My hands freezing while attempting to force thought onto a page, I finally acquiesced. I enjoy S Lit classes when we probe the deeper issues relating to the text, about the veracity with which truth is presented, and so on and so forth. Yet when confronted with the lovely slip of paper, the questions and all its profundity, I blank out. I curl into my little hollow shell that reminds me that loving literature does not, in itself, make me a good literature student. Indeed, it is half the battle won, but my lack of analytical ability, clarity, or tenacity when approaching mind-boggling questions, I think, negates anything that passion counts for in an academic exercise.
Sometimes I wonder about my ability to understand most things. I don't really understand sports. I was watching the Boston Red Sox today, inspired, in part, by assorted friends residing in New England, and I didn't really understand much of it. For some reason, playing softball seems very straightforward in school, but I think this is only because we play it without thinking, guided by rules we make up along the way. The only sport I understand is the sort that is singular in its aim and goal, immensely clear in its execution. Running, swimming, diving, skiing. Its as simple as - run fast, run long, swim fast, dive beautifully, ski downhill (or cross country, depending). I enjoy sport that thrills me immediately, and these things do that for me. I am suitably less thrilled when I fail to understand who exactly is winning or losing, for I cannot live vicariously through any team or sportsperson's upsets and triumphs, which is what I often do.
I'm a rather lethargic character. I have energy for dance when it is demanded of me - but such demands are intermittent, not made consistently throughout the year ever since I stopped ballet. I made attempts to jog frequently back when the park was within acceptable distance from my house, but since I moved I've been stuck in a house which is a 15 minute walk from the main road. I am not particularly keen on jogging around my neighbourhood either, since lots of cars rush about to go to the various embassies and clubs. I am self-conscious about being seen sweaty and disgusting by strangers, even if I will never see them again and the chances that they will remember me are equally unlikely.
Other than dance, and my scant attempts at jogging, I sometimes do langourous laps in the pool. My favourite sport, in the true athletic sense, however, is skiing. It is a nice luxury to have. I like that 6 hours of skiing a day has a tendency to numb both my muscles and brain, cancelling out my ability to do anything other than take a hot bath, drink hot cider, eat 99cent ramen and watch Conan O'Brien. I like curling my body tight like a fist to brave blizzards and strong winds as my ski lift ascends to the very top of the mountain. I like looking back from the ski lift to survey the landscape in its minty shades of green and white and blue. I like falling over not while I'm skiing but while I'm standing stationary, waiting for someone. I enjoy the pain and misery involved in skiing. Its very sadomasochistic of me. But sometimes it is very beautiful, and I am filled with gratitude when I think of how lucky I am, as a tropical kid, to be transplanted to a land beseiged with frothy white snowfall.
At this specific point of time, however, the most athletic thing I do everyday is run across my living room to watch television. Its amazing the bouts of torture and indolence I put my body through sometimes.
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