it ain't california without you

I want you around like last summer

[itaintcaliforniawithoutyou]

Diary entry: warm burnt orange

22/12/23

it’s tuesday. i’m peeling a tangerine i bought at the shop today and gently separating it in halves with you. the late afternoon light drenched us in such warmth, as if a replica of the long awkward hours between our hello and goodbyes years ago. i wanted to stay in that light for as long as i could.

it's tuesday. tangerine is in season again and love is here in our living room, all over us.

[itaintcaliforniawithoutyou]

Diary entry: apartment 7B

01/04/20

It was early afternoon on a Wednesday. Here in the living room, I feel content. Sheryl is stirring her pot of ayam gulai; her latest hobby in becoming the perfect in-law. Alice is in the shower, singing a happy tune from our youth. And I am here, sitting in the sofa, lost in the sea of words of my favorite author. How blissful it is to feel this sense of calm and peace, when the world is burning outside us. 

[itaintcaliforniawithoutyou]

Diary entry: venus in taurus

17/04/20

This morning I woke up and had a sudden urge to buy ceramic dinner plates. Where does this desire come from? I do not know. I found myself daydreaming about spending my birthday, say 9 years from now. When I live on an island in the sun, when I can greet the sea hello every morning afternoon and evening. When I can stand on my own two feet because I want to, not because I have to. 

The day would go like this; I would spend the morning browsing local shop looking for the most beautiful ceramic dinner plates in town, ones that captured my soul, while wearing my blue-stripped cotton sundress. It has to be cotton. I would find one, feel delightful about it, then spend the rest of the day preparing the meal that I would put on it. A risotto, a pasta, a Greek salad, or perhaps sate lilit with sambal matah? The option is endless. 

Maybe if I keep on keeping on, this could be my reality. I have lost my faith that things will get better many months ago, but maybe it won’t hurt to try again? 

[itaintcaliforniawithoutyou]

Only Growing

18/7/20

We were sitting on the balcony, talking

about last Friday dinner with our friends. 

You asked where I want to be, 

say 10 years from now. I said, not much

just a little bit more sunlight, a bigger kitchen to

provide our will be growing Friday dinner guests, 

a golden retriever named Elmo, and maybe you. 

[itaintcaliforniawithoutyou]

Diary entry: life under the sun

27/5/19

The train ride was exceptionally quiet this morning, not even a whisper or a soft hum was heard. It seems like everyone was lost in their own thoughts. Me, especially. Physically, I was standing there on the train, staring mindlessly at the passing scenery. But, in my mind, I was somewhere else, far into some imaginary future.

It was Monday morning, and I didn’t have any work that day. Ever since three years ago, I have decided that my week starts on Tuesday. Making Monday a weekend for me. I was in the kitchen, my favorite part of the house, and where the heart of the home is. I was preparing to make french toast for breakfast while putting my cold morning playlist on loop. Although, the morning was nothing but cold. The sun was shining really gracefully outside. You walked down the stairs, with your bed hair and wrinkled t-shirt. We said our good morning, you made your coffee, and sat on the stool across from me. The morning sun hit your face just right and emphasized the warmth of your eyes. My favorite part of you, since the first time that we met. We had our breakfast, you read the news, I replied a few emails; it was just an ordinary morning. But with you, it’s far from ordinary. We planned on how are we going to spend the day ahead, and came up with the perfect plan; go to the beach, have lunch, take a nap, wake up when the tides are low, make amazing dinner at home, then have a wonderful and relaxing bath, with our favorite japanese cherry blossom aromatherapy candle burning beside us and Alina Baraz playing in the background.  

It’s still Monday, and there’s no you nor a warm morning. There’s only me, and my enduring faith that the lights will find me soon.

[itaintcaliforniawithoutyou]

Diary entry: Dream a Little Dream of Me

06/11/19

September was like a fever dream. Finally in years, I started feeling like myself again. Wait no, even better. I was feeling....light. Just floating away through the days, with ease, with such grace. I had been having a really good night sleep. Ones without dreams, where my body just...rest. 

In September, I felt I was surrounded with much love and joy. I took care of myself, I tidied up my bed every morning, I made tea for me and my friends, I sent good morning texts with emoji, I went out with my friends almost every night, I cooked stir-fried chicken, I....was living. 

But, of course just like every other dreams, I finally have to wake up. Things have to fall apart, in order for it to fall together, right...?

