missing the point completely.
written: 2:15 p.m. on Thursday, Apr. 17, 2008

While I was in Comparative Crim she changed my bedsheets and chanced upon the David-inspired thingy I wrote which was apparently lying around in my room. Knowing myself, it was probably lying around in my room. But it's two sheets of paper with frenzied scribblings in black on them, and even if they were lying around in my room, I'm not sure that qualifies for 'conspicuous', but whatever.

Granted, barring an obvious "Do Not Read" scrawled in bright pink across the top of the page, those two sheets of paper aren't exactly private. I fully intend to get people to read it once I'm done with the editing.

But the thing is, those two sheets of paper are the first draft of what I'm hoping would be something halfway decent. Why does that matter? It bugs me - severely - when someone reads my work when it's in unreadable condition, and I'm not just referring to my handwriting. I'm anal about who gets to read what and when, I'm very protective of my stuff, and I just feel like my privacy has been invaded when someone - doesn't matter who it is - randomly picks up something I left in my room and starts reading it.

Still, I should have kept it somewhere safe and it's my fault for leaving it lying around, but that's not the part that pissed me off.

What really pissed me off was when my mom was all, "Why were you writing about David Cook at 1-something?" At first I was like, "Um, I was in class at 1-something."

Then she went, "No, I meant 1-something in the morning. Why weren't you asleep? Are you crazy? Have you lost your mind? You're siao."

You know, I'm a bit disappointed, if truth be told, that it's been so many years already and yet I suddenly feel like we're back to the same old refrain that I couldn't stop fucking singing when I was in secondary school. Maybe the whole "I must write or else" thing in secondary school was largely an act, part of my poseur 14-year-old self's ploy to set herself apart from the norm; but still, the fact remains that writing was the only thing I was good at, the only thing I enjoyed, and it's still the only thing that I'm good at and the only thing I enjoy.

Except I don't just enjoy writing; I love it the way I haven't loved anything, or anyone, before in my life. You think I'm obsessed with David Cook? Not even my love for David can hope to come even remotely close to my love for writing. It is key to who I am; it is, quite simply, who I am.

My mom doesn't understand the significance of those two sheets of paper because I don't talk to her about my writing. Granted, there hasn't been much to say, considering I haven't been writing very much lately. But somehow, down the years I've stopped talking to her - or my dad - about what truly matters to me. I don't talk to them about how frustrated I get when I sit in front of my laptop with a new Word document opened, wanting to write something, anything, the most banal of crap, just to say that I've written something. I don't talk to them about how insecure I feel about my writing, how I have this standard in my mind that I will never be able to reach, and how, despite feeling discouraged every single time I fail to write or complete what I start, I still cling on to writing for dear life anyway. Even in the face of lack of inspiration, a looming legal career, the very real possibility that I will never live out my dream of being published where it counts, I still cling on to it for the solace and hope and companionship that it provides.

The whole of last year has seen me trying to write weepy and saccharine garbage about love and love lost, inspired by my own needlessly messy love life. But none of the pieces that I started ever got around to completion. In fact, most of them didn't get written past the first two paragraphs. More recently I abandoned that source of "inspiration" which actually ended up choking me and I wrote - and completed - something that was still inspired by my own life, but by different people. And yes, I was proud of the fact that I finished that piece, though not so much the end result.

But I've been itching to write something simple and straightforward and short, stripped of literary pretenses and just write for the love of it, not for the sake of it. I tried a couple of times, using my friends as inspiration, but once again, I was all dried up two paragraphs of clunky sentences later.

Last night's sudden inspiration was palpable and impossible to ignore. It almost didn't work, but I set aside the laptop and went back to basics, and it worked like pure magic. I can't begin to express the wondrous feeling that I felt when I finished it and looked at the time and discovered that so much time had passed. It was honestly like time had stood still, and nothing else mattered in those minutes except getting out the words, giving shape to the idea, and finishing the task.

In other words, what my mom doesn't understand, and probably never will because I will not talk to her about it, is that the subject of the piece wasn't the point; what truly mattered was the fact that there was a piece. I don't care how I get my inspiration anymore. If I need to stay up all night "writing about David Cook", so be it. Because I'm writing something, and that's the only thing that matters.

And of course, what she commented on wasn't the writing, but the fact that I was "writing about David Cook." I wonder if she even made it to the end. I can't fathom for even a second how that would be possible, considering my handwriting is legible only to myself. I mean, I totally understand how the source of inspiration is capable of diminishing the quality of the piece (i.e. people dismissing it because it's "fanfiction", except I don't write fanfiction and it's also not fanfiction 'cause there's nothing fictitious about it in relation to David as a real person), but you know what? I'm pretty sure that wasn't what she had in mind when she said what she said.

It just cuts to the core when the people that are supposed to be the ones that love you most in the world are also the ones that don't understand the one thing that is the most important to you.

Along a similar vein as the previous paragraph, can I just add that I cannot comprehend how it was that I was able to date guys that similarly did not understand the writing thing.

You don't have to like writing, but at the very least, you have to understand - truly understand - what it does for me and what it is to me.

Then again, scratch that. If you're inherently incapable of judging the quality of my work (i.e. just not literary, period), then you're pretty much of no use to me. So, whatever.

I just listened to the studio version of Always Be My Baby and at the end of it I was left with my mouth hanging open.

I'm amazed by his vocal range. I'm amazed that he sang half the song so low and made it sound so good. I'm amazed that I can't croak a single note of this song, and yet, Little Sparrow is right in my vocal range. Billie Jean, on the other hand, is simultaneously too high and too low for me.

I loved the performance but even I have to admit that it wasn't vocally perfect, though for some odd reason it sounded a lot better and near-perfect even on the iTunes version. I loved the rawness of emotions he brought to the performance, as always, but it didn't quite showcase the arrangement he did for the song as well as the studio version does. He takes his time building up to the bridge, and once he hits the bridge, it all pays off, it's all worth it, and he simply does not disappoint.

As expected, Always Be My Baby is the pop-est song he's done so far in spite of the new arrangement (honestly, it's not as emo/rock/whatever as people seem to think it is; it's actually more Mariah Carey's sunshine upbeat cheery Always Be My Baby pop ballad-fied) and oh my god, David Cook can sing the hell out of a soppy pop song too.

He will be wiping the floor with ArchuBot during the finale. And if he doesn't win, there is no justice in this world.

before sunrise // before sunset

Previously:
- - Tuesday, Aug. 29, 2017
I'm moving. - Sunday, Jul. 11, 2010
In all honesty - Tuesday, Jul. 06, 2010
What I want for my birthday... - Sunday, Jul. 04, 2010
On Roger's behalf. - Friday, Jul. 02, 2010