death

Sunday is a good day to watch TV commercials

- Sheylara 8 Comments

I’ll show you one today, starring… me.

I’d talk more about the shoot but I’m outside and don’t have all my photos.

In fact, I’ve been more or less out for the past three days, which the more astute of you might have discerned if you’ve been coming here faithfully every day expecting to see new entries but instead seeing that dodgy picture of some blackish soup.

A close friend’s mum just passed away and we’ve been over at the wake. I’m now blogging from there because, no matter what, life goes on.

I’ve always feared the day I would lose a loved one. I always wonder how people cope but I suppose we cope, eventually.

Have a good Sunday, all.

Suffering an epic nightmare

- Sheylara 10 Comments

I’m actually too busy to blog today. Between moving house and my new editorial work and entertaining the Goonfather’s rubbish, I’m lucky I even have time to have nightmares.

But I don’t want people to get upset if I miss a day blogging, thinking that I’ve been abducted by aliens or something equally nuts. So, here’s a quickie!

Once in a while, when I’m stressed out, I get what I call epic nightmares. These involve a drama or adventure that play through my entire sleep and have themes of death and violence.

Like, there was this time I dreamt about being trapped in a haunted house with my friends. It took us forever to escape and we encountered endless horrible things in the process.

Or this other one about an ex-boyfriend trying to kill me so I had to kill him back but no matter how much I slashed at him, he refused to die.

Last night/this morning, my nightmare was about witnessing a group murder in broad daylight, in full view of hundreds of people, after which a revenge took place involving the attempted murder of the original murders’ instigator, after which I was made to witness gory interrogation sessions, during which I cried and cried to the point of exhaustion because I couldn’t stand seeing people get hurt, after which I became some kind of special agent sent to investigate the crimes.

The dream gripped me so tightly that I didn’t wake up until past 2 pm.

I had gone to bed around 4 am and set my alarm for 10 am. But when my alarm rang, I was so deep in the dream that I didn’t hear the snoozes till 11 am, and then I was so groggy and spaced out that I turned the alarm off and continued sleeping/dreaming.

I hate when this happens.

I’ll bet if I were still 16, my parents would ban me from playing video games. Haha. (But it’s not the games lah. I haven’t played a violent game in ages.)

Do you get epic nightmares, too?

I want to kill myself but I’m too lazy (PG)

- Sheylara 107 Comments

So, I was lying in bed for three hours, thinking about killing myself.

But it’s so much work and I’m too lazy.

I’m always thinking of effective ways to die. But suicide is either too painful or too troublesome, you know?

Throw myself at a speeding car? Not foolproof and could be bloody.

Lie on the road and wait for a vehicle to run over me? That’s gross. Innards flying all over. Severed limbs.

Jump into an MRT track? SMRT staff will curse me for eternity for giving them yet another mess to clean up.

Jump off a tall building? Too inconsiderate. Think of the people who have to clean up and the witnesses who will be traumatised for life.

Cut myself, stab myself, club myself? Too personal.

Overdose on panadol? Not foolproof and the nausea is worse than dying.

Carbon monoxide poisoning? Not sure how to rig it. Too troublesome.

Gas poisoning? I don’t live alone.

There is no good way at all to kill oneself.

The thought of having to plan a good suicide and actually getting up to do it makes me feel tired already. It’s not fun and I don’t like doing not-fun things.

And then, there are the moral aspects.

I don’t want to hurt the people I love who love me.

But I wonder.

How many people will grieve over my death?

I mean truly grieve. I don’t mean like, “Aw, such a pity she’s dead. How sad, I think I’ll miss her.” That’s bullshit. I mean grieve as in feel the pain of loss, the pain like a hole cut out of your heart that will never heal.

How many people will actually feel pained over the cessation of my existence?

I don’t know. I’m thinking maybe a handful, like family. Even then, I don’t see why they should even feel it. I don’t think I value-add anyone’s life. Not a one. Yes, I know I have family who loves me. But I don’t do shit for them. Nobody depends on me for anything. I can be gone and the value of their lives won’t change.

Well, sure, I know there are people who think I’m beautiful and talented and that my death would be a bloody waste. But I don’t think they will really grieve, you know? Maybe they’ll feel sad about it for a while because that’s human compassion, but I don’t think my death will cripple them or pain them.

Maybe a few people will blog about my death because it’s good blogging fodder, and they will say things like, “Oh, how sad, what a waste, I’ll miss reading her blog,” or “What a stupid bitch, good riddance.” But I don’t think they will really grieve. They will move on and, tomorrow, they will blog about monkeys in the desert.

My existence doesn’t really matter in the grand scheme of things so it’s not such a bad thing if I killed myself, is it?

Still, I can’t do it on the off-chance that there are actually people who will grieve.

Now, I know because this post talks about death and suicide, some of you will feel compelled to give me your two cents.

“Don’t kill yourself. It’s not worth it.”

“Don’t be a coward.”

“Life is beautiful. Embrace it, don’t lose it.”

“If u kill you’reself your goin strait to hell becuz god sez so its a sin.”

“can i hav all ur stuff????!!!11!!!!one1!!”

Don’t.

Because, firstly, I’m not going to kill myself. Duh.

Secondly, those words are meaningless. They’re obnoxious and insensitive. I don’t think anyone has the right to tell someone not to kill themselves, especially without having lived in that person’s shoes.

