In Continuum.

Yes, the greenish looking cloud above is, in fact, a nebula. A nebula is really just a giant cloud of dust, hydrogen, and plasma. A nebula is where a star could be formed in the near future, but of course by "near future" in astrological terms, we are talking about millions and millions of years. Gas, dust, and other materials become clumped together into this huge rotating ball, and thus a planet is formed that floats in space. If suitable, maybe it'd support life in the future. Plants would grow on the lands and cells would form bigger cells with other cells. Then animals would live in the sea, crawl out onto the shore, be strong enough to live on land, and everything else will soon come afterwards. A nebula is where it all began though, and I dare say that our own planet began this way too, a long long time ago. But before everything is formed, it remains as a cloud in space, swirling around each other, twirling and teasing at the idea of one day coming together forever to form a planet. Well, it is interesting to know that the same things that used to make up the planets in a nebula is in us, too. We are made of the same thing, and it just feels good sometimes to know that you are all a part of the universe, somehow. 

 A friend of mine and I were sitting at a the Balcony one night, talking about girls we were into at that time. By that, I mean the bar down in town, the one next to Heerens that opens twenty-four hours a day. That friend of mine has always been the one to follow the rules, never stepping out of line, never doing anything out of the ordinary. I suppose it was the Catholic upbringing in his family that made him that way. My friend was never the guy to take chances, even when I knew him in the army. He drove recklessly when he was the driver of our vehicle, and valiantly killed a rogue rat in our bunk by kicking it in the guts one afternoon. That was probably the most adventure he's ever got in his life, until one night when he met a beautiful girl at an event we were in charge to run. Oh, she was beautiful indeed, and swept many guys off their feet when she was around. Yet, only he had the guts to go up to her and ask for her phone number, an act in which many of us still talk about unto this day. We never expected him to do anything so impulsive, so spontaneous, and so bold. I suppose something made sense in his head that night, something fell into the right place. She rejected him outright in his face, but I suppose the act of doing something so wild proved something in his heart, that even he too was capable of something out of the ordinary. 

Three years on at the Balcony, we were talking about the girls we were into. He mentioned someone from his school, someone he recently got to know a little better than being strangers. We were all rather intrigued by this news, and we wanted to know more about our mystery woman. After all, this friend of mine does seem to have a certain taste in woman, always looking upon them from afar and never getting too near. Maybe it is the trauma of the rejection still young within his heart, no one really knows. But we know for sure that from that time onwards, our friend never stepped out of the circle anymore. We talked about the girl from school he was into, but even he couldn't tell us much about her at all. Having been out with her a couple of times on a couple of occasions, our friend never really found out what she likes and what she doesn't like. He doesn't know her birthday, or what schools she went to, her favorite type of music, her hobbies, or anything of that sort that you'd normally know of someone you like, even a little bit. He was just infatuated with her, somehow, and never taking a step further from square number one. I told myself, there and then, never to like someone from afar, never to be in the distance, or on the outside looking in. Oh yes, he was looking in all right, but always with a blindfold and behind a veil. It was as good as never liking anyone ever before.

Months passed, and it was last week when my friend and I were talking about yet another girl he was into, another friend of course. It is easy to like someone from your school, it is convenient that way. I told him that I'd never go for anybody from my own school, but that "condition" sounds ridiculous, now that I think about it. All these conditions that we set for ourselves, they change over time don't they? I started out when I was a little boy, wanting my wife to have pale skin and long hair. In truth, there is nothing about pale skin and long hair pointing to a woman being the love of my life. It was a childish thing, but that was what I grew up wanting. The first girl I ever liked in my life had pale skin and long hair, but it was a childish infatuation in primary school, and I wasn't very nice to her back then because I kept telling her ghost stories that freaked her out. The second girl that I really liked also had pale skin and long hair, but my infatuation for her was so blinded that I could have tripped in broad daylight. And that was what happened on Valentine's Day one year, I tripped myself and broke into a dozen pieces altogether. Then I realized that childish "condition" for a girl doesn't work anymore, and it was time to move on to someone else, with different "conditions". 

Movies have been a big thing in my life ever since I was little. I remember watching Aliens when I was younger, and had nightmares about it for two weeks straight of those xenomorphs crawling out from the floor. I was amazed at the power of films, and music quickly caught on after that. So later on in my life, movies and music became such important "conditions" for someone I love, and I thought finding someone with the same taste in those areas was vital and, above all else. I was someone who believed in the fact that tastes in such thing tell a lot about who you are and what you believe. There are studies done overseas in regards to the type of personalities in accordance to the type of music one listens to. It has been proven that people who listen to a certain genre of music, for example, has the same type of personality traits somehow, more or less. I thought the same way too, and thought it'd make sense to have someone who enjoys the same movies, and loves the same music. I found someone with that kind of likings in life, someone who'd share the same tub of popcorn with me at the same movie, and talk about the same artiste over the phone late into the night. I thought that was it, everything was right, and we were going to grow old together. 

