Attention Please!

 "I want to fly."

Spoken with conviction mixed with passion, Misaki Yoko's voice was trembling as much as the light in her eyes. This was also my favorite line in the entire Jdrama, Attention Please, a short but enjoyable 12 episodes of a tom boy's struggle and pursuit of her dream: becoming a flight attendant (and a top notch one).

Like a lot of good Jdramas, Attention Please has the quirky characters, the recycled jokes, and the unrelentless pursuit of a dream, which always makes my blood boil with envy and admiration. What made this drama unique was the emphasis on the growth of Misaki, instead of on the romance, which to my surprise was only lightly touched on. Another trait that made this drama stand out right off the bat was Misaki's personality, her complete disregard of the usual Japanese demureness found in most heroines. She is loud and overly optimistic, and her carelessness and her lack of common social etiquette sometimes borders on offensive. However, that's what makes me love her (and thus finishing the drama in two days), cringe for her, and worry about her despite knowing that this comedy is definitely leading to a happy ending. The fact that the ending could be so easily guessed didn't stop me at all. I enjoyed the flight.

2012

Recently my mother has been watching a lot of talk shows on television, and one of the most frequent topics is 2012, the prophesied year when mankind's reign comes to an end. I don't know what's going to happen. Will Earth be engulfed in a major solar storm? Or will bizarre freak natural disasters such as those exhibited in The Day After Tomorrow wipe out the mass population?

I have never been fond of morbid fascinations in the end of the world. It puzzles me that people get so caught up in movies like Armageddon and in ancient Mayan fortunetelling. I never really bothered to think about the end of existence except that of my own and the people I love and even just thinking that kills me.

So that day when my mother turned from a scene of a killer tornado and asked me, "What do you think?", my shell of denial and comfortable ignorance was cracked, and I was forced to ponder the possibility of the light that seeped in.

I imagined what it would be like if 2012 was the end of the world. I would be a junior in college, most likely just about to dive into a hellish amount of work. I guess I wouldn't mind the thought of being swallowed by the sun, but my brother would be a freshman, just about to experience all the wonders of college life. It wouldn't be fair.

Then I thought about the meaning of existence and the meaning I want to ascribe to my own existence. If I were to complete the book I wanted to write all my life before 2012, would I be happy? Would I describe my short existence as complete?

No.

I realized that other than having a purposeful existence, I wanted a memorable one. I haven't watched the aurora with my family. I haven't gone to Japan on my own. There's the Buckingham palace, the streets of London, the expanse of the great wall of China, and the migration of the wildebeest in Africa that I have yet to witness. I haven't experienced graduate school, the first day of work, and the excitement that comes with purchasing my own home. I haven't met a man that could make my heart beat as they say it should. I haven't gone to the Maldives for my honeymoon. I haven't had the one boy and one girl I always wanted to have. Then there are the things I still want. I still want to spend Thanksgiving and Christmas with friends and family. I still want to read the books I love and listen to the music that make me swallow my heart. I still want to meet new people along with their idiosyncracies, virtues, and flaws. And the list of desires just went on and on.

The joie de vivre is not only found in the light brush of the Hsinchu breeze on a scorching summer day but also in the want coursing through our veins. Life itself is just one desire after another manifested into action and form.

I am not afraid of the coming of 2012. I'm more afraid of how I'm living, in the present.

I took this picture on our quad. Although the winter snow was still melting, these flowers have blossomed.

Also to my happy surprise, I have gained two followers on this blog. Just seeing that on my dashboard has given me some motivation to write more. EEEEEEEEEE thank you S.Y.!! : '3