Pessimism and Death

Finally free from exams for a while but I think I'm gonna miss having them...suddenly with no deadlines and stuff, a bit duno wad to do. As in, I still wanna watch my movies and dramas and read my ebooks but, without the exams or studying factor making these activities like forbidden fruit (oh so tasty), they sorta lose their attractiveness...

Anyway, so today I planned to watch a free movies but ended up only watching one. Cuz I was clearing my studies stuff n compartmentalising them n also saving all the soft copies n throwing them into an email account. And after I was done with that I checked my emails and stuff and end up went to yahoo site where they ran an article on a 5 months (turning 6 months) old baby who has lost the battle with spinal muscular atrophy or SMA, just a few days back. There was a link to the blog that her dad set up and made posts from Avery's (the little baby girl) POV. It was the sweetest thing ever, seriously.

link: http://averycan.blogspot.com/2012/05/avery-lynn-canahuati-111111-043012.html

There aren't many posts since the dad only started in April this year but I've not gone through every post yet, reading through just I think 4 or 5 posts and I was crying like mad. Like seriously. Cuz I really found the fact that her parents are going on strong and putting up such optimistic posts and pictures to chronicle the days of her life and thinking more of LIFE rather then death extremely sweet n inspiring. There, I typed another run-on sentence. I was really awed by their courage to face this head-on and embracing it, cuz I don't know if I could do the same if I were in their shoes.

Ok, so the dad set up the blog to educate people and spread the word about SMA. From the info they put up in their first post and my little memory of biology few years back, SMA seems to be carried as a recessive allele in our genes. So basically we take one allele from each of our parents, making two alleles that will make up our gene. That's roughly what I remember anyway. But that's not the main thing. Main thing is, diseases sometimes may not be passed on from parent to child but the child may become a carrier of the disease him/herself. Ok I think I'm not gonna explain this well so lemme try to use As and as. There are two types of alleles, 'A' and 'a'. 'a' is the recessive allele. So a person with AA, Aa, aA (basically the same as Aa) will all not have that disease, while only a person with 'aa' will have it. The recessive trait only shows when both alleles are of the recessive type. Since we get an allele each from our parents, we could end up with 'Aa'/'aA' and be a CARRIER of the disease i.e. although it doesn't manifest in us, it could very well end up in our children. If both parents are carriers as in the case of Avery's parents, the probability of having a child with SMA is 25%, or 1 in 4 children.

Ok end of bio lesson. So why educate the public? According to them, the gynae doesn't do checks for SMA gene carriers when doing genetic testing, so they are trying to get more people to ask for that. Simple law of economics, if there is a demand, there will be a supply. At the same time, the blog offers us a few choices to help support research in SMA if we have the means. And really, it's our choice. I ended up spending more time reading the comments under one of the posts rather than the post itself cuz as heartwarming as most of the encouraging comments were, there were still a few by skeptics who were questioning the charity or organisation that the blog advocates, when actually it is really just about our own personal choice (like a fellow reader pointed out). Have some control and chill, people. Personally, I do not know anything abt gynaes n genetic testing and whatnot cuz im not in that phase of life or age yet. And neither are my friends. But I guess I could share the story next time so that as it spreads to other people, more will learn about the disease, whether it concerns them or not.

As Avery's dad likes to add (totally awesome n tear worthy):

"Whatever I bring to life, because I don't have time to sit back and wait for life to bring anything to me."

After wiping all my tears and I thought I've dehydrated, I decided to start on the movies that I saved (sidetrack: youtube actl has FULL movies!!! just that we have to be quick to watch or the copyright holders will complain and it will be removed) back during my study period and I was procrastinating and reading movie synopses to decide which movie link to save. Here is my haul~ for anyone interested in "free online movies" as ur google search would be, u can try typing the title into youtube search bar, the names should appear if not removed. There were a whole lot more but some I have watched before and some I have no interest in. I have read most of these movies' synopses and liked them thus saved them.

Can tell that I have searched for other random stuff during exams eh hahaha the dancing rhythm n all that was for my dance module cuz I suck big time. Anyway, after thinking for a while, decided to settle with Hello Ghost, because it was the first movie I found during this sem, halfway through exams I think. But the vid was removed by the time i re-checked during exams so I found another new subbed link =D thought would be better to watch before this got removed too.

And coincidentally, this movie was about death too. I mean sorta linked. The recurring theme was actually family. I remember reading reviews saying it's tear-wrenching etc etc but was surprised that my eyes were pretty dry except from laughing hard at some parts...then like the last 10 minutes or so? Damn the waterworks started T.T this movie is so good that I don't even want to provide spoilers like I usually like to do. Cuz I think everyone should watch it!!! The twist comes at the most unlikely part and it took me a few seconds to register and then woah, im crying. N it was really unexpected, for me at least, even after reading the synopsis cuz either I don't remember the details or the synopsis I read long ago was really just that, a synopsis and not a spoiler. Worse thing is, my parents were readying for bed, not IN BED yet so I was trying so hard to keep it in and let the tears flow ever so silently and wiping them off surreptitiously. Once they were in their rooms and the door shut, I started sniffing so loud cuz my nose was really blocked by then.

And these two separate events (do I call them events?) made me really wonder about life and how I'm always complaining or like wondering all those "what ifs", n how the grass is super green n lush on the other side, when there are actually so many things I should be grateful for. First, being alive. Second, having a complete family that actually cares for and loves me. Third, having en education. and the list goes on. N then we are to think, there are actually plenty of people who are worse off than us in many ways. Not saying that we should build on other people's despair, but each and every one of us have something that is better or worse off than others. There is really no "perfect" in this world. Cuz we as humans never seem to be satisfied. We want bigger, better, faster, all the "er" just to trying being the "est" in the world. Impossible. I remember chatting with my mum regarding this impossibility just a few days back. It was really one of those random philosophical chats I've been having with her over lunch n at random times when I'm sick of sitting there mugging. My theory is that the only way we can ever achieve "perfectness" is when we embrace and accept who we are and the situation we are in. No longer longing for something that someone else has, thinking its better, only for you to think that actually that isn't good enough when you yourself are in that position. We always aim higher and higher but for what. Doesn't really gives us happiness eh. But that's the whole point of being human I guess, we are imperfect and thus we have these thoughts that render our lives imperfect for us too. Like for me, I don't think I can ever deny myself of the fact that I really do things to gain satisfaction and thus with no satisfaction, I no longer find the value in that thing. Satisfaction=motivation for me. The wondrous nature of humans. Tsk.