You know how they say that waiting is the hardest part?

I know I don't really have much right to complain because people who take other certification exams sometimes have to wait for months before they get their results, and I just finished mine last Monday. Hehe. But patience is not one of my virtues, and they did tell us to wait for the results yesterday, and all that suspense turned out to be for nothing!

I just want to know already. The twelve exams we had weren't easy, and considering that it's a flunk one, flunk all affair, and that anatomy has always been hard for me, I can't help but feel a bit scared. Add to that the pressure of people around me saying they're sure I'll pass, or expecting me to be in the top 10 (to which I say BWAHAHA). I know they mean well, and I also know that I'm supposed to look at expectations as a privilege, but right now they just really make me even more terrified of failing.


*** 

Anyway, I was watching All About Steve (Sandra Bullock + Bradley Cooper) earlier this morning, and although it made me cringe a lot and ask "Sandra Bullock whyyyyyy?" way too many times, I did get a lot of really nice quotes about crosswords. (And if you don't know yet, crosswords are my third love, after chocolates + matcha + mint, and books.) 

My favorites:

If you quit a puzzle, you can’t finish it. Sure, every once in a while, you run into a doozy, that you don’t think you could ever solve in a million years, but if you stick with it, you figure it out eventually. Worst thing you can do is leave it unfinished. It’s never the solution, is it?

You know what I like about crosswords? It's realizing you knew something you never thought you knew.

and this

In life, as in crosswords, some days are harder than others, and that’s what keeps your brain alive. The key to surviving those tough days is to pick yourself up and stay focused on your life’s purpose.

***

If this day is just another day of waiting, then it's another one of those more difficult days. Which means! I have to focus on my life's purpose, which is... um, well... for now, reading as many books as I can in this lifetime. HAHAHA.

S.W.A.L.K.

It would thrill me to no end, it someone were to send me an old-fashioned letter or a postcard. Not an email, or a printed typewritten one, but an genuine old-school letter painstakingly written on nice paper, complete with ink smudges and crumpled edges; or a postcard thoughtfully picked out from another part of the world. Is that too much to ask? Hahaha. There is just something about carefully-penned thoughts on ink that tickles me inside.

Soulmates

The idea of soul mates actually originated with Plato.

His theory was that humans originally consisted of four arms, four legs and two faces. Zeus was threatened by their power and split them all in half, condemning us all to spend our lives trying to complete ourselves.

Tempe Brennan, Bones S05E15
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I wonder how this didn't catch my attention before. I searched for Plato and his soul mate theory, and after some research (ehem Wikipedia), I found out that it was part of a series of speeches he wrote examining the nature of love, titled Symposium.

The scriptwriters of Bones actually summed it up well enough, except for one part:

In this myth about soul mates, there were three kinds of humans, male, female and of both sexes. After the split, humans naturally yearned for their other half, so creatures who were only male sought  another male, and so forth.

So while discussing about love and soul mates, Plato also touched the matters of homosexuality.

Do I believe in myths? No, but I find it interesting how people come up with explanations for natural phenomena, and I think this particular explanation for love and homosexuality is rather nice.

Do you believe in soulmates? :)


Image from Cybercauldron.

Wisdom of Confucius: On Revenge

Before you embark on a journey of revenge,

dig two graves. 

 Confucius. 

I was about to watch ABC's new drama Revenge when this quote flashed on the screen and my mind began to stray from the show and got lost pondering the words of Confucius.

"April ended and May came along, but May was even worse than April. In the deepening of May, I had no choice but to recognize the trembling of my heart. It usually happened as the sun was going down. In the pale evening gloom, when the soft fragrance of magnolias hung in the air, my heart would swell without warning, and tremble, and lurch with a stab of pain. I would try clamping my eyes shut and gritting my teeth, and wait for it to pass. And it would pass -- but slowly, taking its own time, and leaving a dull ache behind."

'Norwegian Wood', Haruki Murakami

 Powerful imagery. I really like the way he writes.