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| A cry for attention... help? |
I remember a doctor saying that when I found myself lying on a narrow bed at the Emergency Room of a hospital, surrounded by a bunch of students in their own narrow hospital beds, in various stages of physical and emotional torment - mostly the latter, judging from how their faces were contorted by pain that no doctor or nurse can seem to repair with their 'magic touch' and 'magic potions'. It was one of the peculiar experiences that international students such as myself that time contend with... living away from home, family and close friends, and not having enough support system in exploring that 'wild vastness' where knowledge are buried, waiting to be unearthed with sweat, blood and tears! But I was ancient... and those students were young... fragile and vulnerable, even as they exude confidence and grit.
Kids these days... they tire easily - from what they do, from all the noise around them, from what's demanded of them, from what's expected of them, from all the happy photos that they need to take and post on social media platforms, from all the posts that they're expected to 'like' and affix a heart to just in case they get left out... from 'life' itself. And yet, is this what's life have become now? A story on an e-wall? A story so eye-catching and jealous-worthy of a life... that does not breathe. And in one heave of a desperate gasp for breath - for life... the 'story' crumbles, and its owner unmasked... revealing a death so 'blank' and empty... a death so unworthy of death itself because it did not know life in the first place?!
But what does one do when a cry for help comes howling in the sad silence of night... echoing one's own silent desperation? How does one reach out to comfort another... when all one desperately needs is the same comforting, too... no matter how little, no matter how meager... just an ounce of comforting touch to lend a spark of life? What if 'good old sleep' is no longer enough... to mend a life that deteriorated so badly to mere survival... fading so sadly to mere existence? How does one keep a strong façade to prod others to keep going when, inside, one is so empty from sheer exhaustion, too - physically, mentally, emotionally... while the spirit struggles to keep the heart beating in a fair semblance of life... against one's hollow chest.
Drowning. How does one stay afloat against the smashing waves and violent current?
Help. Is there help... at all?
But what does one do when a cry for help comes howling in the sad silence of night... echoing one's own silent desperation? How does one reach out to comfort another... when all one desperately needs is the same comforting, too... no matter how little, no matter how meager... just an ounce of comforting touch to lend a spark of life? What if 'good old sleep' is no longer enough... to mend a life that deteriorated so badly to mere survival... fading so sadly to mere existence? How does one keep a strong façade to prod others to keep going when, inside, one is so empty from sheer exhaustion, too - physically, mentally, emotionally... while the spirit struggles to keep the heart beating in a fair semblance of life... against one's hollow chest.
Drowning. How does one stay afloat against the smashing waves and violent current?
Help. Is there help... at all?
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