I open my eyes and I see sand.

Sand, enveloping the earth and falling off the edge of the horizon. I realize I am standing on a beach. Looking down, I see my bare feet have sunk into the sand, deep and warm. I also see a pair of flip-flops a few feet away from me. I recognize them. They are mine. I imagine that I probably have tossed them away, wanting to feel the sand with my bare feet. But, why?

Until this point, I don’t have the slightest idea about what I'm doing here, or even how I get here in the first place. I take a deep breath. The air is soft and scented, carrying the saltiness of ocean. I immediately suspect something. I turn around. Then, I see it. The Ocean. Dark blue, graceful and unfathomable. The waves are coming in at short intervals, one after another, forcefully pounding on the shore. I begin to hear it, the sounds of the tiding. It's funny how I can't hear it before I turn around. It's almost as if I am deaf in that first moment. But now I can hear every bit of it, the melodious humming of the sea, low yet persistent, like a mother's lullaby.

A breeze sweeps by. My mind jolts back. The breeze feels so gentle and warm, like the breezes in the summer time. But wait, it can't be summer. It is still the end of winter last I remembered. Yet, the temperature feels completely mild and humid, and there is not even one tinge of chilliness on my skin. I look down at my clothes. A yellow tank top and a white cotton skirt. I realize that I am dressed in my summer clothes. I become even more confused. What am I doing here? What is this all about?

I look around. There is nothing except a lonely landscape of sand that stretches to eternity, accompanied by a lonelier ocean. There is nobody on this beach, except for me. It is strange that this thought does not frighten me, not even a little bit. In fact, I start to develop a feeling of serenity and relief, like the feeling of leaving an overcrowded party and finally being able to collect my own thoughts back, thoughts that are true to my own form.

With this feeling of ease, I begin to wonder what time it is. It is quite dim; everything seems faded and weak, like an old photo that has lost its original color. The sky is shaded into grayish black. The sun is nowhere to be seen. I guess that the time is either dusk or dawn, which means that the sun has already gone down or is about to rise. I don’t know which it is, but I decide to wait it out. I take another deep breath and begin to relax. I walk towards the edge of the beach where the sand and ocean have become inseparable. I soak my bare feet in the spongy sand, and sit down.

I have no idea whether it will be a sunset or a sunrise; whether the sky will darken or brighten; whether the day is to come or has gone by; just like I have no clue how I get here and why I am here on this beach. But I have decided to stop questioning. As I sit, I continue to watch the waves relentlessly chase the shore like a man madly in love. I listen to the humming of the ocean and I begin to tell that there is a sense of urgency in her voice; a frustrated awareness of the time; the time in between a foregoing wave and the next, the time that is stuck between a lingering past and a future that has yet to come. I close my eyes and let myself sink into the pauses between the waves. I want to stay here, until the next hour is here, until I know whether it will be rays of sunlight or looming shadows when I open my eyes. Before I know it, I slowly drift off to sleep.

I opened my eyes and I saw sunlight leaking in through the curtains.

I turned around and felt my cheek touching the softness of the pillow. It was then that I realized what it was.

I thought that it’d never come to me again, this dream, the one about the beach. But here it is again. I don’t remember how many years have gone by since I had the dream. I thought I have already leapt into the foreseeable future, but I guess time has finally outrun me, dragging me back into that place in between waves, where we call the present, where the idle days of yesterday have already closed the doors, and the mystery of tomorrow refuses to unfold.

I rolled out of my bed, slid my feet into my slippers. And then, I felt it, the prickling sensation, at the tip of my toes. It was sand, still moist and warm, the suvenir of my dream. I was instantly reminded that after all these years, I have never got to the end of the dream and find out how it turns out. Standing there in the middle of my room, I looked through my windows. It was a bright sunny day outside.

I smiled. It is a sunrise, after all. 

I saw this survey "25 Random Things About Me" going around on Facebook for a while now. But instead of 25, I only did 20, because I'm lazy, and this thing gets lame and makes me think too much. And after I finish writing it, I have a problem seeing these 20 things as "random" because they are not. They are just so head-smackingly dead-on ME that it leaves very little randomness for you gush at. Um geez, I'm sorry I think I just missed the whole purpose of this survey. Doh!

1) Okay, let's start off with some light stuff, nothing to knock you socks off. Hrm...I don't have a driver's license. In other words, I don't know how to drive. But in my defense, I've mostly lived in cities where I absolutely didn't need a car to get around. Like, who needs a car in Manhattan, or Hong Kong?

2) I don't know how to swim either. Please throw me a lifesaver when you see me in water. I ain't faking it!

3) I can't stand when people write with bad grammars. I just can't. But I also writes with so much grammar mistakes. OMG I can't stand myself! Ahhhhhhhhh!!!!

4) I am an only child. Interesting fact: When I was little, China had this policy that gave out a bonus to all the only child's in China every year (on International Children's Day, I believe). In other words, I earned money by being a spoiled bratty only child! Ha! My parents said they would keep the money in a box for me until I grow up. They promised. But until this day I never saw that money.

