How willing are you to sacrifice something in the name of love?  Last weekend, I had a moment to rediscover my immense willingness to give up a lot of things for the person I love, despite the many hurts I have gone through.

As an unexplored inner obsessive-compulsive behavior caught up with me last Sunday afternoon, I went to clean up our makeshift walk-in closet at the apartment.  And as I was sweeping floors and rearranging furniture, I had this sudden urge to go through my heaps of books, notebooks and other stationery neatly piled in one corner of the room.

One thing about why I find it fulfilling to write is that it enables me to look at my past and recollect the different kinds of experiences I had recently gone through.  And as my eyes pored over my series of fiction novels and blank notebooks, a familiar piece of the past caught my eye.  I took it out and carefully dusted off its cover, which bore the words “Here and Now” in the upper-left corner of its hardbound covering.  I lifted its pages, slowly, one by one, as if weary of something that may jump right out of it and catch me off-guard.

Thankfully, it bore nothing of what I was anxiously anticipating.  It, however, carried everything I had ever feared about.  You see, this was my private journal, a piece of the past given to me by, well, someone from the past.  In it I wrote all my most intimate thoughts and feelings, my bitter realizations about my past relationship, my naive musings about love, and some pages shared with friends writing and doodling about.

I read through its pages again one by one, and I could not help but feel the stabbed wounds cut open once again; wounds that I thought were forever closed by a momentary moment of truthful conversation; wounds that I thought were already healed and sealed tight forever.  Reading everything I wrote made me realize how hurt I was then.  It showed me how much of myself I gave up for the sake of the other person I loved wholeheartedly.  It presented to me a picture of myself that I never wanted to see again.

And yet, there it was, staring me blankly in the face, unaware of the piercing effect it had on my emotions.  My mood nosedived immediately after.  It made me resent writing and all its certainties amidst an uncertain world.  I mean, how could I ever say I was thankful for the hurt because it showed me how to love, when there I was, looking back at those words, painfully regretting the fact that I allowed myself to be taken advantage of by someone—and someone I deeply loved at that?

What followed after was a series of angsty realizations that took a toll on my already desolate disposition.  I struggled hard to reconcile the fact that love doesn’t come without hurts.  ‘I mean, how can something so good do something so bad?’, I asked a friend.  All we were able to do was heave a collective sigh, a sigh we knew echoed the many sentiments of people around the world, in the absence of a satisfactory answer to our never-ending queries about love, life, hurts, and sacrifice.

Maya Angelou once said that we should love until it hurts because when we do, there will be no more hurts, only more love.  Well, I’ve loved… and I’ve been hurt (bad, at that)… what now?  Where is the ‘more love’ and ‘no more hurt’ she’s talking about?  Seriously.  Give me a hand here.  Love hurts?  You bet hell and heaven it does.  So why still go for it?

The trouble with life is its open-endedness.  The problem with writing rests in its being finite, final, complete.  See the contradiction there?  It’s no surprise, therefore, that words will end up falling short of describing reality.  But does that make words already written eventual lies?  I’ll leave the thinking to your pondering thoughts.  Truth, as it is, is an evasive musing that has escaped the hands of many a philosophers over the centuries.

I was afraid I would speak too soon.  It still baffles me how uncanny the practice of writing has been.  Setting eventualities in words tends to cage thoughts and emotions that linger in the room of uncertainty—because words make them certain, concrete, articulate.  But can these things be captured whole in the first place?  Aren’t we just preoccupying ourselves with useless wandering that can possibly be rendered nonsense by a simple slip of the tongue or a hapless turn of events?

Things have been looking up, alright.  Too high, however, that they may even cross the limits of heaven itself.  The danger with rising so high is the inevitable outcome of the fall.  As with any story, the climax comes with a sharp and quick fall.

And so now I wait for the denouement to arrive.  Until then, let’s keep things open and uncertain.  Whatever happens, happens.  And if I may choose to set them in words rests solely on the premise that it is worth doing so.

