posted by Nk. at 11:41 AM

(* this is a note I posted in my FB last night, just reposting it here with a few edits because I'm lazy like that. Heh.)

A few days ago I finished reading Haruki Murakami's After Dark. Here's an excerpt:

"You know what I think?" she says. "That people's memories are maybe the fuel they burn to stay alive. Whether those memories have any actual importance or not, it doesn't matter as far as the maintenance of life is concerned. They're all just fuel. Advertising fillers in the newspaper, philosophy books, dirty pictures in a magazine, a bundle of ten-thousand-yen bills: when you feed 'em to the fire, they're all just paper. The fire isn't thinking, 'Oh, this is Kant,' or 'Oh, this is the Yomiuri evening edition,' or "Nice tits," while it burns. To the fire, they're nothing but scraps of paper. It's the exact same thing. Important memories, not-so-important memories, totally useless memories: there's no distinction--they're all just fuel."


"You know, I think if I didn't have that fuel, if I didn't have these memory drawers inside me, I would've snapped a long time ago. I would've curled up in a ditch somewhere and died. It's because I can pull the memories out of the drawers when I have to--the important ones and the useless ones--that I can go on living this nightmare of a life. I might think I can't take it anymore, that I can't go on anymore, but one way or another I get past that."

Yeah. I liked this part so much I typed and posted it via my mobile phone.


Ah, memories.



The time he asked if I was hungry and I said no, not really while eyeing the hotdogs and waffles and then telling him later while munching on the same hotdog and waffle that di ako gutom gusto ko lang ngumuya ("I'm not hungry I just want to chew") and that look on his face, what a funny.

Swimming with the whale sharks.

The kid pressing his face in the coffee shop's glass windows.

Sunlight streaming through the windows.

That time, accent training for my first (and last) call center job-- when I stupidly misread compromise as "com-promise".

My dog Sugar giving me that sad, sad look that morning he died.

Not waking up in my own bed.

Anna Nalick singing, but, my god, it's so beautiful when the boy smiles.

HongKong, Singapore.

That "Chika-Chika" song playing in the FX on my way home.

Tonight's argument with my mother.


Burn, burn, burn.

Labels: about a girl, After Dark, Anna Nalick, books, fangirl posts, flashes of light, Haruki Murakami, lucid intervals