Down and Up

Picking life back up together from where I fell.

And I fell hard, smack. All the way back to ground zero, just like the day I arrived in the States. The first exam I took back in Taiwan. The first time I met Alexia.

Straight back to ground zero, straight from unmoving confidents to absolute doubt of self. Straight from one reality to another, two side of a flipping coin. This was a hard fall, and again I am faced with the same question, what to do, how to recover?

For a week I sulked, I sulked horribly. I took it out on everyone and anyone who came across my path. I dreaded everything, and I was frightened to the core. Ivo took most of it, then my family took the rest, then a last, but most poisonest drop, straight into my soul. Poison is intoxicating, and once taken, its addictive makes it hard for people to climb out of it. Yet, maybe that's the one thing I can be proud of myself about, I never die, I shrug and then I say, I'll do better.

When I first arrived in the States, they wanted to put me in the mental retarded class. Considering the fact that I knew absolutely nothing, had hearing problems, and definitely answered the wrong answer when someone asked me what my name was, it was easy to assume so. At that time, however, I didn't care, I assumed myself as a genius despite other's opinions, and refused their special offer. Call it child prodigy if you may, I aced math (they were learning subtraction, and I did that in kindergarten), and then got N/A for everything else. It's a wonder I got passed third grade (the second time) and moved on to fourth. At least I managed to write a play, directed it, and differentiated he/she/I/me/them/it before I left my third grade classroom. Oh, and I infected the whole school with the disease of calling everyone "freaks" in Chinese, cuz they thought it was the way Chinese people said hi to each other. Well... the last I would see of them... :P

By the time I was leaving the States, I've built up quite a confidence, maybe a little too much confidence, as an "acer". Those were the good old days, when I literately "aced" everything, straight through sixth and seventh grade. Got enrolled in eighthgrade art class, and was proclaimed by my sixth grade teacher as her favorite student (and do please be amazed that I haven't been in contact with her... for ages). Okay, Taiwan next. If there is a God, he has a way with people. He would never let you have your fill of glory and then walk off happy. At the height of every one of your success, he's going to click a switch and throw you right back in hell. Of course, you're the one who defines hell, and, well... I never really liked heaven that much either... :P

The first exam I had when I got back to Taiwan, do mind that I was enrolled (with my previous grades as proof) in the best class of one of the best middle school in Taichung. That's pretty good for a start, a classful of students who aces everything. I got 25 in math, and a talk with the Chinese teacher (instead of a grade, cuz I simply weren't "gradable"), then I don't want to talk about the rest.... My math... was prehistoric, compared to the rest of the class... and my grade... exotic to my fellow students. There were actually even talks of whether or not I should be placed into the easiest class in the whole school... (AGAIN!) Along with my tendencies of acting different, rather un-understandable (no, I'm not trying to create new "un-existing" words like BUSH), odd... and sometimes extremely idiotic (laughing out loud, running into walls and doors cuz of balance problems, hard of hearing... etc.) it is again understandable that my fellow students would have those reactions. Yet, as a kid, we don't sulk, we see a problem and we find a solution... so... I decided to ace it. I hate it when people think of me less than who I think of myself, and I do think quite a lot of myself... I'm very narcissist, you know... At least up to the point of acting idiotic... that, I have major problems with. Got into the second best high school in town, won an English speech contest (yes, other contestants also had the same English abilities)...

I have a way of starting low, and then slowly grow. I'm a grower, not a glower. When I got into NTU (with everyone's owe!), I was as proud as heck. You can call me an arrogant bastard, but I had my reasons for most of it. English related classes were never hard for me, classes were never hard for me, as a matter of fact. People were my problems, and laziness was another. I was too proud, too proud to work hard at all. Until I met Alexia. She was something different, someone who wasn't just a grower, but also a glower. Next to her, I was a grass, and her the beautiful flower, and again I was deep down in the pits, and this time, a very deep one. One I can't say I've grown entirely out of, but I've grown to see it differently. She had her beauty, but I had mine. We are beautiful in different ways.

For years, I've been bitter. Since university, I've been rather bitter. It got considerably worse during the first month of my work in Taiwan. I disliked everything, and I definitely disliked everything. This is probably the biggest fall in my life, because I never really climb out of it. I just fell back every time I meet an obstacle, since Alexia, I've just been falling and falling and falling back. Part of me gave up on trying, part of me was just frightened.

I watched a movie today about a girl who never lets anyone close to her enough to hurt her. Not really hurt her. I believe that was a comment I had from one of my former boyfriend. Actually, more than one of my former boyfriend. I am not a very persistant person, and when I get bored, I want to change. I never open my heart, hence I always end up surprising people. My psych friends calls me the most unpredictable person they know. And anyone who thinks they know me well normally will end up thinking they were wrong. No one knew me, even my own mother. Not because no one wanted to, I am sure many people wanted to. But, I never let anyone in. If I want to think of the most touching moment of my life, it goes all the way back to when I was seven years old. When I think of the time when I genuinely cared about people, that was still when I was seven years old. Since I start moving around the world (grrrr) I've been locking myself up. I react as people expects for me to react, as how I believe my roommates would expect of me (my famous phrase being, "I had to cry, because she came in expecting me to be crying").

They say when you fall deep deep down, God would give you a hand if you really want it, and bring you back up. At the beginning of my trip around Europe, I prayed to God. Well, I prayed to God to find me a lovely German guy (typical Naomi) who would be willing to follow me around the world, someone who'd make me stop and think about my heart, my life, my everything. Someone I'd listen to, someone I'd follow, someone I'd give in to. Someone light haired and German. It's funny how life is. Maybe God does exist...

--

Maybe God does exist... Ivo Harms...

--

Back to the ups and downs... Here is a reason for me to be up for, a reason for myself. It's not something someone expects of me, nor is it some unrealistic dream to conquer the world. It's simple, and it's relatively quite average, but it is real. It is something really worthy to think about, something about what I really want in my life. So, from here on, it's going to go up, not quickly, not madly, just gently and slowly. At an even pace. I don't know how yet, I don't even know why, but I know it's going to go up...

Like my horoscope says... I am like a firebird, I am born of the ashes... And each time, the brighter I burn again...