Of the Golden Hare!!!
To liberate myself from the tyranny of FOMO, I decided to do less and live more in 2023. Taking a ‘gap year’ from the 15 years of blogging and hope to resume with fresh thoughts in the future.
十五年乍聽漫長, 眨眼就過. 十五是個好數字, 滾圓滾圓, 富泰平衡. 與其月月捉襟見肘胡亂搪塞 ,還是謙卑向時間大神鞠躬, 暫歇網誌.
福兔綿延
萬事如意
Another month flew by that I found myself overworked and not spending enough time to reflect. Words will come later for this post but for now… colors first.
Happy Halloween!
After a whirlwind homecoming to Taipei, followed by an onslaught of work crises, the home front matched its theatricality with a porn watching glum(still, after all that screen time?) teenage son trying to study for the SAT. Life’s twist, huh?
忽冷忽熱的極端氣候, 整天瞎忙如轉陀螺, 頓想起年少時讀的黑色美學漫畫’惡魔人’與’深邃美麗的亞細亞’, 主軸皆是弱肉強食, 求存活不外乎結盟並吞同化.
Nothing escapes politics. From strolling around the quaint alleys of Taipei to reading about tensions in the Taiwan Strait and Pelosi’s delegation, how does Chinese diaspora from Taiwan navigate the chaotic ambiguity?
After the month long sojourn in Taipei, I stepped into a scene of GOT returning to work. Welcome back to the reality or... surreality! Power play is at the core of psychology, dominance and submission. Canines piss, felines hiss… and the homo sapiens? The contortion between smiling and sneering resulted in the epidemic of hypocrisy. Never an orator, I reconstruct my reality in the drawing.
這趟台北行多年來待最久的一次, 也是首度, 略可想像, 若返鄉長居, 未必不可能.
While I was never enamored with the Bond series, Daniel Craig’s portrayal was my favorite by far so to watch his reign ending in a cliche was a disappointment. The graphic elements were stunning though from the hill town of Matera, the poisonous zen garden of Safin… to the lithe silhouette of Paloma in the rippling black ball gown while kicking villains’ butts with her long legs.
Growing up, my love for Shanghai was vicarious, through the impeccable story telling of my favorite Chinese writer, Eileen Chang. My first visit there was the late 90’s. The communist custom officer welcomed all Taiwanese denizens(they would not have put up with ‘citizens’) with a cautious hospitality. The wintery smog whacked me however and I had a vivid image of the waitress who served us chicken congee with her thumb dipped partially inside the bowl in a renowned local eatery. Regardless, the congee was yum-yum. Surreal, eh?
Swapping the new year’s resolution with a bucket list has become my mission possible 2022. What exactly does a bucket list mean? Is she or he the person you always want to court but for XYZ reasons, you walk away with a woeful heart of what ifs? When facing psychological threats(any thinking outside my comfort zone counts as one!), I tend to take it like Dr. Lecter would, settling old scores…. ta-da.
The world barely even comes out of the pandemic and yet is already at war?! There is nothing kind about our collective humankind and if any, we are of a very special brand of stupidity. I won’t try to pretend understanding the complex geopolitics and only wish we could all focus our energy on creation instead of destruction. That being said, a feeble happy March 14th Pi(e) Day… my friends.
Should auld acquaintance be forgot and never brought to mind? Don’t be silly. Old ghosts haunted me left and right from the parting curse of my ex to a miniature Rolleiflex that I spent a fortune on that only made itself useful a handful of times… Dear reader, allow me to reacquaint you with treasures from the past, a retro calendar I designed for the previous brand I served and my bronze leaf tray ‘By The Lotus Pond’. If you’re compelled to collect the latter, please visit my Etsy boutique :)
2021 is coming to an end and instead of trying to cobble together a new year’s resolution, I decided to jump ahead to the bucket list. After three intricate but thankfully not lethal surgeries this year, checking off the bucket list seems a very sensible thing to do!
How would I even began? Telling the cautionary tale of the deprivation of self love in the wicked and whacked 21st century of capitalist vampiredom?
“The heart of the wise is in the house of mourning; but the heart of the fools is in the house of mirth.”
---------- Hebrew Bible, Ecclesiastes 7:4
Ta-da, my reading of the month was The House of Mirth by Edith Wharton and as a rebound (don’t ask me why, please) I already embarked on Angela Carter’s The Infernal Desire Machines of Doctor Hoffman for my November read. Wharton scaffolds the intricate New York high society and depicts the interiority of her characters with a melancholy sensibility. The protagonist, Lily Bart, is far from likable. Witnessing her demise, the reader is cornered and suffocated by disillusions in the end. Edith Wharton too was the product of her society that privileges did not bestow happiness.
初讀Edith Wharton於花樣年華純真年代, 加上Scorsese的經典電影, 她的不回首與他的過門不入, 讓人惆悵. Wharton寫內心戲真正高手, 十月選讀The House of Mirth 也曾搬上銀幕, 由Gillian Anderson主演, 可惜當年錯過現下也找不著. 浮華人生, 沒落貴族, 花瓶般的女主角Lily Bart有太多的心機, 極度缺乏勇氣, 隨波逐流凋零絕境, 寫實的凄涼.
My team asked me how was it even possible to read so much between work, family, and all. Oh well, I spent minimal amount of energy on social media and that is how I save the time to engage in activities that truly matters to me. Perhaps I was never memetic to begin with. It is the blessing of being an eccentric, the one who marches to the beat of her own drum. That being said, I am still struggling with workaholicism, parenthood and sleep deprivation. When hypocrisy elevated to the realm of art, it is called professionalism :P
八月平行宇宙, 公司全面復工, 幾星期通勤下來, LK變身企管機器, 靈魂留給海底兩萬哩…
The Great Resignation is upon us. Intense last two weeks of July with back to back presentations (in person attendance required) made me wonder, does teamraderie truly require face to face collaboration or the calling for return to office, merely power display of corporate USA?
June has been… absurdity aplenty. I think I am going to hang on to the mask or my smirks will be found. This is a slow death by a thousand cuts. The redemption? There will be nothing for me to think of thee fondly. The antidote to such intellectual and moral atrocity is to surround oneself with nature, delicious food and great books.
SF解除封鎖, 復工彰顯企業文化, 全員若不到齊聽命, 如何誇耀將帥威風?
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