The Hill

3rd year. Oh my, how fast does it all go; although I still have 3 semesters to go it all seems to be approaching much faster than anticipated. 33 weeks. 231 days of studying.

Remember when you were a child watching the countryside fly by in a car, wondering about the distance and scale of everything? How long until we get there? How fast will we need to drive to come across those hills, and what’s behind them? Well, as of now, I am speeding towards those hills, wondering if I have enough speed or even willpower to drive over them. Do I have enough gas? Will the engine hold? Will my tyres stick to the road? What’s the weather up there? Only time will tell.

How to make it more bearable, perhaps even efficient? Cut a few minutes off there and add them somewhere else. And well, how much sleep do I really need? Time becomes just a commodity, a medium through which I channel everything and nothing at once. Calendar to the rescue! Log everything, set up reminders, resolve time conflicts, slice up every minute into different tasks and piece everything together like a large jigsaw. Does the large picture make sense? Hopefully it does. Does this piece fit in here? Hopefully it does. Does this make things better, progresses forwards to the greater goal? Hopefully it does.

But what if it does not fit, what if the jigsaw piece should go in much sooner, what if you encounter a barrier sooner than you expect? Simple choice, or is it? Make a run for it, hide, face it with all you’ve got, stumble and fall, only to get up and soldier on … neither is the ultimate answer, the simple cookie-cutter solution, either can be applicable. Unexpected occurrences, mistakes, mishaps, errors; these will always be present no matter how easy or hard the jigsaw is going to be.

But wait, are we looking at the correct jigsaw? Shouldn’t we look forward, towards greater challenges, and have this one fade out of existence? Maybe, however small or insignificant today’s issues can be in comparison with the issues of tomorrow, they are still carrying a substantial significance. What if this small and insignificant piece blocks a much more important piece later? What if we just don’t recognize that this completed puzzle may be itself a small piece to a larger puzzle? Trial and error as it seems. Hopefully the errors can be corrected sooner than later, if at all.

Now, how do you coordinate your journey while hurling towards the hill? There is no clear way. Does applying a little more gas help? Does slight turn to the left help us choose a better path? Did anybody make it across this particular hill? Let’s just run with it, and see what’s at the top, or perhaps what grander hills lie beyond. What if there’s nothing behind the hill, just disappointing empty planes stretching forever? Well, in that case let’s enjoy the road rather than the endpoint. Sure, the road is quite bumpy and the wind does not seem to stop rocking the car from side to side, but the excitement cannot be lessened by such temporal nuisances.

The top of the hill awaits.

 

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