She left me in the spring of 2006, a day that I shall not soon forget. The irony of it all, the way we attended an artiste's concert together just two days after we decided to sever our ties. We had to sit through what brought us together in the first place, despite wanting to run away from each other. It was uncomfortable, but I survived it nonetheless. I lost interest in trying to come up with other "conditions", I didn't want to set up priorities any longer. They don't seem to work anymore, as clear as the last relationship taught me. So then I learned that whatever happens, happens. You cannot stop something from happening when it forces itself in, because they don't answer to anyone and they are not bounded by laws or rules. They barge in when they want, they leave when they feel threatened, and not even your priorities or conditions are going to stop it from happening. That gave me an easier view on life, and love, and relationships. When you know what you are looking for, when you have a grocery list of what you want to buy at the supermarket, you are constantly looking for things down the aisles, pushing your shopping cart around. But there are times, when you just want to crumple that piece of paper and feel surprised at what you might find. 

Right now, I just feel that life should be about having fewer knobs to turn. Think of the youth as a dashboard of a plane, and the sunset years to be the iPod with just one single click wheel. You should grow better at dealing with things, having lesser switches and knobs to turn, and life should get easier. One shouldn't be boggled down by these stupid little conditions that we set for ourselves, you know? He should be this age, he should be this rich, he should be this handsome, he should be this tall. Those are just the superficial aspect of things, and most people tend to forget that on a deeper level, connection is really what we should be aiming for. I feel comforted when I connect with someone, over a conversation or just small talks. Knowing that someone else feels the same way as you do, knows the same things as you do, likes the same thing as you do, they are certainly deeper than skin deep, but they are not deep enough. Understanding someone, getting someone, despite the differences - that is at the core of all that is love, I feel. It's the need to connect with someone, and that is the same basic reason why we create relationships, even friendships, with other human beings. When you feel like there is a place where the both of you are drawing the same ideas and feelings from, somewhere far away - you know that you have found the right person to settle down with. 

It's like this concept that I have heard before, something about how someone else halfway around the world may have the very same original idea as yourself, even if you claim that you have came up with it on your own. It is as if all human beings as somehow connected to this distant star, and we are drawing our ideas from there like how you would drink milkshake out of a cup with a straw. With someone that you hold dear, it feels very much the same way as well. You just feel like there is a star, a planet, or a nebula somewhere out in outer space, connecting the both of you in some strange and miraculous ways. You send a signal to the star and the other person "downloads" it, and feels the same way. Have you ever had that feeling? Thinking that maybe there is a place where the both of you stores the same ideas and feelings towards something? It is magical, to know that you are connected in such a vast system, and a perfect system at that. You see, I learned about trigonometry when I was in primary school, and I learned that the angles within any triangle is always going to add up to a hundred and eighty degrees. What makes this concept of human connection perfect is that, it doesn't matter how far away this person may be from the other person. You may put this person in one country and one person in the next, in a different time zone and weather altogether. You know that there is always a third angle somewhere out there, making sure that the angles inside the triangle adds up to a hundred and eighty degrees every time. It is comforting to know that physical distance is no longer a factor, and that you can never beat a relationship that is based on numbers and mathematical equations. Because really, we are all connected in strange and miraculous ways, right? That is also why human beings came up with the horoscopes to explain our connections with each other, and the stars. We are all connected, we are all a part of the universe. 

So if you work at it hard enough, maybe some day all the dust and all the gas will come together to form a planet. From this planet, if the conditions are right, maybe there'd be life. Plants may grow and animals may thrive. Maybe an intelligent life may eventually emerge, and then all the beautiful things would come along the way. Of course, there could be fights along the way, wars waged and people being killed in this new planet. But that is a risk that we all have to take with every nebula that we connect with. If we are careful, if we put in enough love in its development, it could turn into something that is perfect, something beautiful. Oh, the possibilities, I think we all have a nebula floating around in space. Perhaps one day you'd find one for yourself, and I'd find one for me. Ours would connect and form this giant cloud of common ideas and memories, and the rest would be up to us to make happen. That is the magic of it all, that is the "divine plan", in my opinion. Nothing biblical about it, no superior being creating the world within seven days. It is the space between two people, the connection, that builds worlds out there. Love, at the end of all things, is what make everything - beautiful.