Post 26: I have been gone too long
Steps a little further from my laptop, stroking my chin for a dramatic effect, read the title/ Yeap perfect! (Author's approval is dripping with sarcasm).
You might be wondering, why did she suddenly pop out and from where.
Hey, I am curious too so let's look back at the few minutes prior to me typing away on the keyboard.
It all started with-
I was just strolling around Youtube listening to disney's Moana soundtracks -cause I am in love with Moana-when I finally remembered I have been wanting to visit this stranded blog of mine since gosh I-dont-know when(since I seem to forget everytime I turn my laptop on). Perhaps the nostalgia and overwhelming feelings Moana gave me reminded me of this wish of mine.
And so since I was worried I might forget about it again (and maybe forget about this blog altogether) I obliged.
I read the last few posts and I have to laugh.
Purely because I can almost feel that exact moment when I wrote that last post.
Relieved of exam mostly and anticipating my holiday plans and of course, work.
...Which the first part never work- that includes me blogging too btw.
So here I am randomly deciding to post a spontaneous post. I actually have alot in mind right now.
Most of them involving the things that I went through the last half of 2016 (oh yeahh, happy new year to you).
However since those are very likely gonna end up windy, long, dull and uninteresting I am challenging myself to summarize my 2016 (the last six months that is)!
Here I go:
Lets start with answering the question "so how did I do in the exam I mentioned in the last post?"
Well, if you wanna know, I received my results at the office where I was assigned for the holiday. I put an indifferent face the whole time that day (while everybody anxiously talked about theirs) but disappointment hold my heart and mocking laughs echoed in my head.
It wasn't terrible really but gosh what is wrong with my standards? (which I realised wasn't only mine) but hey, I knew now that I got what I deserved. (Ha! that's what you get for being okay coming up with stories instead of studying).
Gosh this is going to be long it seems.
Skipping to the month when my sister came home.
I was so happy. Very happy indeed.
We made use of the time we had and I tried hard to not bring "work" when I returned home for the weekend (Hey, you sound like a man who tried to assure his wife that his worklife is doing great lol) but "trying" is probably not the word /laughs. I DID NOT want to. There you go.
I'd rather not touch this topic though lol cause it is very personal for me. It was another world I have to admit.
Alhamdulillah I survived though but not without another rounds of emotional turmoils and crying to sleep unfortunately and being in an asthmatic state for a week non-stop (away from home with people who had never seen me in that state) didn't help . Boy was that terrible. It was the worst asthma experience I ever had and I had to lie I was fine which btw is a poor lie considering my ragged breath was such a big giveaway but nobody pressed on the matter thankfully (except for my families whom when they found out, were very angry) cause the last thing I needed was people worrying about me (which only worsens it ).
But truly, I thank Allah for the strengths to make it through.
Moving back to where I have been with my sister. We had lots of fun. Drew together, sang together, prayed together,
Going back to school in August for the third semester came shortly after.
To be honest it was a rather short one, at least that's what I felt.
Everyday it felt as if I was waiting for it to start /laughs/ and after the stress of works and assignments and clubs (apparently I was appointed being a president of the art club and guess what? I was so disappointed / you dont get to sleep on the couch every session / Kono Bijutsubu ni wa mondai ga aru aka This art club has a problem! anime-manga reference *laughs*) and reaching the exam period I was slapped to reality: the year is ending.
And to be real honest again, I have no idea if I progressed or not this semester.
If I was busy remaking story ideas in the second semester, I was worse in the last semester.
And I meant it.
It was a real nightmare gosh.
I pushed everything to the deadlines and pushed myself to my limits.
I remembered I had only 20 minutes sleep that particular
I still couldn't believe I managed to learn some foreign formulas (and determining the right one to use) and reading graphs by myself that night and redo the whole thing because I was so careless).
Horrible.
Thank Allah for some of my friends who helped me to get the gist of it.
Thank Allah it was only a less than two hour (heck, I think it wasn't even an hour) class before I slept the whole ride back home.
I started counting the exact time I have to sleep this time around but its funny since I am not the type to immediately drift to sleep once my body hits the bed. I need at least an hour for everything (note; my mind) to settle
It was a rather chaotic semester and no matter how much I want to bring myself to not care, I couldn't / am not that irresponsible.
Let's not start on the exam period.
I have to honor it the worst revision period I ever had.
Before that...
As I mentioned , I was crowned (uh-huh grand applause) the art club president. It was not something I wish to happen even though I knew it was coming.
Immediately I was exposed to a part of the school that I don't know of and wish to remain ignorant on. My first mindset was "everyone's expecting me to know everything even if I literally only went to the club once or twice" and I wouldnt say I was wrong. Some did and it was hard cause I dont have anyone to turn to and I didnt want to trouble anyone.
I was struggling.
I was so focused on becoming a good president (perhaps being one in my sixth form triggers the alarm bells in my head) that I didnt realise my committee -whom were all first years albeit older- had no more experience than I do (I guess I immediately thought they would be more experienced or at the least could handle it face-on cause they are nothing like me. Nope. Not shy, Not withdrawn and whose hands didnt shake when she talks and I again decided to shoulder everything to myself).
After a while, I finally came to an understanding that my committee needs my help as much as I need theirs.
I finally see that they were also pushed into the positions without any warning (*laughs in a straight tone* in fact I was warned beforehand btw. I saw all the signs coming) and were as clueless as me on how to run a club professionally.
In the end, I came to accept it and even enjoyed every moment I spent with my committee and club members.
They are amazing people, truly and I have never even imagined I would be making friends with people outside my course.
