Turtle Channel!!!

Last week I read this line...it said "Always remember that you are very unique...just like everybody else". It really got me laughing...and then it got me thinking.

In our quest to be unique and to find some meaning in our lives, we often lament "No one understands me". Or the younger generation would always tell the older ones "You are so outdated. No wonder we can't communicate".

The irony of the scenario is that we are actually so similar. The more we try to be different, the more similar we are to the crowd. We think we should leave a mark in this world, but the truth is that to leave your name in history, you either have to be a very cruel person, or a very saintly one. If you are cruel, you leave your name to be scorned at for generations to come. Think Hitler, for instance. If you are saintly, you leave behind your name to be raped by someone in the future who either thinks you are a fake, or takes your teachings and twist them into something evil.

I would like to be forgotten when I die. Just another name on the stone at the graveyard. Just another face staring out listlessly at the visitors who come once a year either during Cheng Beng or All Souls' day.

You know, when I visit my deceased uncle in Nilai (cemetary), I would look at my uncle's "neighbours". See what year they were born and what year they departed from the earth. Some die so young, and I wonder what their story was. Was it cancer? Or an accident maybe? Some were born before the first world war and died after the second one had ended. What had they seen? Felt? Known? Lived? What were their stories? Perhaps one day, I shall write a fictional series of short stories on these lives.

Perhaps I should do that starting from today. Then we can really see how very similar we are. We are the sand on the beach. We amount to nothing. Yet we amount to something. Different sands, yet similar in compound. Far away, yet indistinguishable when brought together. Our accomplishments, hopes and dreams amount to nothing when we go. Our lives here on earth will be like a dream when we are gone. Just another soul. Just another one. So simple...why do we complicate it all?

This weekend I shall go plant some trees. My life may be forgotten when I'm gone. But it would be nice to do something simple and happy, far far away from the crazy and meaningless dog-eat-dog world we live in.