not something that exists like a goop creeping through the seams of reality. It is not a Force that can make you wear a black cape, a helmet, and give you asthma. Evil is an adjective. It is an adjective used to describe those actions of man (and their effects) that are contrary to the nature of God.

Since (in the Christian system) God is the standard of good and evil, the question can be reframed. How can an all-good, all-powerful God allow things in His creation that displease Him?  .. Evil exists in the world because God created man as a free agent. With freedom (obviously) came the ability to do both right and wrong, to please and displease God. But what a price. Why is human freedom so important that billions of lives had to be sacrificed on its altar? Because a Heaven populated by free souls is a better world than a Heaven populated by puppets.

What is the world? What is it for?
It is art. It is the best of all possible art, a finite picture of the infinite. .. This painting is by an infinite Artist. It is a reflection of Himself (could there be a better subject?), worked out in colours, lives, and constellations, in a universe that to us seems endless but is to Him a mere frame, a small space, a confining challenge for His artistry. 

If we live in art, struggling in the boundary between the shadow and the light, unable to see the whole, how can we begin to judge? How can we presume to talk about a better painting, a better novel, when we see only a single line, a single page, and it brings us grief?

Any single needle can complain. There is death in those branches. Surely I could be full and green, surely I need not be in the wind, connected to the struggle? There is a shadow sprawling across me. I am cold. Can we bring in more light? The contrast could be softer.

And so we all speak. Each of us wanting our own position a little more comfortable.

What words can I use to express my feelings about heading back to Singapore in just over a month's time? Recently everyone seems to be echoing the sentiment that 'you must be excited to be going back.' And yet, I hesitate to agree with them. (But then to make things easier I just go with whatever they think I feel.)

I've spent majority of my free time (that is not already spent procrastinating) on math. It is doable, I'm just not sure if I really understand the why behind every method or calculation. Nonetheless, it's still progress.

Yesterday I received a letter from the university. More specifically, a letter from the Cinema Studies Institute at the university. My professor congratulated me on outstanding results and urged me to consider a major in Cinema Studies because it is rare for any student to get an A in the course. (It's true, the course average was C+). I emailed him asking what prospects a Cinema Studies major offers me.

Today I thought about it, if I hadn't met you, I wouldn't even have thought of doing Cinema Studies. It was only because I thought we'd make great friends and that it would be cool if my classes were near your residence that I took Cinema Studies. But well, who'd have thought we'd get to where we are.

Also, on a side but probably very related note, my monthly friend is about to visit me soon and so I'm breaking out and mood swinging. So let me just be my insecure, moody, entertaining girlish whims and unpredictable self for a bit. I will come back as per Caro soon enough.

So it's been pretty eventful around here the past couple of days and I am worn out. (yeah, already).
I slept over at my friend's place last night - it was interesting because she is Philippino and I have never been in a philippino home before. We stayed up talking from 10pm to 4am and then woke up at 8am for church. After church I had band practice for a performance we're doing on Friday. The guy's house we went to for the practice was impeccably clean. And it looked so sterile it felt like there wasn't anyone living in the house. (Really, I'm not exaggerating.)

And it strikes me how much of a persons house reflects the person's character.

At Bible study this week we were doing the topic of Creation. Very interesting week, I find that I loved the discussions we had. Also, I watched an excerpt from a longer video and subsequently bought the book to that video. Many things hit me this week - that we are God's spoken word, that often we want Him to speak to us in English and when He doesn't we think that He is far away and many many other things.

Also, there is/was you and my starting to question what our friendship is made of.

And many many other things. Like linear algebra.

I don't know what it is with you that irks me so much right now. Is it your taking advantage of people, or expecting people to do things without question for you, or your pure indifference. It just really irritates me now, today, recently. I feel the need to defend my friends with you and I don't like having to defend friends. Friendships and social relations should not have to be defensive. Yes, they should have compromise and I don't mind compromising. But you don't behave as though you realise that I am compromising for you and so to me, that's taking advantage.

