Nurture and Groom

Nurture and groom the new plants, they say.
The Old Farmer scratched his head, familiar words, he thought to himself.

Then it came back to him.
Nurture and groom, his motto back in those days.
Nurture he did, the whole plot of land,
nurturing the plants,
grooming them into plants with different types of flowers, different types of fruits.
A thriving farm, back in those days.

What happened to the farm, the Old Farmer wondered.

The Nanny

The Nanny's status on Facebook:  pensive.

Pensive that the foster child has grown up, and gone back to his parents.
Relieved that that burden is gone.
Pensive that the child, foster though he was, was no longer around, crying to be fed,
and happy when read to.
Relieved that the shaping of the next path  is in his parents' hands.
Relieved that there's no one looking over the shoulders anymore to check  that the baby has been fed the right type of formula milk, burped, etc.
And yet ....
... still pensive over the child's future, foster though he was.

The Nanny is feeling pensive.

The Sweet Doll

The little sweet Doll, sitting demurely on the princess chair,
with big eyes and long lashes, petite mouth and button nose,
her blonde hair curled around her petite face.

The princess she was in the toy room,
adored by the Girl and her family for her demure propriety,
her Queen's English (from the record player at her back).

And more importantly, for her amazing hands,
which demure and smooth they looked,
could scrub clean any stubborn stains left by uncouth creatures.

The Doll, what  an amazing Hyde and Jekyll act.
A demure adorable  Doll in the day to her mistress.
Yet transformed to a witch worthy of those in the Harry Potter movies,
terrorising the toys in the toy room, demanding them to do her bidding.

The intrigues of the toy room.
So pure and simple in the day; yet a sea of chaotic manouvres as dusk fell.

One has to take care what kind of doll to bring home.

To Lead or Not

Is leadership given, earned or is one born into it?  Quite a number of articles debating that.

At times, one doesn't feel like one.
When one gets negative effervescent reactions to new missions.
One feels one has failed as a leader.

Then there are negative responses to attempts to track and manage projects or programmes that are falling behind.
One wonders if one is just too picky. Is one a bad leader?

One sees other teams, members rushing around like bumble bees, serving up the outputs under stress.
How come some teams are so motivated and others not?
One must have failed as a leader then not to be able to motivate one's team.

Unmotivated, lackadaiscal.  No one's fault but the so-called leader's, it must be, going by conventional wisdom.

Lead.  What a four-letter word.

Yue Fei

Yue Fei is a patriot and a hero admired over the generations.  The story of his mother famously tattooing "loyalty" onto his back.

Though a story of immense courage, loyalty and perseverance, the drama is hard on the heart.
To see good men sacrificed for lack of leadership, or not even leadership, just simple commonsense on the part of those sitting in the leader's seats.
To see good men sacrificed by the treachery of corrupted traitors who easily swayed brainless emperors.  No wonder the Song dynasty declined.
While on the Jin's side, the leaders were brave and fearless, dedicated and aligned in their mission.

And for the family back home, how they suffered despite the national duty of Yue Fei.
Honour, duty, country. What price the family had to pay.

Corruption and treachery loomed as large as bravery and sacrifice in the drama series.
How important it is to have incorruptible and loyal officials.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qNeWrDnFoVE

http://www.dramacool.com/drama-detail/the-patriot-yue-fei

The hard pencilled borders

The white paper, it flutters hopefully, for help.

The  white paper, full of lines.

Pencilled, yet so hard to erase.

Each line deeply etched - did they use  4H pencil?!

Each turf clearly drawn.

Nary shall a letter or a punctuation mark cross over!

And neither shall I spare you any comma or bracket.

Full stop.

The little white paper.

It despairs.

Its little paper tears seep through the white paper,

like chromography.

The lines blur,

though a deep trench remains,

a reminder of the deeply etched lines.

And so the little paper tears go,

seeping thoroughly through the white paper.

The lines eventually gone.

But so was the little white paper by then.

All limp and so easy to tear.

Fare thee well, little white paper.

That's how kingdoms fall.

The Energiser Snail

The little old energiser Snail.
Sliding all around, in circles, in patterns, in waves,
Daintily throwing little flowers as it glides, energised and brimming over.

A thousand flowers bloom, they say.
The little old Snail throws, here, there and everywhere.

But the omnipresent Grass shy away,
moving their blades aside as the flowers fall,
and fall on the hard soil.

The little flowers wither, with a whimper,
sad at not being embraced.

And the little old Snail slows down,
drained, despite the full-battery within.
For the battery heart was saddened and dying,
dying from the lack of enthusiasm.

And so the little old Snail lays on the hard soil,
among its withered flowers,
one or two with petals still hopefully fluttering.

The little old Snail,
with its deadened heart and its energiser battery still technically strong.

Knot Goode Enuff

Miss Knot Goode Enuff works hard.
She works hard to do the work well.
Works hard to groom the willing.
Works hard to manage, though that gets harder and harder nowadays.

Miss Knot Goode Enuff tries hard.
But it's always not good enough.
The marker keeps moving, further and further each time.
So she's always not good enough.
The judgements, the condescending looks,
she's tired of them.
The marker keeps moving, ever changing,
till she is tired, tired of  trying to reach it.

Miss Knot Goode Enuff is good enough,
good enough for herself!
Yes, she is!

The Cheeses

The Cheeses live in the Freedge.

All kinds of Cheeses, all hailing from the Dairy ancestor, but evolved to different types.  Some Brie, some Cheddar, some Parmesan, and some with long names like Mascarpone.

The Cheeses like their own spots in the Freedge.

But there are other residents in the Freedge.  Some big, some small.  Some come and go.  When new residents come in, or previous residents return to the Freedge, seating spots have to be adjusted.

Sometimes new creations are made, like Tiramisu, from Milk, Mascarpone and Coffee.  Or Cake, from Flour, Cheese and Eggs.

And so life goes on.  Each doing its best, to keep its freshest and most optimal in the Freedge.

Passing through ... the Long Corridor

The long corridor, the throughway we pass through,
to get from our end to the other.
The long corridor that I dread.  To pass through.

For the long corridor brings back memories ...
... memories of waiting outside the operating theatre,
memories of the hours of waiting, of anxious waiting,
of looking intently each time a bed is pushed out.
Memories of waiting from  day to dusk.
Though memories from another hospital.

Memories from half a decade away.
Memories of tubes being stuck in various parts of the body,
after the lung operation.
Memories of her moans of pain, vivid even now.

Along the long corridor, memories return,
even as one tries to shut them out,
as one tries to walk briskly through to the other side.
Along the long corridor, memories flood back,
especially when one bed is pushed on one's direction.
Keeping a lid on memories, one walks quickly on.

The long corridor of the NNI,
from the entrance near the mortuary,
to the other end, where the lifts are.