Childhood Memories

I sat down in my thinking chair, closed my eyes and counted to ten with each breath. Feeling calm, I thought back to times of my childhood when I felt joy. Flashes of images came running through my head. I caught glimpses of each one. 

As I tried to focus on the first ones that appeared, they were memories of me reading books. Reading books used to be my way of getting away from the real world, into my own world where the details were created bit by bit as I read through the book. At times, I found myself staring off into space when I was reading, caught up in the magical world that I have created inside my head. I could be anything; a soldier, a gladiator, a character in a fairy tale. Imagination was the only limit to what I can become in my world.

Then there were the memories of me creating things like artworks and origami. I used to take art as a subject in school. It wasn't my best subject, but I found it interesting (the awesome idea I have in mind usually don't translate very well onto paper). I remember getting some comic books, then going home and drawing the characters in the books. This was something I loved doing. Our art teacher was great in encouraging us to develop our skills and exposing us to different styles of art. He was someone that I looked up to and respected and played a great part in this phase of my life. 

Origami was another thing that I loved doing as a child. I have no idea how this started but there was a point when i was carrying a small "briefcase", and I would just fold and fold and fold and fill it up with paper cranes. As I grew older, I began searching for more challenging things to make. I had origami books and I could pretty much do everything in them. Thinking back, I realised that being in love gave me great ideas, in other words, love fueled my creativity. Here's an example of what I did when I was in love.

Why do..

birds, suddenly appear?

Every time you are near.

Just like me

They long to be

Close to you.

Why do stars

fall down from the sky

Every time, you walk by.

Just like me,

They long to be

Close to you

On the day that you were born

The angels got together,

And decided to create a dream come true,

So they sprinkle moon dust in your hair of gold.

And starlight in your eyes of blue.

That is why all the boys in town,

Follow you

all around.

Just like me

They long to be

Close to you

That certainly brought back some bitter sweet memories, but moving on. I also got into something called architectural origami. These were probably the most time consuming projects that I have gotten into. A big part of it involves patiently cutting out the pieces and when you're done cutting, you would then have to slowly fold everything into place so that they would fold nicely in half and turn into a pop-up when you opened it up. I can remember sitting back and with a sigh of relief after I'm done with each one.

This model of Sagrada Familia was probably the one that took the longest. 

To sum it all up, I guess in general, I loved creating things, whether its a book or an artwork. Its the process of creation that moved me, the anticipation of what the end result would be like. And when it does come out the way you want it to, nothing can beat the satisfaction that you feel from that.

P.S. A small part of me was into puzzles during my childhood. A type of puzzle called "Fill-it-ins", in particular. It's very similar to a crossword puzzles, but you are given all the words and you have to fit them all in into the grid.