30 Days of Copywriting Challenge

I stole a line from a show the otherday; something about how I'd forget if I had no one to tell. I've remembered it vividly since.

I think I forget too. There's a lot of things I dont remember once considered done and dusted. And there's a few things that stuck with me because I told someone, or, rather, they wouldn't let me forget.

Because it's a piece of me embedded between us now.

If I don't tell someone, I'd forget. But I don't have a lot of friends I'd willingly tell because I want to forget. This costed me distance. There is no uncomfortable wedge that welds us together.

There's plenty of things unsaid because I rather forget than being remembered as raw, awkward, and undone. Though, I probably already am either way.

I'm someone who forgets. By habit I scrub away my humiliation but also the lessons that come with it. I undo the untidy growth. I leave asking why I've never learned anything at all.

Oh.

I'm here again.

Thinking about the doing

instead of doing the deed

Because doing is commitment

It is ownership. A declarative clause,

standing in the chapel saying "I do"

while knowing all the while you can't say undo.

An abandoned bride, an idea I've not married because I am too busy spelling our future.

A fear with no name and one I cannot dispel, hence one I remain imprisoned to

Until someone gives me ownership of words.

10.32pm - start work by sitting down in front of laptop, refreshing memory, and defining timelines.

11.11pm - had half a piece of kaya bread. aquired pdfs of keller, aaker, and oliver main theories.

11.30pm - got a mask. reading brand equity

11.44pm - stole a fry

12.16am - we crossed the 12am mark. many are working in separate stations now as battery drains low. it's cold in here, not freezing, but enough to make my hair stand on its edges. i had a rudimentary idea of keller vs aaker. think I should export my findings now.

1.20am - the section we were working at closed, so we scramble to find a table big enough to fit the nine of us (there isn't any). the final group vote is to move to DC Coffee, a 24/7 coffee shop operated by a small hotel lobby. the bartender is quite friendly. hopefully we'll get to stay here without any more disruptions.

3.06am - had a snooze. getting back in the flow. gonna try for 20 minutes. im working on the manual writing now.

4.53am - food break. surprisingly, im hungry.

I am losing the ability to ask good questions.

I can't type correct keywords, and I can't figure out what to ask holistically. This is bad, because before AI there was search bars. And before search bars there were dictionaries. My brother no longer knows how to operate a dictionary. I don't believe I do, too.

Knowing what to search is crucial because the right keywords lead you to the right answers. And, knowing what to ask leads you to a world of broader knowledge. To do that, you need critical thinking skills --- a heart and mind that knows what percisely to ask.

Asking good and right questions is becoming rare.

The moment AI took over our search bars; it took away our ability to search critically. And humans love easy answers. It didn't take long for me to start outsourcing my brain to a machine, and the price is my ability to question. Because without question, I learn to accept generated answers as absolute. Because without knowing how to question, I can't find accurate, helpful, holistic knowledge. Because questioning meant thinking, and thinking requires knowledge; without knowledge, I can't question the regime. I can't fire against the status quo, because they have grown me complacent.

For two days the sky was beige. Twin strips of light meet each other at a cross. A third light shone down accusatorily on my face. The air was cold, hot, bone-biting, and unmoving at the same time. I couldn't tell time anymore, I only knew it was two days pass after waking up from my fawn state.

It was a blur. I was drifting through states of consciousness, between wakefulness and mind-numbing escape (I had deemed it necessary). My body had wanted me to work in my sleep. I couldn't sleep. That effect is wading.

The waiting, the waiting, the waiting.

A dragged-out endurance test or a blessing in hindsight?

It beckons me to be patient. To be steadfast. Remain loyal and devoted to the purpose.

It shields me from further pain; there is mercy in delaying an end.

The waiting, the waiting; to carve sanctuary.

Am I waiting? Or avoiding?

Many blessings in the Universe today. Many highs and lows simultaneously happening within second family. I wait by the sidelines. I keep walking. I must keep walking. I rest. I want to rest; may it be divine will that I do.

I return as I wait it out.

What am I supposed to do now that it's over?

We won. The fog cleared up, shore is in sight. I should feel cathartic; isn't this what I wanted? Certainty? A finishing line?

Why do I feel sick?

No more are the nights of interiority; the upper hand that I put in effort. That I alone, am carrying the burden of thought on my shoulders. That I am a martyr, that I am the mother. That only through me we stand a chance at winning.

I think I am great in that regard: suffering.

Because I am purposeless without it. I am no hero without a villain to terrorise our time over. There is no fanfare, no dramatic exit. Just. Pick up. Move on. We have better things to worry about.

We have better things to worry about, I echoed back. My chambers hollow and empty.

Are we there yet? Are we where we are?

No/ Yes/ Nearly

It's a long treacherous road/ We are at the end/ I wished we were there sooner.