Good times are hard to come by these days, that’s why it’s always a good habit to commemorate when it approaches you all of a sudden.  I’ve been down and lonely the past few months, burdened by problem after problem that consumed most of my energies.  But through those ordeals, all I had in my mind’s eye was a future when things will start to look up.  And I’m happy (and at the same time afraid) to say that I believe things are on their way to getting better, definitely.

Family Life
Our financial problem hasn’t left us yet, but in a way I’m off the hook.  My mom is starting to get better ever since retiring early for work, and my dad… well, he’s the same piece of furniture in the house, which I’m trying my best to ignore.  In the middle of all this is my little sister, to whom I feel ultimately indebted to.  I shall get back to her when things get better in the future.

Love Life (…?)
I’ve definitely moved on from my past, evidenced by the absence of longing despite weeks of no contact.  And I’m also happy to say I’m lighting a new flame, albeit everything remaining uncertain up to now.  “Let’s just enjoy our time together…” and “You make me happy” are two lines I will never, ever forget.  And I think that for now, that will do for me.  We may never end up together eventually but still, I’m thankful that I met someone who made me smile again.  And for that, I will be eternally grateful.

Work
I shouldn’t even be calling it work.  This should be deemed extended student life, without the perks of free cut.  Haha.  This is one area of life that I’m doing really well with.  Just the other day, I made an article about how the Internet helped in the relief efforts during Typhoon Ondoy.  My good editor sent me this email a few days after publishing the article online:

The moment I read those words, my jaw dropped to the floor and I felt every blood in my body rush down to my foot.  I was completely dumbfounded.  It felt great to have your work appreciated, but it felt better to receive validation from the ones who matter the most.  Again, for that, I’ll be eternally grateful.

Finances
This is probably the area I’m having the hardest time with, but thankfully I’m getting by each payday.  Still, the situation’s not at all good, and I just hope there’ll come a time when I’d be able to treat myself when I want to, or at least spend a couple of my earnings for myself, and not for paying off debts.  Regardless, I’m thankful that my needs are provided for, even if it gets a bit hard at times (and I have to eat noodles for days on end!  ARRRR)

Friends
Compared to money matters, this is the area I’m definitely the happiest.  Friends are always love, and I’m glad to know that despite small bickerings and misunderstanding, I just know we’re stronger than ever.  I just miss them, you know?  We don’t have much time to go out anymore.  But I’m glad that every time we’re together, a new happy memory is formed, a new moment is there to cherish.  AND FOR THAT I’LL BE FOREVER THANKFUL!  Luvyah, my betches! :)

I’m just afraid that with all the good things going on, the universe will find its way to bite me back in the ass one more time.  Then again, after everything that happened, all I can say is:  nothing I cannot handle! :D

I like you.  I don’t know if I love you yet but really, is there even a way of knowing or telling?  And who knows, right?  I just might.  But right now all I know is I like you, be sure of that, and I feel strongly about this—whatever it is that we have.  You’re an interesting person and you make me very happy in a more-than-profound kind of way.  I’d like to tell you how I feel about you, but I’m not really sure where it would go afterwards, or if it’d go anywhere at all.  Just listen to me, because I realize I still have a lot to know about you.  But I really, really, really like you, and I’d love to get to know you a lot better.

There’s a reason they call it the dating ‘game.’  It’s governed by rules.  You have two opposing sides with their individual goals.  Every move is a means to an end.  There are stakes involved, and every wrong move is a point off your score.  Adrenaline is expected to run high, and you may experience some high and low points in the middle of playing.

But the most important factor of this ‘game’ is that there are winners and losers, and the only way to find out if you’ve won is when time inevitably runs out.  But in spite of it all, despite getting wild applauses and deep bruises, always, always, remember that it’s just a game, and the point is to give it your all and that you have fun in the end.

