i can only hope
that i've made a difference in your life these past couple years-

that your world might be a more colorful, beautiful, lovable place.





it was worth it,
all of it.

this is what dreams are made of

disneyland, california

feels something like summertime

santa monica beach, california

analogy #3802734

while walking to the simi valley mall, treading on the golden train summer has trailing on the sidewalk, the wind blew in another analogy for our hypothetical book:

a christian relationship is like southern californian weather- its golden rays warm your very soul and makes you giddy, just like passion and the flurry of firsts in a relationship. it has you smitten, but not just for a spell because the breeze is like jesus, and having him in your relationship makes sure you don't burn out and get a heat stroke and allows you to enjoy it for longer :)

jesus is my everything

He even cuts my hair :)

no, my hair dresser's name isn't hay-zeus.
it's usually tiger, but sometimes william, not that he changes his name, but i just get my hair cut by whoever my mom wants.

but i really don't have any opinions on how i want my hair to look, unlike my brother who is mad picky about his haircuts, but me, i'm very eh! instead, before every haircut, and even during, i pray that jesus will give my hair dresser wisdom and be the one cutting my hair. i mean, it makes sense because we pray for our doctors to be filled with jesus and administer under His guidance, so why not hair dressers? after all, He created us and He above all people would know what looks best on our heads, what brings out the exact shade He's colored in our eyes, what complements the shape of our face He so carefully formed. it just makes so much sense. and sometimes, i close my eyes and imagine that i'm sitting in front of Jesus and He's lovingly considering each lock of hair that He's put on my head and it just makes me smile.

so yup, all this to say i got a haircut sunday night.

los angeles

oh toto, i've a feeling we're not in shanghai anymore.
but i've gotta say, this weather's got me impressed.

home is

a freaking unicorn-
beautifully elusive.

"home is where the heart is"
if you ask me,
a heart is a ridonkulous place for a home,
in fact i've never heard of a worst idea.
heart's are unbeatably, unbearably fragile,
ever changing like the shifting-sands.
didn't we learn anything from the foolish man who built his house upon the sand?

oh well, it doesn't matter what a "home" is.
shanghai is, and will always be, home.

of course it was you

it's always you

so, that's why it matters
that's what makes all the difference
that's what's important to me
that's why it's worth waiting for

i remember now

song in me

i miss you
i miss singing along
i miss the song in me

instead of going out tonight and probably ending up even more confused,
i stayed in my room on my comfy little bed and wrote a song.

sing to me this song once more
sing to me of promises and dreams not out of reach
gently hang the stars back in the sky for me

"simba, remember who you are."

sigh, i couldn't forget even if i wanted to-
and believe me, i have tried.

and all that's come out of trying is the realization that
i can't run from people's expectations of me because they're my own too.

i just.
it's just.
i can't.
i know.
i wish.
i want.
i long.
i know.
i just.
but.

GAH.
:(

it's lonely up here

i'm up so high that i can't see the ground below
so help me down you've got it wrong
i don't belong here

sometimes i wish i could break all the legs off this pedestal
i wish i could fall and fail and have a little fun on the way down

love is like sour skittles

it hurts so good.

mm. sour skittles.
is your mouth watering reading those beautifully alliterated words?
mine is ♥

so it's been a few days since a proper "sit-down-and-blog"
let's see, in the past few days i've hobo'd on my brother's couch. watched far too much disney channel. had rendezvous for old times sake. consumed several packs of sour skittles. was disappointed with the candy stock at longbai- oh how the great have fallen. increased my repertoire of chinese music by 3897120983712089 times in search of this one beautiful chinese song i heard in two stores but didn't catch any of the words of- so basically all i know is that it was in chinese. oh how quickly tunes slip out of our heads. oh how quickly love slips out of our hearts.. (hah. i couldn't help myself. i don't know if i entirely agree with that. though i don't entirely disagree either.) placed people in hogwarts houses. debated the reality of hogwarts and why i would want to go there. decided that political parties should be modeled after hogwarts houses- out with the donkey and the elephant, in with the badger, eagle, lion, and serpent. arrived at the conclusion that i would be in hufflepuff. discovered and rejected fluorescent lollipops. went to the dentist. and decided that people should be shiny and glittery on their birthdays- you can ask me about this, it's something i feel very strongly about :)

i remember when we code-named boys after candy in middle school-
the boy i liked was crunchy m&ms ♥

we'll feel this way again

and when we do we'll deny that we had ever felt this way before.

what can i say

my internet's been working all day.
i have three reliable proxies to choose from.
i've sat around at home with nothing to do at times.

i have no excuse.


i just haven't felt like writing.
all my words feel empty.

and usually empty things are good-
empty things can be used,
empty things can be filled,
but not my words.

they're empty and bottomless and
incapable of actually containing any of my thoughts and feelings-
syllables leak out, heartbeats slip out between sentence fragments.

