Down In The Doldrums

It's late at night and the air is still.

Somewhere in my room, Eva Cassidy is singing "Fields Of Gold".

The rain is falling softly outside.

It's times like this when I pause and reflect...

Have I been true to myself lately? Did I miss any opportunities to show the people around me how much I appreciate them? Why does it seem like I'm losing more hair and gaining more weight lately?

And then after weighing myself and combing my hair in front of the mirror, I thank God it was just my imagination playing tricks on my worrisome mind. In fact, I honestly think I look like Vin Diesel at certain angles, under the right lighting and on a good hair day. Ok, forget I said the last bit...

In the silence of the rainy night, I find myself thinking about the world and my place in it.

As the year comes to a close, I can't help but feel a bit emo.

Somehow, I just feel that I've grown older but no wiser.

I am 21.

but I don't behave like I'm 21.

At times, I feel like I am 12, at times 52.

I worry too much and take things too lightly. What a contradiction.

I wonder what's eating me these days...I snap at people for no reason...my mood vaccillates between sudden bursts of intense anxiety and long periods of melancholic pensiveness.

I'm starting to lose my ability to make people laugh.

All day long I coop myself in my room like a battery farmed hen...funneling lakes of caffeine-laced liquids down my throat and spoiling my eyes with voluminous law books.

ugh

Ten years ago, if someone told me this was my fate at 21, I'd have laughed my head off.

Maybe I just need a break from myself.

Monday Night Musings..

Singapore Legal System is over and done with....

Well, not THE Singapore Legal System. What I meant was my SLS module.

I am supposed to be immensely relieved now. After all, my sensitive digestive system has remained relatively intact after a horrible weekend spent guzzling reservoirs worth of Red Bull and Nescafe and grappling with the take home exam. Life's a bitch when you have not kept up with one semester's worth of readings and the SLS Profs don't share your wicked sense of humour...

It seems like the only thing they are interested in is objective, rational legal analysis.

This does not work to my advantage at all, since I have always been eager to add in a healthy dose of humour in my writing....

And a healthy dose of what can be accurately described as "NOT objective, rational legal analysis".

I nearly suffered nervous shock when I got the topics.

I was not expecting "What I did last last Christmas", or even "What do you like best about the Singaporean dining scene?" or "A Night At The Disco"...but nothing prepared me for what my Professors had in store for us...

The killer question was Question 2, which was something about the law and economics...

"Examining the law in relation to economics compels you to critique and analyse the relationships and tensions between a system of enforced morality and a system that is driven by the behavioural impulses of society, as reflected by human needs and means."

Sounds pretty impressive eh?

Actually, this sound bite was composed after I had submitted my paper, as I was ruminating in the toilet.

The main problem I had over the weekend was actually quite minor-I just did not understand how the law relates to economics (but now I do!). Writing about the invisible hand was almost like being whipped by a very visible rotan...It was an excruciating experience which I hope I will never have to repeat.

Nevertheless, SLS was a learning experience because it really forced me to think hard about some of the issues that affect our society. At least now I can sound intellectual on dates.

I am not too optimistic about the final exam. Somehow, I think I am under-equppied to face the demands of the examination hall. These fears and insecurities probably stem from a previous traumatic experience during the mid-sem torts test. I had entered the examination venue with a wagon (and I mean it literally....just ask any Law year one) of books and files for the open book test. However, I had forgotten to bring a working blue pen. I still remember the bucketloads (this is figurative) of perspiration dribbling down my back (and front) as I desperately whirled around looking for a kind soul with a spare blue pen. As the tension had made my quite incoherent in my anxious pleas, I had only managed to obtain a pen five seconds before the commencement of the test.

Well, let's hope the same thing does not happen.

Feveroles

I've done it.

I have reached law Nirvana.

My intellectual enlightenment was attained when I woke up in the middle of the night and shrieked, "Feveroles!"

For about five minutes, I stared into space like a nitwit wondering what the heck Feveroles were...and then the bits and pieces slowly trickled into my mind...

Feveroles were those damn Mexican horse beans that caused two ding dongs to bring a law suit before the UK Court of Appeal for a common mistake!

Finally, I've gone where no law student has gone before!!!

I've reached the state where my subconscious mind actually works on legal issues while my conscious mind sleeps! Muahaha...

Admittedly, it would have been much more helpful if my subconscious mind had distilled the rules in Rose v. Pym; but hey, working out the subject matter of the contractual dispute ain't a bad start at all:)

This echoes an incident a couple of months back...

I was muttering the word, "consideration" repeatedly in the midst of an unexpected and unplanned power nap when my mum woke me up...

"Boy ah! If you had studied hard enough you won't be saying the same thing over and over lar! You'd be talking about other things mah!"

That, according to my mum, would have made me the law student of law students....

Au contraire, I believe that would make me a freak show.