Thanks for making me smile, even if it’s just a momentary thing, because smiles come around rarely this time of the year.  :)

When you’re just out of a relationship, it feels good to get rid of every piece of memory that reminds you of your old flame.  Part of the proverbial rituals of a break up include cutting that hair short (a pretty physical “letting go” of the past), burning old photos you’ve taken together, and getting rid of journals or blog posts written about your undying love for each other, which, evidently, met its bitter end.

It’s relieving, really.  Letting go of all these physical manifestations of a foregone love gives you an opportunity to start over again with a clean slate.  Tabula Rasa.  A blank page of paper.  A whole sky of blue, waiting to be painted on with clouds and birds and rainbows.  And you know how these fragrant possibilities offer multitudes of hope, which is very helpful in that difficult practice of coping.

But brushing off the dusts of an old flame is only half the step.  Sometimes, finding a new spark to ignite offers far greater possibilities.  Finding a new love can sometimes send you to heavens you never knew existed, and can give you that much-needed boost towards finally moving on.  It’s like the feeling you get before the start of school, when your parents take you to the book store and buy all your school stuff, never mind that you still have leftover supplies from last year’s shopping trip.  The smell of new notebooks, new erasers, new pens and new clothes—that’s something that can surely drive me ecstatically nuts for days on end.  I think the romantics would call it kilig.

While I’m still far from being in a new relationship—heck, even far from total recovery—the innumerable possibilities that pass by my eyes everyday is making me very excited towards finally finding the next one, or, god forbid, the one (‘cause yeah, barring pragmatic and intellectual arguments aside, I believe we’re destined to meet one person who will genuinely love us).  That thought of meeting new people, sharing your thoughts and yourself with them, is a very interesting prospect for me.  It’s like buying a new notebook and smelling the fresh paper all over again.  And quite frankly, I can’t wait ‘til the wind blows me in that direction.

But, until then, I shall innocently smile here in my corner and admire all the good things—and people—that the universe is currently sending my way.  :)

Last night, I had an epiphany.  As I was settling down the couch, fresh from dinner with close friends that are utterly missed, I realized that I’m actually making progress.  That I have, for the past few months, actually been “moving on,” even if for the past few weeks I’ve been feeling stuck in a certain sentiment, refusing to move.

Contemporary psychology says there are five stages to dealing with grief, and that the fourth stage is depression.  As I was casually fixing myself down the couch, it dawned on me: I have actually already gone through the first three stages, and that I’m now stuck in the depression stage.  No wonder I’ve been feeling a lot more morose recently.  Considering I’m really a very emo person, the past few weeks have been nothing but intense I can’t even begin to fathom its depth.

I backtracked a little, went on a little recollection down  the path I’ve just taken, and traced the stages of grief that I have, in fact, gone through.  There’s the denial part early this year, refusing to accept the pain and telling myself that I don’t need someone to love to make me happy.  Then there were the angry months of March and April, when I lashed out and blamed my ex for everything that happened.  Then there were the bargaining months of May to July, asking the universe to simply end it all, to finally give me the closure I so rightfully deserve.

And now, after getting the closure I’ve been asking for—the fourth stage of depression, which, I think, I’m currently stuck in.  While depression is not really some achievement to celebrate, I’m glad of the fact that I now realize that I’m actually moving, when for the past few months I thought I’d never get anywhere at all.

So, here’s to depression, to the lonesome feeling I’m more than prepared to bathe in for however long it should take.  I take delight in knowing this because it tells me that I’m just one step away from my goal—acceptance.  I don’t care if it comes soon, I just know it will.  And, I guess, in answer to my question in a previous blog post, that should keep me moving.

It was not at all difficult doing this out of spite—moving on, that is. Spite gives you that long-awaited push for you to finally skid through the row and walk idly down the finish line, bound to wherever you’re bound to be. Bitterness is such a sweet drug that keeps you alive and awake despite the fact that you’re nursing a broken heart, too broken to even carry on.