Time is ticking. (Are we there yet? Will it be over soon?)

There is so much to do/ There will be enough time/ I wished there isn't time.

Faith. Have faith.

I am stuck, I am barely hitting my word count/ Revel in the achievement of progress, no matter how small/ I wished this be over already.

I'm patient; impatient. (Time is ticking)

Do you enjoy this?

No/ Yes/ Nearly

Are we there yet?

Faith is a home and a stranger.

There are many days where I scream and less days when I pray. Never once has faith crossed my mind except in times of desperate need, but I've rejected it a year ago. The ache, the disorientating days, it's hard to find a compass when your head grows senseless.

Faith is a home. I've not grown disillusioned, but I know it is best if I treat it as surface. It has a story I could only trace on my fingertips. It has a tragedy that comes undone. I look away, but today it forces me to stare right at it. I know this sound. I shut it out. Branching a dialogue when I've quietly disengaged a long while ago.

I need faith. I need faith to go on. But more often than not I survive anyhow; pridefully I believe my achievements must be credited to my own accord. Faith is convoluted. I benefit from my mum's hour-long prayers and contribute nothing of my own, except towards myself.

Faith reminds me of sin. Faith reminds me how incompetent I am, in regard to my spirituality. But modern-day prayer doesn't ask much from me. I don't have to attend mass, and I don't have to perform daily prayers. There's a disconnect I try to bridge, but found myself alienated through language, distance, and the preachiness and believe. I do not need the evidence to believe --- I have felt and seen miracles. I don't know how else to be. And I don't know how else to feel, if not judged, by the communal weight of the church and its sympathies.

Faith is within me. In its very essence, no matter how jaded, outrageous, gratuitous I feel about it. Buddhism speaks of a little Buddha that resides within you; it's probably a metaphor for goodness, or the self. I believe it's the same with any other. Occasionally I remind myself I am doing the best I could. I am not malicious. I need to patch my sinking ship. Ironically, I feel it's better that I live off grid so the Mormons never reach me with the pressures of organised religion. I enjoy my own privacy.

Please stop thinking of me.

Please stop calling my name.

Please stop, because... HACHOO.

*groan*

There's a fun folklore about sneezing. Depending on the number of times you've sneezed, you might have been praised, bad-mouthed of, or loved. There's no better way of knowing.

I'd often see mum with a snot full of sneezes that goes away once she reaches home. The reason is simple: I've been thinking of her. I've missed her, lots.

And when I sneeze, I look to my friends: they must have been thinking of me.

Perhaps the reason is simple: I've been at home for too long. I've overworked myself to the bone, the air at home is stuffy and dusty. It'd be time to call my friends so I could sneeze less.

Or, yknow. hachoo!.

There's a bit of heritage under each glasses.

For mine, it is gold with a thin round, slightly octangular frame. It used to be rose-gold, but I lost my glasses then. And before that it used to be your standard issue rectangular plastic framed glasses. I don't like plastic frames because they make me look old.

Mum hasn't changed her glasses either. She's stuck with a deep black plastic frame, for utility, she said. Though I reckon it's because it's cheaper. Recently she's also bought new glasses. She's tried on something new, but never straying too far from her first pair.

My dad has many glasses. He collects them like trophies --- arrayed and shut behind his cupboard the same way he kept his keys. There are clear pink frames, a leopard print frame, a thin metal frame, a thick black one, and a white one that blends into his shirt like a ghost. He rarely wears them at home except for looking at his phone. The same applies to my mum, my brother, and me --- we all only ever wear glasses when we are working. It is perhaps a thousand times better to get away from seeing for a while.

Before we even had glasses, mum had sunglasses. She has two pair of big, round, statement pieces bounded tight in a hard fabric glass case. I remember retrieving it from her car's glove box every time when we drove. She doesn't wear it anymore. I don't know where it's at now.

It's a deeply personal item, both accessory and functional. I know I started off as a fashion piece too, but my eyes grow weary and I need to wear it more often than I once wished. Now, I wear it when I work. It's like a mask --- I put on my glasses to physically transition myself into work and paper; I put it off when I'm not working. I've grown more accustomed to them than I'd like to these days.

The worst tragedy is finding out you've ran out of water after your number two problems.

It fucking stinks. There's no way to flush, no way to wash your hands, and no way to avoid the surprise you've left for others.

It's also a public health hazard.

Literally --- sanitary is a huge issue in water scarce areas. like Florida, New York, and California. all within first-world countries, where AI data centres abound.

We could be next.

You know what I want? Easy. I want things to be easy.

I want to be able to come home and just sleep and not think about work. In fact, I want to lie in bed, curled up under the weight of my blanket, stare at my phone while I drown out the worry accumulated in my head and my hands. I want to lie down, crossed leg, flat, on the comfort of my bed. I want to sleep without worry about comparison, how others perceive me as carefree but uptight, spontaneous but busy, insightful but a worry-some wreck. I want things to be easy. But things aren't. They aren't, and I hate that they aren't.