[itaintcaliforniawithoutyou]

Diary Entry: the fourth house

8/5/19

The past few years have been excruciatingly dull, empty, and exhausting. There are times when I feel all sort of emotions at once, like a balloon that could be popped up at the slightest nudge of a pin anytime. And there are also times when I am a walking void, wandering around with no direction, no hope for the future. Lost. 

Sometimes in between those days where I am busy doing nothing and everything at the same time, I let my mind wander into some imaginary future. Wherever in the world it is and whoever I choose to spend those future days with, it would always be filled with love, warmth, and contentment. Things that I lack in my current life and crave so much, yet somehow everything had convinced me time and time again that those things were not made for me. That the picture perfect future I have always longed for was never meant for me. 

I dream of a life where every morning is quiet but hopeful. With breakfast shared over morning conversations, mildly complaining yet excited for the day ahead with all the phone calls to make, the grocery shopping, the lunch meeting, and the busy traffic of the after-office hour. I longed for a life where every weekend always starts slow but never tasted lonely. Spend with good food, good music, and the warmth presence of people I love and cherish. 

[itaintcaliforniawithoutyou]

I look for you in everything

I look for you in every person I meet. I look for you in every place I visit; in the busiest part of my hometown at night, and in the cold and windy days of Bandung late last year. I look for you in every memory I make; at my 22nd birthday, just before I blew the candle and made a hopeless wish to feel you, to feel anything really. at the new year’s eve, when I was humming to a sad love song played on spotify while stirring a pot of my bolognese sauce. and at my graduation, when I was overwhelmed with the heat of that late august sun and felt jealous with the apparent display of joy and love other people showed, which I don’t have the capability to receive or give. 

I look for you in everything, I still look for you in everything. Even though deep down I had convinced myself that I would never find you. 

[itaintcaliforniawithoutyou]

On Asking for Help

A few afternoons ago, I met up with friends from university in a nice and secluded coffee shop near where I live. It’s an activity that seems to happen less and less now that we have graduated. We talked about a lot of things; how life has been, our mutual friends, the last movie we saw, and the moments we shared together. Half an hour before we were supposed to leave, I asked my friends what lesson they had learned last year. A question I realized I didn’t have the answer to. I did some reflection, and besides the obvious lesson “life as an adult is utterly and painfully lonely”, I learned that I don’t know how to ask for help. 

The past two years wasn’t exactly a kind year to me. Sure, I managed to graduate from University, but I also had to deal with two separate heartbreaks which really hurt me at the time. To sum it up, it wasn’t exactly a year of sunshine and rainbows, I was losing so much weight due to stress and other personal things. It was at this situation people usually reach out to their family and or friends for help, asking for support; be it emotional, financial, or even physical. But, I found myself unable to do that. It was really hard for me to do such a simple thing like send a chat to one of my best friends and to tell her I need help, to tell her I need a friend to talk to. Instead, what I did was keeping it all to myself and pulling myself from them, slowly disappearing. I ignored my friends’ messages asking me how I was and I made up excuses not to meet them.  It took me a year to realize I was doing that and to realize that it was something that’s very unhealthy to do. 

I reflected back to myself and wondered why I did all those things. Turned out that I was scared my friends would pity me when I told them of my very ugly story of suffering and pain, and let me believed that I was not worthy of my friends’ love and or compassion when I was not the best version of myself. So, I pushed them away and kept everything to myself. No matter how much my friends told me that they love me, that they would be there for me no matter what, could convince me that I actually deserve those things. Why do I feel like I have to be perfect in order to be loved? Why do I feel like I don’t deserve any compassion when I’m crying my eyes out laying shamefully on my bedroom floor at 2 in the morning? Why do I feel like I’m not worthy of love when I’m not swimming with wonderful achievements and still couldn’t get a job offer 8 months after my graduation?  

The answer is something that I need to work on with my therapist I think. The one that I’ve been ghosting since last fall. I figure it has something to do with how I was raised, the media I consume, and a lot of other contributing factors. What really matters now is, on how I choose to work on that.

I learned a little secret, it’s called acceptance. Accepting that it’s okay to have bad or even very bad days, that everyone goes through that too. Accepting that sometimes sadness and happiness exist together, you can’t expect for a constant happiness in your life. It’s just ridiculous. Most importantly, accepting yourself as who you are. That it’s totally okay to not always be the best version of yourself. Because sometimes, what you think as the best version of yourself is actually someone else’s version of best.  

It took me months to get here, but I finally decided to see my therapist again, I asked my friends out for a simple lunch or dinner whenever I felt like I cannot make it through another day, I try to be kind to myself especially on my worst days. It has been a slow process, but it’s still a process nonetheless.