Spite masks the pain, because it drives the anger. And anger can fuel the nerves to help one briskly walk the other direction. It is the powerful brakes that will make the car drift and turn a full hundred and eighty degrees back to where it came from.

But now that spite has come and gone, what is there left for me to carry on? Now that the ill intentions have all but faded like wisps of smoke from a cigarette, what is there left to push me to move on?

Maybe the hopeful anticipation of what lies ahead can make me want to keep walking. Maybe the bitter realizations of the past can help me run away from it—and fast. But in so much as the present is concerned, the pain does nothing but linger, the brokenness looms just around the corner, and moving on seems like an ill-fated dream that refuses to be hatched.

Once you’ve learned to love, turning back is like reaching for the stars. And when you’ve finally learned to love someone—in a certain degree and a certain manner—you cross the point of no return. There is only unlearning in the habits and the ways you deal with the everyday things. But the love—the love shall always be there, planting its roots further and further down the deep recesses of your soul, a tree that shall never, ever be uprooted.

So, in the stillness of one’s thoughts, we beg the question: is there such a thing as moving on? Yes, there is moving on from the ways we have gotten used to, from the people we have been used to being with, from the things we have been used to holding. But I believe there is no moving on from the love you once shared with someone; because love, even if it has met its inevitable failure, can never be forgotten, can never be left unspoken, can never be buried under the remnants of a new one.  It shall live immortal and follow death as its loyal lapdog, forever a part of us that can never be erased, no matter how hard we try.

Nothing can ever make you own up to the feeling of independence or lonesome than by getting sick. Contracting a fever or nursing a flu is a surefire way to make you feel that you're alone, because it underscores the fact that you have your own body to battle with and that only you can get into fight with it. Getting sick highlights the feeling of isolation because at a time like this, company is most sought-after and if one fails to find it, the sinking feeling of lonesome seeps in even more.

I've been sick the whole weekend, probably the longest time since I've last been sick after religiously taking vitamins for the past few months. I can't say I'm to blame for this, but I also can't say that I didn't ask for it. I've run out of vitamins last week and my stubborn self refused to drag my feet along the Watsons store that's a stone's throw away from the office. In a way, I wanted to get sick. In an abominably sick (pun intended) way, I needed to get sick.

I needed it because I wanted to know the worth of my existence. Deep, I know, and very existentialist, too. But you know how it is when you get sick--people stumble upon their tracks to comfort you, console you, ask what you need and make the best efforts to make you feel good. So, in a way, being sick is selfish. It validates your worth among your peers. And wanting to get sick--even more.

In a way, getting sick has provided me the time to rest and think about a lot of things. And, suffice to say, it has proven a lot of things as well. It fortified my belief that I'm really on my own now--that no matter how much I try to believe that there are people out there whom I can steadily lean on, at the end of the day it's just me and my bed, me cooking my own food, me buying my own medicine, me trying my best to take care of myself. (I do not discount the fact that I have friends to call up on, but I also try, as much as possible, not to take them out of their own lives, because we all know people can only be bothered so much)

When you sum it all up, there's just me and no one else. And, in a maddeningly eccentric way, I'd say I needed that emphasis--that underline, bold and italics--to tell me that I can no longer expect someone--anyone--to be there for me, that I only have myself to lean on, that I can only trust myself to take care of me.

Because at the end of the day, I only have myself to turn to. At the end of the day, it's just me and no one else.

Independence, in a way, is both liberating and restricting. It opens up an entire world to you but if you're not ready to take those difficult steps using your own two feet, you're not bound to get anywhere. And in yet another sick way I thank God I got sick, because I got my much-needed push towards that journey of finding myself again. Because we all know that it all begins with that first difficult step.

And somehow, some way, this is my version of moving on--of moving forward. So here's to getting better--and here's to 'getting there'.

