I love you more than anybody I ever know but I still wish I had never met you because I think life would be a lot less complicated. Yet, I will never trade in the memories I've created with you, both good and bad.

I think in life, one of the hardest lessons we learn is that love is not enough to make a relationship work. Some of us are lucky. We fall in love and we put ourselves out on a line and we are fortunate to be loved in return and the road to making the relationship work is a rocky one, but it's a ship that actually got to set sail. Others fall in love and give their hearts to the ones who don't deserve it or to ones who do deserve it but circumstances make it impossible for a relationship to to cultivated.

Some go through life without ever having to face the hardship of loving and never being loved in return. For others, it is the story of their life: to love and never have the feelings returned.

At the relatively young age of 23, I have experienced the pain of being in love and never being loved in return and it has become the story of my life (for now).

I fell in love with someone who didn't deserve it. Maybe he isn't worth my love but the reality is that, as much pain he's put me through, he will always be someone I will care for deeply.

Day after day, I live with the knowledge that I love him and I will always worry about him and care about him but it will never lead anywhere. Because we have no future together. At least, not in the foreseeable future. I have accepted the reality of the fact that the feelings will never be recipocrated. But it will never change the way I feel.

We love who we love for reasons we cannot fathom. Sometimes it ends in a fairytale ending, more often than not, it's a cross we bear and the pervese part of it lies in the fact that it is self-inflicted.

People tell me that if there is no future, then, I need to distance myself and move on. The truth is, I will never cut him from my life because he permanently owns a piece of my heart. The difference between the past and now is that I know it is an unrequited love. And I'm willing to bear that pain.

It's not self-sacrifice or martyrdom. It is simply the reality of Life.

In 2003, a boy- though only half of that heritage was a true Russian at heart - would sing to a girl:

Gori, gori, moya zvezda
Zvezda lyubvi privetnaya
Ti u menya odna zavetnaya
Drugoi ne budet nikogda…

(“Shine on, shine, my only star,
my star of love eternally,
You are my sole and chosen one,
There’ll be no other one for me…”)

But the girl was at conflict with her own self and would not be able to return his love: his obsession, when she could not love herself.

And that was his only fault; that he loved her too deeply. It was a love that was doomed because of its youth and its infinite possibilities. And so she forced herself to say goodbye and walk away from what scared her deeply.

Four years later, she wonders if perhaps she should have taken a chance on that past possibility but it is too late and all that lingers is the faint memory that she was once worthy of love. The only words that come to mind are ironically from him:

Tak zhivya, bez radosti/bez muki/pomniu ya ushedshiye goda
(So I live – remembering with sadness all the happy years gone by)

She wonders how in all his overwhelming passion, did he let his pragmatism overrule him and allow him to let her go and she remembers that the true Russian that he is, his happy ending is in finding out the reason for his suffering.

In the present, she sits in the balcony of her empty apartment at 5.24a.m and watches for a sun that will not rise for another two hours. Cigarette after cigarette she lights and inhales. The cold numbs her but still she waits. Black puffed jacket over pink Hello Kitty pajamas that are incongruent with the melancholy mood that cloaks her. And she borrows her own philosophy from a cheesy movie toast:

Here’s to the men we love
And here’s to the men who love us
Here’s to the men we love but don’t love us
F*ck Them All
So, here’s to us!

It's Day 3 and the final day of my diet. I'm dying for a juicy steak or a bar of chocolate. In other words, I wish I could have a nice big binge. They were giving samples of sausages in the supermarket today which almost made me faint.

But 2kg in 3 days is something I've worked very, very hard for and I'm not about to waste all my efforts by going on a binge. But I really wouldn't mind a nice bowl of Parpadelle and Braised Mushroom Sauce.

*DROOL*

Day 2 of my diet sees me feeling a little less chirpy. Still swigging the Coke Zero but feeling a little faint from the diet. Although I do think that a large part of it may be the fact that I should eat as soon as I get up and not wait till I'm about to faint from hunger. Still, can't complain about today's food. I pretty much like everything on the menu...

Brr...It's bloody cold.

Someone was really concerned about my lack of eating habits and gave me a diet that is hospital-recommended. It requires you to follow a strict diet for three days and eat normally for 4 days. It, of course, recommends that you do not overdo it on the other four days but as this person remarked, that shouldn't be a problem considering the diet has more food than what I normally eat. Still, if followed properly, you stand to lose 10lbs in one week.

Today marks my first day...

So far so good, I don't feel hungry from the lack of carbs or eating three small meals instead of six small meals. But I did also realize that I will never be a true blue Aussie: I hate Beetroot. The diet requires you to eat 1 cup of Beetroot for dinner on the first day. I did it with much disgust and choking it down with heaps of Coke Zero. But it made the ice-cream and apples all the more enjoyable.

Did I mention that the diet allows unlimited amounts of diet cola? I'm loving it since I'm such a big fan of Coke Zero. But I can also say the caffeine is making me bounce off the walls.

I feel strange, I feel changed...
I thought it would take me longer to pick up the pieces and move on. I'm either stronger than I realized or the part of me that cared died long before my heart thought it did.

For awhile, you were my universe and when you left the way you did, I didn't think I would be able to go on. I was wrong. I bounced right back, better than ever. I guess I didn't miss you all that much because you really didn't mean that much to me, afterall.

I had everything to offer you and you had nothing to offer me. I see that now. Life can only get better from here.

I found the song that describes me perfectly when it comes to affairs of the heart...



Gwen Stefani 4 In The Morning Lyrics

Waking up to find another day
The moon got lost again last night
But now the sun has finally had it’s say
I guess I feel alright

But it hurts
when I think,
when I let it sink in
It’s all over me
I'm lying here in the dark
Watchin you sleep, it hurts a lot

[Bridge]
And all I know is you’ve got to give me everything
Nothing less 'cause you know I give you all of me

[Chorus]
I give you everything that I am
I’m handin over everything that I’ve got
Cause I wanna have a really true love
Don’t ever wanna have to go and give you up
Stay up till four in the morning and the tears are pouring
And I wanna make it worth the fight

What have we been doing for all this time
Baby if we’re gonna do it come on do it right

All I wanted was to know I'm safe
Don’t wanna lose the love I found
Remember when you said that you would change
Don’t let me down

It’s not fair, how you are
I can’t be complete, can you give me more

Oh please, you know what I need
Save all your love for me
We can’t escape the love
Give me everything that you have

Today was my last day at work...

It ended on a good note. It was the last day of FAMILY AND FRIENDS and my very last customers were friends of mine. I was kinda sad to leave because I've been with the company for nine months (people have babies in that amount of time!) but kinda happy because I no longer work for a company that has not done right by me!!!! I will miss the lovely employee's discount that has enabled me to further my shophaholic tendencies. *SIGH*

On a positive note, I think I am getting better. Health-wise, I haven't eaten rice in over three weeks and I've been on a careful calorie-control diet with an increased effort to exercise daily. And while the weight isn't dropping off yet, I can see the improvements in other areas of my health. :)

Emotionally, the wounds are healing but they still hurt a little when probed. I think in the past few days, I have been telling myself not to dwell on it, and I've been fine. But I just want things to be fine again. Where it won't hurt when I think of it. At all. The only thing I worry about is my tendency to over-sleep. I think my body can't deal with the stress anymore and so it's resorted to "sleeping to forget". Good for the chronic insomniac but kinda bad because it means I'm still not healed.

Only God (and time) can heal me.

41 days to home (and a chance to regain the old me).

One Month and 19 days till I go home...

I'm excited yet scared.

Does distance make the heart grow fonder or is "out of sight, out of mind"?

In too deep.