Ha ha.

I had the weirdest dream in a while; I dreamt that I was a soldier running around this urban futuristic battle zone, which had trees and stuff as cover… but the battle zone was covered in these large winding drains, like a swimming pool maze. I was swimming in these narrow little drains from cover to cover, clutching my rifle, to avoid these huge blasts that went off in the distance and sent powerful gusts of forceful wind and debris flying all over the place.

The next thing I remember is looking through a bird’s eye view of the battle around me, and I saw three “army men” green-coloured plastic toys “camping” outside an enemy “spawn point” (which was a troop transport), valiantly blowing up the enemy tan-coloured soldiers which emerged from it. For SOME reason, those 3 “army men” toys had the names and faces of my friends, whom I won’t really name but… lets call them Ah Ding, Pat and KT.

Sadly, my 3 toy soldier comrades’ hitpoints were quickly deteriorating because although they blew up the bad guys when they immediately spawned out of the “spawn point”, the baddies kept coming and my comrades’ had limited HP. So they got blown up, too.

Back to me – I realized that I was nearby to where my toy comrades had fallen, so I remember going to the army base which had recovered their remains to pay my respects to them. For some reason, when I dream, I always end up lost in huuuuuuge monolithic buildings with hundreds of storeys and an endless towering expanse of winding staircases and lift lobbys and empty stairwells. This time was no different, with the army base looking like an old school campus, blocky and all cement, but entirely covered in a thin layer of dust and glowing dimly in the dusky orange light of the desert sun.

(Come to think of it in many of my dreams I’m running around strangely huge buildings with no exits and lots of stairs, corridors and lifts leading to more stairs, corridors and lifts.)

I raced up flights of dust-covered steps to a medical bay where my fallen comrades were, and saluted them with my rifle. Then this old senior commander walked into the room and said, “What the heck are you doing here? You’re supposed to be out in the field! Do you think you can throw your weight around just because you got promoted?”

(Promoted? I remember looking down at my shoulder and seeing the same three stripes that should be there, there. Weird.)

Unaware of my promotion, I replied angrily that I was just paying my respects to my old friends, (toys though they might be haha) and that I should at least be given that right. I then turned sharply to my right and started marching away from the dumbass occifer.

STRANGELY (and embarrassingly) enough, on my way out of the base, as I was walking down another endless flight of stairs, I realized that I was walking barefoot, and that my feet were injured or something, so I had to go find a Medical Officer to uh, get me an “excuse boots” status. Haha. The last image I see is of me walking in my blue-and-orange slippers which I bought from Marine Parade for 12 bucks. Haha.

The heck.

When you’re in an ocean, surrounded on all sides by water, and you can’t really swim very well, what do you do?

Do you use a hairdryer to try and blow dry the infinite expanse of water around you – and if that hairdryer isn’t good enough, or runs out of batteries, and you see a passing cruise ship, do you call out for the sailors to throw you a bigger, better hairdryer?

You can’t hop onto the ship and go away; you like your little spot in the ocean, even though you don’t really like water and you can’t really swim very well, so you intend to stay right there. And the bigger, heavier and more powerful your hairdryer is, the more batteries you use up, and the more your arm tires from holding it.

You can’t remember when it was that you forgot to swim, or when you actually began to dislike the water around you – even though you really do like your little patch of ocean. Were you ever fond of the water around you, you wonder? It seems as if long ago you swam carelessly through the lovely blue depths around you happily, back when you knew how to swim.

But that can’t be right, can it, since all you can remember is how nasty the water around you is, how salty it tastes and how cold it gets at night. You don’t trust the water anymore, even though it surrounds you and its fish provide you with food. You don’t trust the water anymore, so you don’t teach yourself how to swim – who knows when the ocean will swallow you into its murky depths if you did?

So you struggle to keep your mouth above the water, and, holding your one hairdryer up high above the waves, continue trying to blow the water around you away.

Dear God,

I know I haven’t been praying much.
But if it is Thy will,
Please, please, please let this Cup pass.

Amen.

Your unworthy servant,
Joel Ong

I’ve not been updating this because for the most part of summer, I’ve been caught up in work and in readings and a nonstop slew of tests. Apologies.

Something more important has happened, however.

For the first time in my life, I feel as if an ominous dark cloud has descended over me. As if the Hope that I had found, the Hope that had found a place in my heart, was now under threat of being mercilessly ripped out and trampled underfoot.

I don’t know what to do now. I feel cold… and alone, and powerless to do anything.