If lore and superstition are to be believed, then a person gets to whisper a wish for every falling star he sees.  But what of a dozen meteors spraying the twilight sky?

(via)

Does it mean we get a thousand wishes by tonight? 

(August is one of the most popular times of the year to observe meteor showers. The famous Perseids meteor shower will be observed with its peak on the late night of August 12 until dawn on the following day. Occasionally, an exceptional shower may show tens or even hundreds of meteors per minute, but around 50 meteors per hour is more typical. The Perseids meteor shower is the most reliable one, which is best seen during August 10-14 every year) (via)

Suppose the myth is true, and you get a wish for every single meteor you see, what would you wish for?

I don’t need a hundred meteors for this wish.  I just need one.  I wish for love to overflow the world—as it should—just as dozens or so star-like figures flow like water sprinkling over the night sky.

Or, sige na nga, sana yumaman naman ako!  :P

This journal post is illegal. Considering I have tons of pending articles to write, sneaking a blog entry isn't really the most logical thing to do, much less something that my boss will appreciate. But I'm suddenly overcome with thoughts--unorganized and senseless, yes, but thoughts nonetheless--that I suddenly had the itch to write something. Anything. I think I need to get these things out before I can even proceed with my work.

I've been afforded a lot of thinking time lately, so I indulged in self-introspection at every moment I could. The turn of events the past few days have proved to be, well, turning points, that got me thinking really deep and hard. For one, there's the notion of trying to be independent, of breaking free from all notions of being tied down and dependency. Our family problem has really weighed me down, and I think spending time by myself--surviving on my own--is a necessary step towards reclaiming my self.

Speaking of self, I haven't been my usual self lately. For several days last week, I've been grumpy, pessimistic and, well, emo. Okay, so the latter part is my usual self, but it's been aggravated by the sinking feeling of depression and loneliness last week. It just wasn't me, and I knew it clearly. I wasn't sleeping well, I wasn't smiling a lot, and I wasn't being giddy with work.

I told myself such disposition couldn't--shouldn't--go on, so I made it a point to empty myself of baggage in order to proceed with a clear direction in mind. Last Sunday, I got my much-needed closure, albeit it hurt a lot to hear those words. Somehow, hearing the truth was a necessary pain, a required rite of passage before I could recoup and gather myself.

So now, I'm withholding any dependence I may have on people. My strategy from now on is to be selfish, to take care of myself, to think of what will happen to me first before anyone else. To hell with moralists if they deem this wrong, but I think I've lost myself enough in the problems and troubles of the world that I needed to find it again. And I realize only I could do it, away from my reliance on people and circumstances.

So here's to being dependent, and finding that self that got lost along the way. Hopefully, I will be made whole again, and, pray tell, I'd be a better and wiser person by then.

For days I’ve been meaning to write every piece of emotion that has arrested me for the past couple of weeks, yet the words seem reluctant to come out of me.  It’s as if for the first time in my 21 years of existence, the words that used to trickle down like a steady stream of water turned into hesitant newborn children, afraid of the outside world that could and would corrupt them the moment they come out.

But I am a writer.  And I have no other means of making myself heard or establishing my point than by writing.  By writing I declare my stand, by writing I tell the world that I exist and that I am a human being.  Words are my embodiment, they are inseparable as my soul to my body.

And so with this difficulty to articulate what I feel, I turn to the age-old escape hatch that writers time and again have used in order to at least assuage the nagging and itching feeling to write but the words just wouldn’t come.  Just as they say, when you have writer’s block, then write about having a writer’s block.  The blockade of words isn’t reason enough to stop writing—for writers, words may seem scarce but the world will never run out of things to write about.

Despite this feeling of helplessness and surrender in my efforts to say what I feel, I now make the best effort to articulate how difficult this is.  Not just writing, not just finding the right words and the right adjectives to say, but everything that has happened to me for the past few days.  A couple of my friends know about everything that have happened, and try as I may to narrate all of them, it seems utterly useless and pointless.  Words can never ever come close to the exact sentiments, and all I can do is try even if I know I’m bound to fail.