Can you imagine me doing it in the law library? I can already picture a mob pointing at me and laughing while I critique some obscure case in my sleep...with tape recorders in their opportunistic hands of course.

Exam blues are really getting to me...was supposed to start my new fitness regime last week, but the rain implied that the only exercise I could do was read Men's Health and stare in envy at the sculpted washboard abs of the dudes inside...

I'm pretty sure that if I work hard, I would be able to achieve the same results...

With Adobe Photoshop.

The only fun thing I did this week was write some orbiter dictums for a local publication that has been criticised by foreign voices for its compliance to the establishment. haha

In Loving Memory...

It was supposed to be an ordinary day.

Just another day spent desperately clawing through the morning traffic along Lornie Road.

Another day spent struggling with my school work.

Another day spent being the butt of others' tasteless jokes...and being rewarded for three days worth of slogging with a derisive sneer by my tutor.

Nothing seemed to portend that today was going to be shockingly different...and so when the shock came I was overwhelmed.

It was a text message from Mike, a friend from a lifetime ago,

" Nic, you heard what happened? Encik passed away."

There was a fleeting moment of disbelief, followed by a deluge of emotions...

"No..." I silently mouthed, hoping that it was not true.

But it was not to be.

Throughout the day, fervid text messages were exchanged between my army buddies and I. The mysterious circumstances surrounding our former sergeant-major's death led to much speculation, the details of which I shall not disclose.

The loss hit some of us quite deeply, as we mourned the passing of a man we had come to love during our army days.

Encik was a simple man.

Unlike many career soldiers, he was down-to-earth and unassuming. Soft spoken by nature, he never failed to give an encouraging word whenever he felt that it was well-deserved. Although I disagreed with the way he handled certain things, I respected him for the fact that he was approachable and understanding towards the NSFs.

I remember that I got screwed once for reporting back to camp on my off day. Encik gamely signed another off pass so I could be compensated for the off day that I had wasted.

We shared many memories during the two years I spent at 2nd Brigade.

Eating pizza together in the National Stadium during NDP'04...watching DVDs in the company lounge during my COS duty...killing time in the camp canteen...

The last time I saw Encik was on the day I collected my ic.

We chatted for awhile and he was his usual happy-go-lucky self. In the words of my ex-campmate, "nobody would have expected this to happen seven months later." I promised to buy him coffee for taking care of me in my time in the unit, and to thank him for shutting one eye when I got myself into trouble on several occasions.

I never had the chance to buy him that cup of coffee.

At the wake, I witnessed the grief of his family, especially his mother. There was a dull pain in my chest. There is something perverse and unnatural about parents attending their children's funerals. Parents are supposed to watch their children grow up, settle down and set up their own families.

Parents are supposed to have their children by ther bedside when their time is up...

...and not the other way round.

I left the wake with a heavy heart.

I forced myself to banter and make some idle chit chat with my ex-campmates on the way home. As I looked up at the November sky, I was sure I saw one star shining more brightly than the others.

I refuse to dismiss it as just a figment of my imagination.

Encik, may God bless you and may you rest in peace.

This harsh, harsh world was never meant for one as good as you.

You are always in our hearts.

Litigation Team C rocks!

"Did a celebrity spokesperson breach an implied condition when she failed to perform with the continuity required for the term of the employment contract?"

"Was the employer entitled to repudiate the contract when the celebrity contracted skin disease?"

"Did an extraneous supervening event radically alter the nature of the contract such that performance has become legally impossible?"

Turned off yet? haha...Imagine trying to resolve these issues in bed, in the shower and even while using the toilet!

These were the areas that my team had to research for our case presentation. We were role playing junior partners in a law firm and had to draft a predictive memorandum for the senior partners.

The past few weeks have been hell...16 hour days spent poring through ancient texts in the law library...struggling with our schoolwork...office politics...mood swings...tantrums and outbursts...moments of reflection and contemplation...weekends that were incinerated by the demands of the project...and did i mention that coffee no longer works for me? I know because I once fell asleep while sipping my mocha.

Thank God we have a brilliant team!

Initially, I was very apprehensive about working with Pat and Ann Gee. Keeping up with them was never easy and there were moments when I felt slow/blur/just plain inadequate...Pat's spontaneous energy kept me on my toes all the time; Ann Gee's stamina was simply astounding. Working with them was excruciatingly tiring, but I learnt alot and had a ball of a time (not doing the memo, but hanging out with them)...

Best part of our partnership?

Eating delicious cake from Awfully Chocolate during our emotionally charged discussion sessions!

No wonder Patrick said I was gaining weight...It's like that one la...when you are stressed you tend to eat alot!

We were grilled viciously for the Oral Presentation and one of the senior partners said our arguments were "outlandish".

Whatever la...It's law school lor...even if you give two hundred per cent effort there will always be someone who shoots you down...used to it already...haha