The Anatomy of My Desk

1. Zen Garden - a memento of Cy's Japanese Garden Surprise on our 7th Anniversary

2. Format lamp from IKEA - Cy and I bought matching ones. For those long nights of hacking away.

3. Bottled Water - Hydrate! Hydrate! Hydrate!

4. Thingamajig from IKEA - Holds my pens, post-its, pennies and nickels and whatnot.

5. Hikari my iPad - Valentine's gift from Cy. For my casual browsing and ebooks.

6. External Monitor - This with SizeUp makes for a wicked productivity boost. Top-down configuration works best for me.

7. Trinity - MBP. Twin to Cy's Morpheus.

8. Hungy. Foolish. - Bluetooth wireless keyboard. As to the name, I bought it at the 5th Ave. Applestore the day after Steve Jobs died.

9. Pot of Lightning - Magic mouse. Twin to Cy's Pot of Fire.

10. Straw hat - Bought at Sta. Monica. Shields me from the sun and reminds me of weekends with Cy at the Promenade. Tells me that there is always something to look forward to.

A flight of fancy

Today is another beautiful day in LA. Apart from the usual sun and infinitely blue sky, there is also a strong, cool breeze that might just be one of the last this fall. It dances about, rustling the leaves in the yard and making noises like a mischievous, happy child would during play. It runs here and there, picking up the fallen orange leaves of autumn and hurtles them uncaringly into the pool. First, one then another until it has created a whole armada. Then, like a fickle Poseidon, it breaks the stillness of the usually calm pool by making ripples that reverberate to the edges and undulates back to collide with the oncoming ones creating shaky diamonds in the water - a miniature sea-storm for the doomed fleet of leaves in the pool.

Transfixed, I open the large sliding door and invite the wind to come in, not caring if it sends the post-its and pieces of paper I stack neatly on my desk in a disarray when it does. True to form however, it remains distant and skittish, preferring to play its unrehearsed games alone leaving me envious and crestfallen.

Because of all this, a memory jostles itself from the recesses. The initially subtle glow it makes brightens ever so faintly with every step closer to recollection until I finally reminisce about how, as I sat within the confines of my highschool classroom, I daydreamed of traveling the world by transfiguring myself into the wind.

Beloved.

Yesterday, for our 7th Anniversary, Cy took me to the すいほえん (which means The Garden of Water and Fragrance) as a surprise. It was his way of bringing me to Japan, if only for a few hours, knowing how badly I've been wanting to go. Words fail to express how special I felt to be the one chosen, to be the companion of and to be loved every day as if it were the first by this amazing man who is and will always be, the better part of me.

7 Years. 7 Stones.

Victor's Magnanimity

I hope that one day soon, you'll wake up and find past inflictions healed, albeit not in its entirety.

May you muster the strength to shatter that fragment of the past which cripples you, alarmingly still so, in the present.