A little whisper in the dark

Like I had wings

Some time ago, I'd had a vivid dream, unlike nightmares which most people remember, mine was a good one.

In this dream I was in a lush valley, everything in Technicolour, the grass a lush green, the sky an azure blue, rocky cliff faces forming either side of valley, ending with a cascading waterfall. As dreams don't have to be logical, the next thing I knew I was soaring across the valley. My dreams usually aren't ridiculous airy-fairy stuff, so in this one I actually had a hang glider. (of course, how I managed to learn to fly a hang glider I do not know) The experience was so intense, so real, that my pulse raced, I could feel the rise and the fall of flight, and somehow, subconsciously, I felt my breath coming in short, ragged gasps. I shouted at the people below, swooped down at them, and then soared across the face of the waterfall and then down again......

I can't remember how the dream ended, but its funny how I remembered it all of a sudden, sitting here, wondering what I could blog about. I've been a little 'blogged out' lately, wondering what I could write about.

Back then, work was good, things were going well, I had the time to watch telly, watch some feel-good adventure stuff (NatGeo Adventure on SCV) and it doesn't take much to put good things together in a dream.

Its a sad bloke who wishes for the weekend to be over so that he can get back to work, but that's what I sometimes feel like on Friday, the weekend breaks the flow of work and then I'd have to pick it all up again on Monday.

I wonder if other people feel that way midway through a project, when it seems that things aren't moving well, and there's the inkling of self doubt that this thing could actually be completed. The golden question, 'Is it worth it?' I look at row upon row of trees, I wonder how much of it is my effort, and how much of it belongs to the people whom I direct to actually do the work. I've to admit, delegating work is something I'm not entirely comfortable with, but its something that I've found necessary to do.

How convincing is it, when you tell the workers to plant faster, when you are standing under a tree in the shade, while they struggle with a heavy wheelbarrow across a muddy rutted path in sweltering midday heat?

I still have trouble coming to terms with it myself.

And so I find myself protecting myself, giving instructions to their foreman, instead only giving them the nod or the wave, or "Selamat Pagi" in the morning when I see them. But who am I kidding, their labour is the result of my instruction.

But without my project, they'd be slogging somewhere else also. Oh well. Look on the nicer side of life, at the green fields, at the baby trees taking root in the fertile soils, and the mechanical symphony of earthmoving equipment making it all happen.

Yesterday, I laughed out loud. A dumptruck got stuck in the mud, so the excavator came over and gave it a friendly shove with its shovel to get it going. I might be a bit stressed, because I found that terribly funny but no one else reacted to it.

Just as well. There's not been much to smile about at work lately.

posted by Chung Leong @ 10:57 PM