Dear H,

The cold has indeed formed an inviting blanket as I walk early in the morning to the hospital. With my hands in my pockets, my dress/trench-coat outfit glaringly clashes with my bone-white sneaker shoes that always seem more comfortable to walk briskly in; the gloomy gray sky morning somehow insulates the warmth so easily, compounded further with the calm surrounds that the crack of dawn can bring.

Yes it has been weeks since our last discourse. What has happened in your life - you may indeed ask - as I struggle to think of an accurate answer; this same question posed to you; both of us biding our time (as if there was enough of it between us), making sense of what the past has unfolded so far.

I had a short chat with a friend: on temperatures (hot vs cold) and colours (black vs white). It seems like all things can be plotted on a scale (or a graph, if you’re diagrammatically inclined). And like a progressive study, as we chart the dots on the line, the overall picture gives us an idea of the scenario: whether the wait itself is worth waiting for.

My endeavours have been these: randomised, double-blind; a tinge of selection bias and a wealth of inconclusive outcomes. There was a predictable trend, a pattern - but denial has its rosy hues fringing it.

What about the mid-point - the grayness of a situation, the neutral sensations that blitz through as one alternates from hot to cold? Cardiologists call the isoelectric point of an ECG the J-point; orthopaedic surgeons call the balanced spine Neutral. I call it limbo; terra nullius by any other name still reeks of the unknown.

Was I blind, H; could I have seen beyond it?

How have I been thus far, I have yet to answer - for that is after all the purpose of this e-mail, isn’t it? I’m numb, H: I can feel nothing; the grayness of the morning sky the only colour that brings warmth to my heart.

I used to believe in this; I used to pray for an absolution. I don’t know what to call this unfamiliar feeling anymore.

Yours truly,
Diyana

Dear H,

My spare days have now inched towards its end; those lacklustre mornings circling the wards will now resume once more. It’s ironic - or perhaps coincidental - that I should start my rotations with Haematology: the essence of life itself, that warm blood that flows through our veins. That exsanguination - of life, love, ambition and passion - would be the death of us all eventually.

The search for perfection can consume us. I have learnt that, through those months of thinking, of waiting, I have understood that there is no way that we can be completely happy with our current station in life. It takes that last chapter - death - to end that dissatisfaction, to finally put our worries at ease.

My yearning to graduate from medical school would eventually convert into a desire to enter a training programme, thereafter pacing my years slowly to the joys of retirement. My youth will be invested too willingly in ’saving’ other people: will that in effect save my soul? A balance can somehow be sought, if I had tried, to do what I love (that is Medicine) and to love what I am doing (the other things that make living worthwhile). Where family would someday come into play; where ambitions lie beyond the reaches of the stethoscope.

I look back and think of how I could have changed events if I had more insight. And then it ceases; that desire to be someone I am not - because my past choices have made me who I am, and I cannot think of being anything else. That my flaws, being an imperfection, make me the perfect example of normalcy. And no matter what happens, this steadfastness in searching for meaning within the interstices, should keep me holding on when it seems like I’m losing my grip.

And that is coincidentally when I think of him; I am brought back to those moments where his fallibility shone through with the actions and decisions he made - that could have hurt me, but it didn’t. We can all make forgivable mistakes, because through them we learn a little more about ourselves; making sense of the chaos that curses us. If only I could tell him that it is possible to pierce through that sheath, that despite his fall - as there is a risk in everything we do - I can promise him that there are ways to break it gently. For everyone deserves to be loved for who they are, not what they can be. And I will continue moving on, with this compunction that I could have told him that before I walked away.

I believe that every single thing has worth. It just takes a little time, some faith and a lot of support to get there. And it will happen, as long as this warmth pulses from my heart.

Love
Diyana

Dear H,

Can you hear that? The rain that pounds against the glass windows; will it beat so heavily against yours as it is mine? Will it scratch the surface, does it try to creep through the gaps, to glisteningly coat the warmth that lies within? To blow the candles out, and to let the darkness seep through: once more I am blinded, once more I am cold.

I have been trying to live without it for so long - it seemed so possible at first, as I was nearing its end. But like an addiction, the withdrawal kicks in; that yearning in one’s heart beats more strongly than life itself. And I got pulled back; because those words that he keeps on saying always pulls me back. Always.

What does it mean to lose control? Why is it so hard to stand on one’s own two feet in the rain? Why is reason consumed by the rainfall?

I thought I had it right; I thought the answers were clear that night. But it was just like any other night, just like any other question in my mind. And because moving on takes more than just strength - it takes some luck too - it would be a little while more before this all ends; when the chapter runs dry.

And like the rest, he will be swimming in my memory - yet another victim drowned by rain.

Love
Diyana