Sure, you can tell me not to. But then be prepared to shoulder all my burdens. Solve all my problems. Soothe all my pain. Give me money.

If you’re not prepared to do any of that, what right do you have to tell anyone not to die? Talk is cheap.

The only people who have the right are parents. “I fucking spent hundreds of thousands of dollars and zillions of hours of my life raising you to this point, you little shit. So you’d better not just up and throw it away on a whim, dammit!”

And then, there’s the aftermath to consider. I mean afterlife (or lack thereof).

Lack would be good. Then death would be a clean end to everything.

But life isn’t easy. I have no reason to believe that death would be any easier.

What if I became a restless ghost doomed for eternity to be bound to the very spot where I chose to take my own life?

That’s a really scary thought. I don’t want to hang out at the same bloody spot for eternity and have stupid humans walk through me or sit on me and I can’t scream at them because they can’t hear me or see me.

Even if they could feel my presence, I’m sure haunting people will get old after a while.

What if I got reincarnated as a cockroach as punishment for suicide? Well, cockroaches have really short lifespans so I guess it’s not too big a problem. But what if I keep getting reincarnated as a cockroach for eternity?

What if there’s really a hell?

What if death is worse than life?

Well, there are too many things to consider. Suicide is so troublesome and has so many consequences. I guess I won’t be doing it any time soon. I’m not free today, anyway. I have tons of work to do.

I guess it’ll have to wait.

Would you cry if they die?

- Sheylara 28 Comments

I always ask myself this question: What if [a loved one] were to die? How deeply would I grieve?

I know that’s very morbid. (But it’s hardly my most morbid yet.)

I often think about a loved one’s death to gauge exactly how much that person means to me. It could be a family member, a significant other, a close friend. Actually, I also wonder about regular friends periodically, just to see how far up the friendship rung I’ve moved up with them at a given moment.

Sometimes when I’m lying in bed trying to sleep, my mind wanders. I have really bad insomnia so that happens a lot.

I think about a specific person and I picture his (or her) death. I imagine the way I receive the news. I imagine going to the funeral. I imagine living life without him/her. I imagine the little things the person does that makes me laugh or smile. I imagine his/her absence from my life. And I imagine never being able to see this person ever again.

As I visualise each stage, I allow genuine emotions to wash over me, as if the events I’m imagining are really happening. Usually, if the person means a whole lot to me, tears will roll. I will feel the emptiness and the pain of loss. And I will feel the abject fear of losing him/her.

That’s when I know how much the person means to me and I resolve never to take him (or her) for granted, and to treasure each and every moment I have with him/her.

Yes, it’s a very morbid exercise, but I think it helps me appreciate life and especially appreciate the people around me. It keeps me from taking people for granted.

Do you question yourself thus?

You might find yourself surprised by the result.

Death by dehydration

- Sheylara 10 Comments

I just got hit by a revelation. I know exactly how I’m going to die when I do eventually die.

No, no. Not the sadiistic Final Destination vision type of revelation. Mine is of the intellectual, eureka type.

I just know I’m going to shrivel up and die of dehydration someday.

Let’s see. It’s 7 pm right now.

I have been awake since 5 am. Surfed the net in the dark because I couldn’t sleep. Three hours later, got off my butt to do some physical warm up because Nanny Wen was going to come at 8 am to jog with me. By the time she arrived, late as usual, it was raining, so we went up to my room to slack off, which, for Wen, means sleeping.

At about 10 am, I wake her up.

“Wake up, sleepyhead,” I said. “The rain’s stopped and it’s now nice and cloudy. Let’s go jogging.”

“Wake up, WAKE UP!!!!!!!!”

So she takes 15 minutes to wake up, by which time the sun had decided to come out in full force. Too hot for jogging.

Plan B: I put on Groove Coverage and we did muscle toning exercises in the comfort of my air-conditioned room for 40 minutes, stopping after we ran out of muscles to tone.

Lunch for me was a plate of chicken rice and half a can of soda at a nearby coffee shop. (Yeah, I know, my diet isn’t quite ideal for one who makes an effort to jog and torture her muscles, who cares.) After lunch, I shopped and did research online (read: waste time). Napped from 4 pm to 6 pm.

Now that I’m showered and fully awake, I realise that I’m parched. I realise that, in all of today I only drank half a can of soda.

In the last 20 hours, the only liquid I’ve taken is half a can of soda (and maybe half a drop of water accidentally swallowed while brushing my teeth).

I fear for my hair and my skin and my innards.

Maybe I’m worse than Nanny Wen. She merely forgets her wallets, keys and handphone. Everyone forgets those, right. I forget to drink water.

All my friends know that I’m a camel and can go through a whole day without drinking anything. When we go out for coffee or drinks, I don’t order anything half the time. When I do order something, I don’t finish the drink half the time.

I seldom feel thirsty, you see, so I forget that I need to drink water. And during the rare times I do feel thirsty, I sometimes ignore it because I have better things to do than to pour myself some water. Getting a drink is a chore, like brushing your teeth or making the bed, stuff that calls for procrastination. And I’d procrastinate until the thirst is totally forgotten.

For instance, I’m now blogging this instead of getting a drink even though I’m parched to high heaven.

I think I’d better go get some now before I keel over.