5) Oh, and when I was in 6th grade, I started writing monthly for a young adult column for a newspaper. My income was 100 RMB per month. That's right, I had an INCOME, suckers! I think I kept it up for two years. Uh yeah, you do that math. My parents said they would keep the money in another box for me until I grow up. They promised. But, of course, until this day I never saw that money.

6) Now I am starting to think this survey is a complete waste of time, and that anyone who enjoys writing this is a total narcissist.

7) My second toes are longer than my big toes. Okay I know they made fun of this in Shallow Hal, but it really isn't that freaky. It is considered a sign of good fortune. In some cultures. I bet.

8) Aside from my blog, I also keep a real diary book where I write down my darkest secrets and reveal my true identity as a super hero.

9) I was kidding, you dumbass. Okay fine, I make lame jokes, but the diary book part is true though!

10) I love learning languages. I used to speak French when I lived in Switzerland as a kid. I don't anymore, obviously. I think it just went away one day. Poof! Just like that! Weird, eh? I also used to speak Shanghainese after living in Shanghai for one year. I spoke it with my Dad for six months, and it also poofed away. I tried to pick both languages up after I grew up but to no avail. Languages just don't like me I guess, they keep poofing away from me!

11) I want to have a puppy someday, a little dumb looking puppy, and I'll name him Forrest, you know, after Forrest Gump. I am going to love him to death.

12) There is a sweet romantic side of me, and there is a dark cynical side of me. They co-exist in me, and it is my job to make sure they get along. It's hard work, itellya. Well, think of them as a married couple who want a divorce, and I am their marriage counselor. Sometimes I just don't know how to keep their paws off each other! I mean, what do you do when one of them watches Titanic and sobs, and the other one watches it...and laughs?

13) Oh man, this thing is more annoying than I thought. Why do I always overestimate my attention span?

20 minutes later

14) I got bored with writing this so I took a break and browsed the internet t. Lookie at what I found! http://www.insult-o-matic.com/ This site is so awesome for those who suffer from a lack of insultatory imagination, ie, me. You know how many times I think to myself Aha! I will say that the next time! ten minutes AFTER my brilliant retort would have been useful? Ugh!

15) Anyhoodles, where was I? ..... Oh, do you know that I am SEVERELY location-ally challenged? I know most girls claim to have bad sense of direction, but I mean, OMG I'm probably the worst you will ever meet. Sometimes I amaze myself just walking on the street, LOST, of course. So basically this is what you have to do to teach me how to go to a new place. You take me there. You take me there again. You take me there for a third time. You get a phone call from me telling you that I lost my way trying to get there. You take me there again (on the way there I would swear on ALL my Marc Jacobs that it would be the last time).....and of course after that you will have to take me again (and you decide to never believe me again), ...then mayyyyybe, just maybe, I will be able to get there myself.

16) I love love love writing. I cannot imagine my life without writing. I have been writing since I was 6th grade. Well, for those of you who don't know, in Chinese schools, they want (erhm, more like they make) kids to write cheesy-weesy stuff like I helped a blind old man cross the road today, or I found a dollar and gave it to the policeman (yeah I know, wtf) So that's what I did. I wrote about all kinds of nice crap that I did, except that I didn't really do them. Years later I learned the correct term for "making up nice crap" - fictionalization. That is when the writing got serious. I started writing stories during high school. But please don't presume the quality of my writing based on this post, as I mainly wrote in Chinese. It wasn't until in college years when I attempted at writing in English, which I sucked at and still do.

17) I express myself better and come cross funnier in written form than face to face. I can delete the dumbass lame jokes I make much easier than pulling a foot out of my mouth.

Ugh, I wanna go pee.

18) I keep a list of books that I've enjoyed reading so that I can reread them after I turn 50. They say whatever books you read in your 20s or 30s will have a whole new meaning once you read them again in your 50s. I guess things do look different once you put on those reading glasses huh. Ha. But seriously, that's quite an interesting idea, isn't it? I wonder what kind of new meaning I will get when I reread The Confessions of a Shopaholic in my 50s. Hmm...maybe that's when I will finally find an explanation why I don't have a saving account.

19) My name came from the movie "Grease", my favorite movie in adolescent years. Wow, I can't believe I just said adolescent years. *sob*

20) My ALL TIME favorite movie is "Great Expectations" by Ethan Hawke and Gwenyth Paltrow. In case you don't know, the story is from the classic book by Charles Dickens, who is also one of my favorite classic fiction writers. Yeah, I like Charles Dickens, take that and chew on it!

..... ......

Okay I give up. I want to go pee and then go to sleep now. You know what, I just realize that the reason that I can't finish this is not because I am lazy. I just talk too much, way too much. So yeah, there ya go, 21st random thing about me:

I talk too much.

But I am going to shut up now.