真没用。

forever and ever and everr

for some time passes slowly, an hour can seem an eternity.
for others, there's never enough.

the hours felt like eternities in maryland and surprisingly, or sadly, far too many hours in shanghai have also felt like an eternity. summers are so anti-climatic. we spend semesters looking forward to them and then when they finally roll around like clockwork, for in fact they are dictated by clockwork, we get all excited like with a new toy and then the boredom kicks in and we just waste it. and before we know it, we'll be all grown'd up (ha. i never noticed how much grown'd up, yea, yea, it's improper and nonexistent but i like it, sounds like grooooann'd up) and we won't have any more summers. we'll have outgrown them like tight jeans and purple eyeliner- though personally, i'm hoping to never outgrow the latter. i'm so acutely aware of how there's not enough time in this world, yet tonight, like so many nights this week, i have way too much time. man, i wish at&t controlled my hours and that way i can have roll-over minutes! i'd actually use these unlike my silly unnecessary phone minutes- how does anyone ever use them all up with all those free nights and weekends and at&t to at&t calls? but seriously, if only i could do a little bit of rearranging and move some of these extra minutes and hours and save them for some day or someone- for one of those moments teeming with all sorts of magic and you would give the world if only it could last forever. it's so unfair, so ironic, so typical of life to make the moments you want to last forever the most fleeting.

tuck said it to winnie the summer she turned 15- do not fear death, but rather the un-lived life. you don't have to live forever. you just have to live.

and she did.

rush of fools

i’m so aware of what i deserve
i should be drowning in the red sea tonight

but so aware of what you impart
i’m only drowning in Your love tonight
i’m only drowning in Your love

cause You give when You should take away
and You take what should have been my pain
and You offer good when I’ve none in me
You’re the only love that makes me complete

midnight melted to morning

a moment faded to memory

after all the remembering last night. after getting home at 6 in the morning. after sleeping until 5 in the afternoon. i spent the last three hours reading through some of my high school diaries- july 8, 2004 to november 9, 2006. four diaries in two years, one of which was filled up in two months. i used to write so much. my current diary? june 7, 2007 to.. well, you can fill in the blanks because clearly, i'm not. and i guess it's discouraging but i think i've figured out why i don't write anymore. somewhere along the way, i realized that i can't fit my whole life into my diary. i can stick in as many ticket stubs and boarding passes or copy in as many text messages (and believe me, i've copied in a lot) as i want. i can record the exact length of phone calls and video chats and capture the anxiety and anticipation before and the satisfaction or frustration or giddyness afterward. i can print out photos and emails and blog entries and painstakingly glue them all in. but to what end? it'll never be enough- not nearly. there are so many shades of emotions in the heat of moments and even in stillness, nuances and voice inflections and silences and whispered sentiments and sound effects that can't just be printed out and glued onto a page- words, hours worth of words, start slipping away here and there before the conversation is even over. glances and eyes rolled and eyebrows raised, shy smiles and smells and inexplicable brushes of fingertips, silent wishes and hasty prayers and acts of deliberation and words, words, words- more words than i could ever write.

so why write them? just to say i was here? that this is my moment- the finished bowl of watermelon on my right, the saran-wrap untidily peeled away, scrunched, perched on one edge of the bowl, the fork lying diagonally in it, my right leg propped up on the same corner of the table, my calf touching the bowl, i'm incomplete and i'm undone, but i suppose like everyone, there's so much more that's going on, behind the scenes, the microwave in the kitchen down the hall just 'ding'ed, my tigger cell phone silenced, my elmo bag in a heap on the scanner. but there's so much more. there are thoughts racing through my mind beyond the ones i'm typing out. my heart is murmuring all sorts of unintelligible emotions. there are files in my recycling bin that i haven't gotten around to 'move to trash.' if even a simple still moment like this one can't be captured, no other moment stands a chance.

this is my moment, my simple still moment. it's not yours and it'll never be mine again- no amount of words or diagrams could make it either of ours. you have your own moment and even if i could paint a perfect picture of my moment for you to relive, by engaging it you'll lose yours. so i'll live my moment and you'll live yours. and we'll love the time we have because that's really all we can ever do.

running through yesterday into tomorrow
don’t let it just drift away
forget about tying the hands of time
give every minute to the One who gave us today
- joy williams

there's gotta be forever somewhere

otherwise, all this loving is for nothing.