Eric Tian

Bit tired. Lazy dump.

“We all fear death and question our place in the universe. The artist’s job is not to succumb to despair, but to find an antidote for the emptiness of existence.” – Woody Allen, Midnight in Paris

“I believe that love that is true and real, creates a respite from death. All cowardice comes from not loving or not loving well, which is the same thing.” – Woody Allen, Midnight in Paris

“Pain and suffering are always inevitable for a large intelligence and a deep heart. The really great men must, I think, have great sadness on Earth.” – Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Crime and Punishment

“Love is not simply giving; it is judicious giving and judicious withholding as well. It is judicious praising and judicious criticizing. It is judicious arguing, struggling, confronting, urging, pushing and pulling in addition to comforting. It is leadership. The word ‘judicious’ means requiring judgment, and judgment requires more than instinct; it requires thoughtful and often painful decision-making.” – M. Scott Peck, The Road Less Travelled

“If prostitutes attract us so little, it is not because they are ugly or stupider than other women, it is because they are ready and waiting; because they already offer us precisely what we seek to attain… The secret to a long-lasting relationship is infidelity. Not the act itself, but the threat of it. For Proust, an injection of jealousy is the only thing capable of rescuing a relationship ruined by habit.” – Alain de Botton, How Proust Can Change Your Life

Occasionally, I like to open my old journals and read what I was thinking in an earlier time. It’s always amazing to see the stuff I used to worry about.

In year 8, I wrote how terrified I was when I was late to maths class. It was one of the first classes of the year and looking through the window outside, I saw the teacher had already begun teaching. I was too embarrassed to walk in and face the ridicule of everybody so I waited outside, trying to find an opening to sneak in when the teacher wasn’t looking. I think I would’ve spent the whole class outside if another teacher didn’t walk past and ask me what I was doing. Embarrassed, I walked in. The math teacher didn’t even look up.

In year 11, I wrote how frustrated I was that I wasn’t improving in a video game. “How did I lose 10 games in a row today? Either I’m the worst player ever, or I have terrible luck,” I wrote. That was it for that day’s entry.

In second year university, I wrote how neurotic I was about my grades. “I have ten lectures I need to watch by tomorrow”, I wrote at 11pm one night. “Time to get cracking.” The assessment was worth 15%.

Reading these entries made me smile. From my current perspective, these worries were hilariously unnecessary. Even though it felt dreadful in the moment, I wouldn’t feel much less stressed at these situations now.

One of the greatest benefits of journalling is the ability to find patterns in behaviour. And one resounding message that transpires from my records is that everything will be okay.

It will be okay!

You are breathing, you are safe, you are healthy. This problem you’re worrying about will probably be the same one you laugh about in a year’s time.

So let your neuroticism chill a bit. It will be fine.

This week three patients died on the hematology ward.

I had met them all before, though in varying degrees. Two I had only met on the morning ward rounds, perhaps a few seconds of eye contact here and there. I had chatted to the third for 30 minutes last week, trying to take a history, but mostly talking about his life. He was still able to smile and talk fondly about his family. Weak, but still breathing. Still alive.

It feels strange to walk on the ward now, new patients sleeping where they once laid. Because I wasn’t there to see their body pronounced dead and wheeled off somewhere else, it’s like they only exist in my memory and the hospital’s electronic records. Friday afternoon, they were there. Monday morning, they were gone. There’s no “this is where patient X once laid” or photographs of them anywhere. They’re just gone.

But the strangest thing of all this is how little emotion I’ve felt. When I heard the news, I was shocked for a bit, but didn’t think too much of it. Just paused, whispered a “rest in peace”, and got on with my day. It was only when my colleague brought it up did I consider how significant it was. Yeah – the man I had spoken to last week, who told me about his childhood and love life, is now no longer alive. Isn’t that crazy? I expected, even hoped, to feel a larger wave of sadness, perhaps an inability to focus, maybe even some tears. But it just didn’t affect me that much.

Three years ago, I wrote a post outlining my fear of becoming an emotional void. It was one of my most honest and personal posts I had ever written. And now I worry my fears are coming true.

Why didn’t I feel more emotion at the news? Am I too sleep deprived, and just numb to any input? Am I too used to death, having experienced heavy loss growing up? Or am I still unconsciously processing it, waiting for the tears to erupt randomly one day?

The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows has a phrase called the wends:

n. frustration that you’re not enjoying an experience as much as you should, even something you’ve worked for years to attain, which prompts you to plug in various thought combinations to try for anything more than static emotional blankness, as if your heart had been accidentally demagnetized by a surge of expectations.

Maybe I’m going through the wends and expecting too much of myself. Maybe death is just no big deal and a natural part of life. Maybe it’s fine, even good, to feel little in the face of death, as a sign of resilience.

But if it comes at the cost of my humanity and my empathy, then dear God, please let me be more sensitive. Please let me love more readily, let me cry more heavily, let me sleep less easily. Let me feel again.

RK, may you rest in peace.