[itaintcaliforniawithoutyou]

January started with a heartbreak. The kind of heartbreak that makes her spent hours crying in the bathtub, throwing out of whatever was left inside her empty stomach. February, March, April, and May went on like a blur. Filled with days spent staring blankly at her laptop screen for hours, forcing her brain to come up with something to type, every day at that favorite place of hers, that one quiet place at the third floor with the perfect view of the lake and the sky. Both of which she believes kept her sane. Although in March, she visited a city she loves with people she loves, looking for a closure that doesn’t exist. I mean, how do you expect a closure for something that never even begin. After all, it was just a pure obsession.

June is the month she’s been anxiously waiting for; her birthday. It was also the month she realized, birthdays are getting lonelier the more she grows up. No more stacks of presents hidden behind her bedroom door, no more Winnie the Pooh cakes, and no more birthday shopping with her favorite aunt. There were a lunar eclipse and another heartbreak in July. The heartbreak came first. Crying silently inside the office bathroom stall, calling her best friend but couldn’t utter a single word, just gasp between her tears.

August went by like the wind, and in September she fell in love. It lasted a week, but she swore it was love. She is, after all, your textbook Gemini. She stops answering messages or returning any calls in October. She went full-on hermit mode; went up the mountain by herself with only a single lantern, leaving everyone she knows behind. And it doesn’t seem like she’s coming down anytime soon.

This year started with a heartbreak. It’s November now, and sadly the pain persists. Sadly, she’s the one who let it.

[itaintcaliforniawithoutyou]

Seeking a Friend for The End of The World

I know you’re probably bored to hear my lame excuse, but really I’ve been meaning to write something since last November. I got distracted easily, instead of actually finishing what I write, I found myself lost in Buzzfeed’s endless quiz and spend the day wondering should I really travel to Barcelona this year based on my preference on dessert. I have hundreds of drafts in my google docs of my unfinished and probably never will writing, the topic range from silly things like a detailed recount of me crying in my university’s library, my ongoing denial about my daddy’s issues, to things that actually matter like what friendship really means when you’re in your twenties. 

To say 2017 was not a kind year to me, would make me sound like an ungrateful asshole. In some aspects things were good to me, I met good people, made new wonderful friends, started writing again, and learned new things every day. In another aspect though, things weren’t exactly all sunshine and rainbow. I noticed there was a main theme which seems to persist throughout my 2017, and it was confusion. 

Yes, 2017 was a year full of confusion for me. And no, not in a sexual kind of confusion. But more in a general life as an adult is confusing. It was like that time I dreamt Prabowo invited me to his house and let me rode and played with his horses (okay, this does sound wrong a bit). Now, I don’t know if it was actually his party’s campaign trick to infiltrate voters’ dreamland, but I remember I woke up feeling undeniably confused, you could see a giant question mark hanging over my head. Except, I felt that throughout the whole year. I was confused about myself and started questioning my inner values, although I still am. My confusion about my inner values led me to question my relationship with people around me; my family, my friends, and even with my own self.

Last year, Medium’s article has been my go-to consolation whenever I feel bad about myself. I read this one article about how we constantly seeking for a distraction throughout life, and how in today’s rise of social media distraction is something that’s actually inevitable. Even when I was reading that article, I was actually distracting myself from the unstimulating discussion my friends trying to have in front of the class. That’s when it hits me. My confusion towards myself could be because all these times I’ve always been moving from one distraction to another. The distraction comes in many different forms; from social media to escape the reality I am in, a silver tongue boy to replace the lack of love I have for myself, new shiny expensive things to fill the gaping void inside my heart, to drowning myself in work I swore I was so passionate. Turns out I am that afraid to confront myself. To ask myself out for a sushi date, sit her down, and have a conversation with her. 

My lack of knowledge about my own self-has had a ripple effect on other important aspects of my life, especially with my relations with people around me. I got into some sort of passive-aggressive fight with my best friends because I couldn’t identify what I was feeling at that time. Was I upset, jealous, disappointed, or something else? Were those feelings I had caused by her or was it just a mixture of a lot of emotions caused by my lack of inner self-aware. I couldn’t tell which was it, but I now know it was the latter. I put all of my emotions in one box and with a lot (and I mean it A LOT) of things that had happened last year it got so overwhelming, which resulted in me acting like a ticking time bomb to everyone around me. 

