apollo

"good morning! enjoy your sunday!" the message read. as expected, while the sun will rise from the east, so will i have my morning greeting from Apollo.

apollo. (ink on paper) 2008

we have never met before, nor have we ever spoken over the phone. to be honest, our longest conversation ever was this one lazy sunday afternoon wherein we exchanged SMS' the entire day playing a "getting to know you better" game. we volleyed questions at each other, having the other person guess something about ourselves from mundane stuff like what was our age to more private details. loser treats the other guy out to a movie. i won but never had the chance to claim my prize.

ever since then, Apollo would keep in touch with me over text. never really to converse but more just sending general greetings everyday saying "good morning" or "hi, just woke up and feeling lazy to go to work." there was even a time i got a message that said "hello. just got home from work and gym. feeling tired. can't wait to go to sleep! anyway, good night!".

though his messages sounded like a mass forward to a bunch of people in his phonebook, i still take time, whenever i remember to reply. he would then sometimes return my greeting with a simple "thank you" with no inkling to have further conversation. so this has been my relationship with Apollo, getting regular updates through text and me occasionally responding. his messages have now become a fixture to my day, to the point that i think they find themselves lost in the flurry of activities i jam pack myself with, disappearing in the blur. it never really occurred to me why, a practical stranger, would take such efforts in consistently sending these greetings to me (and probably also to many others), who are fellow strangers as well.

the thought came to me when Apollo again texted me this morning while i was in the middle of dimsum. probably due to the mandatory laid back decorum one has to adhere to when "dimsum-ing" that i was sober minded enough to actually ponder on this question. surprisingly, the answer came to me rather instantly. i believe Apollo was simply trying to connect with the people around him, reinforcing his existence in the memory of others and, to a certain extent, the cosmos.

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a constant fear of living alone and growing alone is that one day, we will be forgotten and that the memory of the lives we have led, though they may have been fruitful and free from many regrets, will fade away the day we expire. our existence and mark on this earth, disappear like the dream in the twilight of people's awakenings.

Apollo strums the strings of the universe by sending blanket messages to people. hoping that the vibrations he create travels far enough, long enough, for him to leave a lasting note. i reply to tell him that i heard him, that i understand what he is trying to do. maybe because i blog for the same reason.