I want to come back to home. To bed. Clock off and unwind the moment I reach my front door, transform into the version of homecare and house duties --- become a sister, a daughter, a child, an adult, who lazes at home after cleaning the dishes and washing my hair clean. I want to abandon the stresses of work at my doorsteps; take upon what my dad said about work-life balance, that he'd rather avoid touching his phone or thinking about work, but work catches up often. At this point, it's hypocritical how many WhatsApp enquiries he still tends to after work in his dimmed bedroom-slash-study. At this point, I'm thinking whether or not can work and life ever coexist, or should it be mutually exclusive.

I run, I run, I run away from the sheer thought of guilt; I flinch like a scarred cat (I am still one). Home is supposed to be where the heart is, where I decompress into my most desired self --- the one that does nothing but perhaps scroll away, or distract myself with more content --- is that truly the desired self? Is this what I want? At least I'm more aware I'm slaving away at Meta Corp., feeding these creators with empty dopamine --- a morsel of man-made hunger that cannot be satisfied.

Who is this desired self? Maybe I just want a break, because when I'm on break, things are easier, less out of control, less new, less risky. I know where I'm at and what I do. I am sure of myself, and I rather it that way once I get in the groove. I want to rise and fall with the sun, and go to sleep early, if that's a task possible in an unsleeping city like ours. Sleeping early is weird. Sleeping late is undesirable, detrimental, and unimaginable to my mind; but I do so anyhow. Easy means predictable. Easy means routine. Easy is the ideal, where I can return to a "productive" persona maintained during my semester holidays at home. (But admittedly, the home me grows cold, and I grow flaccid at the monotony of homelife.)

Rain.

A distant thunder roll from the far mountains. Bird song echo from the bushes. It is cold --- different from the weight of draught and sheer brightness that scorched the sun-burned land --- it is comfortable; a grey blanket perfect to fall sleep to.

Swish, slosh, slosh. My heavy boots skid gently to a riverbank. The tinkering of sword and metal drags across my waist, sparking, groaning. My breath suffocatingly warm as it fogs up my helmet. I pause. Listening. Scanning for danger. My heart stills. Running water, the crunch of gravel and sand under my footsteps. The occasional chatter of waterfowl. I force my heart still before I finally reached up to unlock my helmet.

Cold. Another droplet --- multiple, soft caresses of cold that trickles down my chin. I didn't look. Didn't want to. I let the rain envelope me and I feel its embrace, a familiar calling of home. Home. So distant, yet so close. The air is crisp. Wet with the smell of petrichor. How familiar. How I missed the deep, all-encompassing earth.

It's a methodical process as I remove my armory. I wished it'd be faster. I couldn't contain my excitement as I threw away the last of my chainmail. My feet half trip, half skid, half jump, as I find myself inching closer and closer to the depths of the wild, flowing stream. Let it wash clean. Let it remove the tang of metal I am accustomed to, but desperately trying to ignore. In fact, I've placed it far away. I need not more reminders of the bloodshed. Is it dangerous to leave my armour? Yes. But I'm risking it. I don't need it, don't want to think of it right now.

I dig my heels into the sand, burrowing each piece of earth and sand between my toes. A curious school of fry nudges my translucent skin. I let my head bob in the water. Let it wash the days, if not weeks of accumulated rot that had swelled up in me. I sigh in release.

ACOTAR is pissing me off.

I'm 14 chapters deep. I downloaded the pdf to catch up on my reading, and then, the writing becomes glaring. Because I'm not listening anymore -- I'm reading.

Fine. I've had my suspicions. The paragraphs dedicated to colour. The triple threat of geodes to describe a the same colour. No, it doesn't add to the scene. It's unnecessary flourish. It's just comical; it reminds me of something I'd write as a teen. So, much colour. But no textures of bark or moss. Surprising, given how Feyreh is an artist.

Another thing: the constant descriptions of muscle, of groveling, and manliness. Of buldge tearing through the seams. Of "tearing into ribbons" being repeated the third time in the row. Of masculinity, heat. I cringe every time I hear it. If I hadn't looked it up, I would have thought these were half beasts, if not were-beasts; yes I am circling the word I am refusing to name.

There's also one thing I can't get. The high fae reading through Feyreh's every, single, internal thought. I believe the constant plotting is private business, no? It should be. If not they should also be misunderstood, some form or another. You can't read intentions a 100% all the time. But somehow, seemingly, the high fae can! And they are right on the nail every time. You know what this reminds me of? C.ai roleplay. Because the chatbot can't differentiate subtlety. The book provides no explanation either on how the fae could tell lies --- the book never say they could.