To know thyself is the greatest accomplishment someone could achieve. It is, however, couldn’t happen in one night or two nights, like the movie two-night stand. You cannot expect some sort of epiphany to come upon you while you were driving down the highway at night, and then suddenly everything is clear. It’s a long process and an ongoing journey of oneself towards wisdom and peace. It’s not a clear path journey, not a path well trotted, and definitely not a red-eye flight. It’s a road trip through gravel country roads, where your car broke down in the middle of the road, where you have to make a stop several times, where the trip takes longer than what you planned. But when you finally reach the destination, you will be more than satisfied with what you have, you will have a new best friend which is yourself, and you will find home within yourself. 

As for me, I am now currently on that road trip where my inner self is the one who’s driving, and I’m here on the passenger side admiring her hair that gets blown out by the wind and the love-shaped sunglasses she’s wearing, while also savoring the scenery we passed along the way. 

[itaintcaliforniawithoutyou]

Keep your head up high, and great things will fall like maple leaves in October

My dear senior in College

[itaintcaliforniawithoutyou]

Ephemeral Sun

It was almost late night, she was walking home alone when she realised that all of these, of what seems to be a soul-draining routine, will soon be a memory. 

No more staying up until 3 am at McDonald’s making a final project for a class that they knew they’d get an A anyway. No more spending time in that favourite student lounge of hers, doing their group projects (but mostly just listening to music really), sneaking food past that grumpy old man at the front desk. No more spending Monday afternoon in a cramped apartment with those people who spends more than thirty minutes to decide which food they should order for dinner. And maybe no more Friday night talks of everything (from the secret of the universe, what kind of porn they’re into, to why did the chicken cross the road) at her favourite coffee shop in town.

Under the flickering street lamp, she realised, eventually she has to say goodbye to all of those. To that friend who’s now pursuing her dreams on the other side of the world, to the one who genuinely wants to know how she’s doing and always listen to her whiny stories, to the ones who become her safe space to tell whatever it is on her mind without being judged and let her know when she does something wrong.

And she was never good at goodbye.

[itaintcaliforniawithoutyou]

Pseudo-happiness

I’ve been trying to write this since a month ago, as a part of my ongoing struggle of being an adult and whining about how hard it is to be a 21 years old human being in this fast-paced demanding world. But I’m a pro procrastinator, so I’ve been saying “I will write it later on my free time” far too many times while I was mindlessly busy scrolling Instagram.

Some of my friends and I have been having rather intense discussion on this particular topic; love. It’s always an exciting topic to talk about, people have been having discussion about this, dedicating their lives into this in order to find its meaning for centuries, and yet it will always remain a mystery of the human world. One of the famous philosopher (It’s one of the big three, but I’m sorry I couldn’t remember which one) said love is a madness. Indeed, it is. I read this awesome book ‘Backwards in Heels’ which my friend lend me, and it describes love as a chemical reaction in your brain. That love is produced by that part of your brain who makes you do cocaine. Basically it says how love is actually not as grand and pure as how some people (cough,Hollywood, cough) portrays it to be.

When we talk about love, we often forget that love comes in various forms; not only the romantic love that’s being overused in popular tropes’. There are also platonic love;the love you have for that best friends you’ve known since first grade; your parents’ love, your love for your family and or siblings, the love for yourself, and even the love for everything in life; like the color of the sky at dusk, your favourite scene in a movie, or even like my love for ripped jeans (it’s like the best invention ever, after electricity).

Being in my early twenties, I suddenly feel all my senses had been awaken, I can feel everything, yet I feel nothing at the same time. I told a few of my friends of how I am feeling, and turned out they feel more or less the same. So we created this support group of three independent sophisticated woman who’s trying to make sense of this constant madness the universe seems to enjoy throwing at us, of this vulnerability we feel inside, of our entire existence, really. Our most recent and most favourite topic to talk about is love, the romantic kind.

I have never been the girl who’s always have a boyfriend (I’ve never even been in a serious relationship) or have someone give me their intensive attention. In short, romantic love is not an aspect that I thrive on in life. And I was okay with that, for a long time. Until the thirst kicks in. The ‘thirst’ is something my friends and I refer to as our desperate longing to have someone you belong to, to have someone that you could be able to call yours, to feel loved.

Lately I’ve been reading a lot of Magdalene’s article during my free time in internship, which is kinda therapeutic and is insightful and empowering. What I learned from those articles is actually as basic as, when you want something you better make an effort to get it. 

