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You know who I despise? Overly-friendly people. I have nothing against being cheerful but have you met that one person who just won’t stop smiling, or talking to you like you are the most beautiful panda cub on the planet? I hate those people. I hate them because I know for a fact they’re faking, and I cannot tolerate that.

In fact, I’d take a person with a crooked smile, whose face betrays their words, over an audaciously and annoyingly smiling person whose tone, not words, are overly positive. I have nothing against positive words, but that cringeworthy tone that screams “Oh, I’m from the land of rainbows and everything good in the world”, that tone riles me up.

I hate overly-friendly people because they’re not real; they’re trying too hard. It isn’t the angry, frustrated, or the frowning you should look out for. On the contrary, it’s the Mr. Sunshines you should keep an eye out for.

There’s a reason stereotypical serial killers are shown to pretend to be (overly) good; it’s quite frankly the easiest thing to emulate.

This isn’t the end; this is just a small part. Move forward with balance and stability.

(A description of the first tattoo I ever got done.)

They say “no man is an island” quoting a poem they haven’t even read or felt. Yet, isn’t it in the nature of our planet itself to spread out? It all began with Pangaea splitting into Gondwana and Laurasia, then them into the seven continents we know, then the borders arrived.

Separation to become a completely different being is in the very nature of habitable life. Why fight nature then? Why fight history? Just let it run its course.

If you ask me, every man is an island, drifting apart from places he can no longer call his own, and over time, drifting toward better, newer horizons, becoming something completely new and magnificent in the process.

I think when people say your 20s are the most important years, they aren’t exaggerating. I’ve just spent a year or so in the bracket and there is an ever-present uncertainty. However, with that uncertainty comes a lot of energy and opportunity.

So, it feels like everyone is doing a lot and yet, it feels like none of it is going anywhere. This is perhaps the time of our lives where everything changes quickly; interests, majors, jobs, passions, lovers, habits, everything.

We’re at our most malleable and yet, we don’t lack identity like we did when we were kids or rebellious adolescents. We’ve made a rough sketch, perhaps a line art of the final thing and we’re working on the picture, slowly yet steadily.

Every day is a roller-coaster and the peculiar thing is that you don’t know what coaster you’re on until it’s dusk and the day descends to its end. It is then that you realise whether the ride was worth it or not. Then, you wake up again, buy a ticket again, get on the coaster again and be surprised again.

It’s uncertain. It’s exciting. It could be amazing. It could be devastating. The catch is that you’ll only know once you’re through with it.

That’s what I believe. I’m not sure what will happen. Who is, right?

I don’t get flowery language. Someone may have the correct word. Perhaps, there is no other word that could mean exactly what they want to say but is it any good if no one gets it?

Language was never solely about finding the right word. Rather, it was about saying the right things to the right people at the right time. At least, that is what I believe. I have a liking to the simpler things in life. So naturally, I use the first word that comes to my mind. The right word comes to you, like the ones you just read and the ones you are about to read.

I have nothing against words. Every word is beautiful, and some words are obviously more accurate than the others. However, the way I see it is that if someone spends more time on the dictionary than on your message, I think you’ve failed. If your sentence is unable to give context to that one long word you’ve squeezed in it, why bother writing it?

Someone called me a poor man’s Bukowski and I didn’t mind. “I’m only twenty-something-years-old”, I thought, “I have a long way to go. Countless pages to fill. Countless years to go unnoticed”.

I guess I’ll take a gap year. Travel maybe. Focus on the writing. I’ll work on myself with all the time I’ll have. Does that make sense?” I asked. “Send me a postcard from every place you see”, she said as I smiled sheepishly.

Let’s pretend to be connoisseurs of what we love. Art, words, technology and the fuel behind them.