Days like these I sit quietly in my room, doing almost nothing, just waiting for time to go by and feeling like I could sit here forever, doing nothing. I am not peaceful though, I am wrought with worry and concern. For my relationships and friendships, for my self-image, for my past and future. 

Days like these I wished I could just vanish from this earth and people would just look around and mumble to themselves about what a sweet girl she was, but perhaps its better that she's gone. It's better to go.

It's Friday already and my summer break will be over in two days.
I didn't quite achieve everything I wanted to achieve in this time, but I have had a good rest (sleeping almost 12 hours a day) both physically and mentally. Recently I've been listening to Jason Mraz's Love Is A Four Letter Word album and it's pretty good.

I've had some reservations recently about you, but somehow I find myself still laughing and smiling around you. I cannot explain why. I tell myself I will keep my distance from you because surely people mistaking us being together is a sign of how much time we spend with each other. It's not that I'm afraid one will fall in and for the other. I'm afraid of when you fall out with me; what would I do then? I'm afraid of when you have to leave and then I realise I hear from you less and less. What would I do then?

Cinema Studies: 80%

'Because Your love is better than life, my lips will glorify You.' -Psalm 63:3

Off to play the piano.

#1. It's 1130pm as I type this on a Tuesday night. I just got back from bible study about God's Word (the Bible) and fact relevant to the Bible. Today was the first time I brought my NKJV Bible (given to me by Jet's parents) out to a bible study. I realised that it is a great help (because it is a study Bible).

#2. I can tell who reads my blog and who doesn't by the conversations I have with people. Though I don't post as frequently as I used to, I still post about things that happen. (I think more so now that I post less frequently.) And I guess it makes me feel that tinge of disappointment, knowing that people have stopped reading. Simply because I like to tell myself that the people back home value me as much as I value them.

Maybe they do, and maybe reading blogs is not a fair judgement of this perceived/supposed value.

#3. Sitting in the car with you today; you were right beside me, cramped because there was no other choice. And sitting with my shoulder underneath yours, it just made me miss him so much more. Listening to the words come out of your mouth - somehow I felt like I didn't know how I brought myself to this place with you.

'I am not close to anyone :)'
I don't know if I took that as an insult. Perhaps my subconscious did. Perhaps because I feel like I am close to you and so you telling me that just made me feel hurt. 

I realised that in the past 4 months, the initial awe I had of you and how nice you were/are to people has faded. And it made me wonder if I've been doing that to everyone around me. If I have been degrading people in my mind. Put another way, if I have known you and gotten used to you and have started to take you for granted.

They/We were talking about your camping trip and how many people were going. And then someone asked if I was going. And then we realised that you hadn't asked me along. And someone said 'it is polite to ask' even though you said you knew I would have rejected the offer. I repeated, 'it's okay, it's okay.' But was it okay with me when I realised that yesterday?

'That they stayed friends, that they looked out for each other, most agreed, was what kept them from cracking up altogether. And in the end was the only thing, was the one true thing, that was genuinely worth fighting for.'
-Skippy Dies, Paul Murray.

Today, I baked. I had to turn down a friend's request to come to my house because my mother wasn't too happy. He hasn't replied my texts since. These days I wonder if I actually affect him by doing these things - laughing at him, teasing him, turning down requests. But then I tell myself to shrug it off and move on.

I feel like my cupcakes are going to be horrible. But that was because I couldn't find the measuring spoons. That and I think I put too much cinnamon. I always do that. I underestimate the strength of cinnamon.

I calculated how much time it will be since I left (evidently). It tells me 418 days.
Of that 418 days, I have 63 more to go. 

In that time I would like to achieve a 3.4 GPA, play more frisbee, read books I want to read and write/doodle more in my little notebook. And I guess that's my cue to go back to my book (which is proving to be great).