Then I met this guy a month ago; everything about him looked just right. He was nice and looks cute, too. I was thinking, this is it, all those times you spent reading Magdalene and Wattpad’s cliche stories had finally paid off. I approached him and we had a brief conversation, it was casual and harmless. We never really talked again after that, so before I left for my flight I left him a super sappy notes which I was actually so embarrassed about.

He texted me a few days after that, and I remember I was that happy receiving a message from him, I was smiling all the way home on the train. I remember thinking, oh I should start making a happy playlist on Spotify just to keep the mood you know. Some back and forth message later, and suddenly he stopped texting me back. I was so ready to finally have something close to romantic relationship in my life, I was so ready to just give someone my attention and my time.

Now, I don’t blame him for not texting me back, but let’s be honest it’s really messed my confidence up. I was in a bad place emotionally during that time (I lost 6 kilos without trying), and to make matter worse it made me question my self-worth. Am I really that worthy after all? Am I not enough? I was frustrated because this one time I actually put an effort into something someone, I didn’t get the result I expected. Wall of confidence I’ve been carefully built these past 6 years, come crumbling down because of one single blow.

I was so high on my men ain’t shit phase this past year that I was so confused how a simple thing like this could affect me so much. I started to list down all of my qualities and personal achievement to make me feel better about myself. Then it hit me, if my self-confidence could be tore down with a simple thing like this, then I wonder if the ground its built from is really that strong after all. So I reflected back on myself and I realised, that the things that make me feel worthy and confidence about myself is really just based on me believing that others are less than me because of my personal achievements, rather than truly believing that I am a worthy individual without comparing myself to others in order to feel superior towards them.

So here I am trying to rebuild the wall with much stronger foundation of self-love, so when the south wind blows again, I won’t be crumbling down to the ground, rather I would stand tall and even stronger than before.  

[itaintcaliforniawithoutyou]

Sundae on a Sunday

They've been on countless adventure together. Each and every one of them become her favourite memories. Memories she often revisits when things go south

That impromptu roadtrip to places they've never been before; soft radio buzz playing in the background, waking up to a different city and not knowing where she is. The Friday late night drive to private hidden beaches, where they could smell the sea, the sun kissed skin, the apple-scented shampoo, and all the excitement it offers from miles away. 

Or maybe the fact that trouble seems to follow them wherever they go. Good trouble of course, the kind of trouble they laugh about at how stupid they are, the kind of trouble that makes them feel alive. 

Like when the car broke down in the middle of nowhere en route to Jogja, they laughed at first but then got freaked out when the sun has set yet there seemed to be no one around to ask for help. Or the time when they slept overnight at a police station in Malang, due to one of them being an idiot. Or that one trip they took to Dieng where one of them convinced the other to walk for 4 miles to watch a sunrise on top of the hill, where they could just drive there. They've been on countless adventure together; and here’s hoping to many more of them, although one of us had to go sailing the universe on our own. 

[itaintcaliforniawithoutyou]

Stormswept

She fell in love with the sea last December. The same time she realised her seemingly immense and endless problems weren't that bad after all.

She always believed the sea possess some magic; the kind of magic which lures any mortal into its captivating beauty, into the calm turquoise water and forget every mundane things that have weighed them down. Just like what happened in her favourite books; about a father who never came back home after a storm and decided to become one with the ocean. Just like what she felt when she first jumped into the water; a surge of calm and happy feelings, an epiphany.

As she sat there on the wooden dock bathe in the silvery moonlight, listening to the gentle sound of waves, she finally felt at ease. Calm. Composed.

The heavy feeling in her chest, the intrusive harming thoughts, the hates, the loneliness, everything, is no longer there. And that's when she fell in love with the sea.

[itaintcaliforniawithoutyou]

Internal Affairs

When people asked me what’s the thing I feared the most, they expect me to answer with typical things human feared; heights, spiders, closed space, losing control, commitment, or clowns. I mean, yes I’m afraid of heights, I’m afraid of commitment and I don’t like the idea being in a closed space- it gives me anxiety. But, all of those are nothing. Nothing compared to how much it scares me to be alone with my own thoughts. On those sleepless nights when my brain won't let me have a peaceful sleep, my thoughts decided to have a trip down a memory lane, and replying over and over and over those god awful memories I've been trying to repress for a long time. Trying to convince me that nobody loves me- no one ever does, and tear down that wall of confidence and self-love in mere seconds, which I've been trying so hard to build for the past 16 years. They tricked me into believing that I'm alone in all of this, and always will be. So yeah, I'm afraid to be alone with my own thoughts and never understand why are they so against me to just simply existing.