Every session end with an exhausted me but with a smile etched on my face.
I swear there wasn't any session that are silent despite me fearing I would be Boring. These people are so close-knitted with one another that I unexpectedly grew comfortable to (and considering how we seemingly always ended up having a non-small talks, it was refreshing to be able to engaged with the conversations).
May Allah bless them .
I swear to you writing those made me smile.
And no, I did not forget about my rants.
Wait, this whole post IS a rant.
Carrying the club matters on my shoulder, I worried for projects and my time for studying.
However at the same time, I was excited on planning for a very own art project.
It was a first and it just made me so enthusiastic.
Each day an idea would be added to the long lists of artworks ideas.
I never got tired of just looking at them, happy to just begin.
I went shopping right away and I swear it's the first time in my whole life I ever own so many art supplies and seriously I couldnt have done it without a friend of mine whom is also an art-enthusiast and know more than I do but didnt mind sharing them with me with great excitement. Apparently she also has the ability to bring a side of me that I have never shown to anyone. I was surprised myself when I realised this.
At the same time as well, I was infatuated with gintama more than ever especially since I have started watching it at that point.
Fanarts and fanfictions, I grabbed all there is that the fandom can offer. It's horrifying and blissful at the same time cause it's gintama , an anime that can make me (and most other fans) cry and laugh in an episode.
This anime and its manga deserve a whole separate post and maybe I would work on it, InsyaAllah.
With being hooked up with art and owning new art supplies (with the addition to being exposed to different art medium and styles credits to my friends and club), I was in art high the entire semester.
The best thing was I took the courage and decided to try new stuffs (watercolors, complex drawings etc) and enjoyed it.
-Which just lead to why I had a trouble focusing on my studies.
My mind was full with art ideas and my hand always had the urge to draw on every empty space on my notes.
Beside being in my art high I was simply anxious to study.
It was so hard and I need to reread the same line of a text over and over again but it just slipped out as easily as it entered.
It didnt help that I was rewriting what I have revised and realising I do not understand them.
Suddenly my whole course seems so foreign and it just fueled the fear .
It would paralysed me in my seat, the blood loud in my ear and my brain would stop for the rest of the day, only functioning when I ponder why I was acting like that and drowned into another fits of self pity.
In the end I stick to being a night owl with my concentration improving by night time and I spent the remaining hours before sleeping, (which was around 3 am at the least) summarising my notes and cramping them into my head before attempting whatever past year papers I could.
Again, I ended up with a lack of sleep.
Thinking back, I probably shed more tears than I ever did revise.
On one of the days I didnt have exam, I decided I was tired of the whole cycle.
The art high was easy to control by giving them time to flow whenever I need a break but the anxiety was harder.
The first thing I did to help myself was to stop staring at my feet (which is a habit I fell into whenever I think about my self worth I realised).
I stop bringing myself down and excusing myself with it cause initially it was indeed my own fault for falling into a terrible studying pattern.
I stop self-pitying.
It wasnt easy *laughs*, really it wasn't.
Soon, I managed to dawn it to myself that I wasn't special in anyway.
I might have been through some bad things which undoubtedly others had as well and there is no particular reason why I should be excused.
To be excused from the hardship of the world, from decisions and my responsibility to change whatever it is I dislike.
I am responsible of my life after all and I can't just announce to the world that I am running away for abit and that they should just accept it cause I deserve it.
I hold on to these mindset and Alhamdulillah until the end of the exam (which I greatly dread) I managed to hold on and try my best to study.
After the exam, I was completely immersed in my art-high which surprisingly did not extinguished like it usually did. I explored every inch of my brain and the result? I drew almost everyday, almost filling up a quite new notebook of mine.
I also answered to my love for gintama with a few spontaneous (Yes, I literally came up with a comic idea at 1 am in the morning) more-than-5-pages decent-looking comics which is something I haven't done in years (personally I place them close to my heart cause I enjoyed doing them and they surprises me with great paneling I didn't know I could do).
All in all I was a happy being drawing during the holiday.
As for my other holiday plans which only consist of watching gintama, I managed to complete two seasons/ I am taking it slow really and I have no idea why.
My examination's result were out halfway into the holiday. To be honest, I wasnt expecting anything great . In actuality I even refused going out of my bedroom that day until I got my results via my friends.
When I did though, I have to look at it repeatedly to make sure I got the right result.
Alhamdulillah.
I wanted to cry but I want to question my results first.
How?
I have no idea.
It was so much better than I thought. In fact, my result was better than the rest of my semesters.
Really, how? when I was obviously struggling getting through the exam weeks.
Only Allah knows.
All in all, it was another hectic year with so much going on, loss and gains.
Alhamdulillah I have made it through and hopefully did grew in some aspects.
In the end, it was such a long and boring posts.
But since the beginning of it I have decided I might as well rant selfishly and let it be the way it is.
If anybody's gonna read it by any chance, they will.
It might be for a few while until I post again /laughs.
I apologize for this diary-entry like post cause maybe it is? Perhaps I am hoping I would come back again like I did today and have a good laugh at how silly I have been during my youth days (really, when am I expecting to come back? lol).
InsyaAllah next time I might post some drawings that I had done for the pas few months last year that I really like (since this is probably the only best platform there is for posting them lol).
Listening to: Dark Days-Local Natives
"The countries? The skies? You can have them. I'm busy just protecting what's right in front of me"-Sakata Gintoki from Gintama.
(seriously how can I even fall in love with a lazy-bum, diabetic, sweets-addict anime character with silver perm? just kidding . Anyone watching the series will have the answer).
Well then,
AniYuuki
