Puty's Journal

Sepertinya sudah lama sekali saya nggak main mainan semacam ini. Kangen rasanya. Maklum, saya bertumbuhkembang dengan mainan-mainan ini. Mainan yang rapuh oleh angin kencang, dan mengharuskan kita berinteraksi langsung dengan lawan, dimana lawan adalah anak tetangga. “Janittt, Janitttt….” begitu dulu saya selalu memanggil teman masa kecil favorit saya dari depan pagar (namanya Janitra). Saya bertumbuhkembang di kompleks BTN, dimana tetangga adalah keluarga, dan silaturahmi adalah pasti.

Anak-anak zaman sekarang sepertinya nggak mengalami masa menyenangkan itu ya? Sepertinya mereka lebih asyik dengan mainan seperti play station, atau bahkan sekarang nintendo wii. Memang canggih sih, tapi kok sepertinya sepi ya? Terlalu sepi ah untuk masa anak-anak. Hehehe. Eh, tapi kalau anak-anak gaul jaman sekarang masih main kartu atau uno sih. Mainnya di kafe tapi, dressed up dan pakai make-up, sambil ngerokok. Sangat nggak nostalgik ah :P

Kemarin saya dan Ais (Ais ini nama pacar saya, haha, ahey :>) mendadak mau main monopoli atau halma. Kita lalu putar-putar keluar masuk toko-toko mainan untuk mencari board games tersebut. Tapi ternyata sudah jarang yang jual. Akhirnya saya berhasil mendapat mereka di Pasar Simpang Dago, setelah mencari di beberapa toko.

Ibu Penjual: Iya, sok neng, mau cari apa?
Saya: Ada game kayak halma atau monopoli gitu bu?
Ibu Penjual: Wahh, kalau game mah nggak ada neng.. Adanya mainan.
Saya: Oh, iya. Mainan aja deh kalau gitu. *langsung berencana update blog pakai Bahasa Indonesia :P*

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Yeyy.. Akhirnya dapat.
Teman-teman, ayo kita main :)

I always dream to be a writer. A professional one. Yes, I often dream to be someone whose books are found and sold out everywhere; whose signature is valued even more than the copy itself. It is not that I want to be famous, or rich, or both. It is actually the vision of living a life with coffee and cheesecake and notebook and writing all day. Ah, I’m starting to think naive, but late at night, it just sounds more tempting.

But well, it’s maybe more than that.

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Because writing is something magical.

You can make people fall in love with you, with life, with something even when they have no idea about anything. You can make them laugh, you can make them cry. Smile, frown, or even sleep. You can make them wonder, and if you’re powerful enough, then you can make them think (oh yes, you should be flattered when you can make other people use their brain). You can inspire them. You can be alive in your death. You can stay young and wise for hundred years. Isn’t it magical?

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What if it is not magical at all?

Unsuccessful professional writer is the other name of the lame and unemployed you, with unpaid debt, beers and cigarettes on the floor, and a stack of dusty unsold-plastic-wrapped-books-you-author in your shelf those you bought yourself just because you couldn’t stand seeing your words left untouched, unseen, unintended, in the bookstores. Sleeping with dream, and dreaming about something else other than sleeping. Broke. Well, it’s my worst case scenario of a writer, but I know, it’s pretty realistic for an idealistic life-plan.

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I always dream to be a writer. But I’m never a risk taker. I choose to be a coward turns an earth exploiter. I love words, but they are too fragile. They are my dream, but they are not the only ones. I can’t put my dreams based on another dream. I can’t stand taking risks. I can’t stand dreaming to be a dreamer.

Then I left it here. Where my words are mine, and people won’t kill me just because I write or I don’t write. Some people may be inspired, and I don’t have to worry, whether people would feed me by buying my words or not. Whether people would care or not. Whether Earth would grow old and dying. It just would.

For a materialist, I’m pretty idealistic (no, I’m not mocking Paramore). Maybe some of you, who have been reading my blog for a year, more or less, know that I think and write in swordlike words, plus innuendos. About consumerism, or being trendy or being cheesy or even about definite individuals. Like this, or this, or dozens more tweets and under-160-characters type of posts. I know a lot of people were offended. A few protested and countered, and some might disliked me silently (or maybe not, and it’s just me).

I maybe sound so skeptical, but it doesn’t mean that I never regret my words. It doesn’t mean that I’m happy being a cynical person. I try to tell my version of truth, but sometimes it turns me unwise.

I wish I were wiser.

And the best way, I can think, to be wise is trying to put myself in someone else’s shoes as much as possible.

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Putting yourself in someone else’s shoes is an idiomatic expression.

It’s meaning is that you should consider other people’s circumstances before passing judgement or making conclusions about them. Figuratively, putting yourself in someone else’s shoes means stepping directly into their life and viewing a situation as if you were that person. Hence, you would understand their thoughts and actions.

The lesson is that one should always consider other people’s perspectives before making conclusions. The expression most commonly applies to situations of conflict and judgement.

(very definitive definition from here)

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To be wiser, maybe I have to try owning my own shoe shop.

So I can put myself in a lot of kinds of shoes.

Ugly brown boots, pink ballet flats, rubber flip-flops, cheapo fake Crocs ™, red stilettos, plain sneakers, old moccasin, fluffy slipper…

Ultra-expensive shoes of millionaires, or ultra-glamorous shoes of celebrities, are never affordable though. Too rich, and too popular, kind of shoes. Head over heels.

There, I can’t be any wiser.

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“The idea of putting yourself in someone else’s shoes — that’s pretty basic. But staying conscious of that stuff helped me.”
- Don Freeman

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(image from gettyimages.com)