I met up with a friend one day, and instead of talking about my state of being, I insisted we talk about her problem.  Which we did.  And in the middle of all the long and complicated conversations, I asked her: so how are you?  What is the state of your heart today?  It was a question directed towards her, but I knew deep inside it was the exact same question I wanted to ask myself.

And as much as I dread people asking Kamusta na? because there never really seems to be a proper and correct answer to it nowadays, I faced this question with much fear and hesitation.  What is the state of my heart today?  It was a difficult question, the same magnitude as when Karen Davila asked Kris Aquino what she would do if PGMA went to her mother’s wake.

And though Kris refused to answer the question, I face it with nonchalant pseudo-bravery, because I know deep inside what the state of my heart is, and that I realize there’s no other way out of my problems than through it.  My heart, as of this very moment, shameful as it is to say to the whole world, is broken, shed to a thousand pieces, shattered by the torrent of emotions and problems that have berated me for the past couple of weeks.  And difficult as it may seem, I have no other recourse but to pick up the pieces, patch on some glue and a little tape, and slowly yet painstakingly put my heart back together.

In the midst of all these difficulties—all the emotional, physical and mental battery of tests that universe has recently sent my way—I only have one set of words, words that have forever been my refuge, that I hold on to this day:  what doesn’t kill me makes me stronger.  And with that I look on to the future, with my broken heart, hoping that some time, some day, my heart will be made whole again.

"Not As We"
by Alanis Morissette

Reborn and shivering
Spat out on new terrain
Unsure unconvincing
This faint and shaky hour

Day one day one start over again
Step one step one
I'm barely making sense for now
I'm faking it 'til I'm pseudo making it
From scratch begin again but this time I as i
And not as we

Gun shy and quivering
Timid without a hand
Feign brave with steel intent
little and hardly here

Day one day one start over again
Step one step one
with not much making sense just yet
I'm faking it til I'm pseudo making it
From scratch begin again but this time I as i
And not as we

Eyes wet toward
Wide open frayed
If God's taking bets
I pray He wants to lose

Day one day one start over again
Step one step one
I'm barely making sense just yet
I'm faking it til I'm pseudo making it
From scratch begin again but this time I as I
And not as we

Now that I have the luxury of time to think about other things aside from my current problems, I can honestly say I didn’t expect for this feeling to suddenly sink in.

I know I’ve been a masochist, willfully exposing myself and my heart to the pain, but I didn’t even feel all the hurt, didn’t even see all the wounds then.

Until now. 

Because little by little, it’s starting to sink in.  Reality is catching up with me, and spending my time escaping to a place I hoped it would never find me is inching further away from my grip.

Just like you, day by every freaking day.

After tucking it away inside my bag for more than a week, I hoisted Dharma, my mp3 player, out of my bag’s pocket and tucked its earbuds onto my ear.  I listened to the songs, intently, just like I always did before.

They were the same songs, but they had totally different meanings now.

They still pierce me—those sad, emo songs that’ve offered me company all these months.  But they don’t hurt me for the same reasons now.  Before, I was hurting because I thought you were gone for good.

But now you’re here, and I know you’ll be here for long.  But suddenly, the thought of us having different lives now appears to be a bit more unsettling than I ever thought it’d be.

And now the feeling is starting to sink in.  And once again, I’m relegated to indulge in the pain.  Because I needed this.  And, suffice to say, I asked for it.

It’s been great taking your shotgun for the ride.  But I can honestly say, I wouldn’t mind taking the backseat from now on.

Love.  It’s an amazingly unpredictable vague thing.

I don’t know why, but I always have the knack for boarding a sinking ship.  I don’t know if it’s just me, but whenever I enter a group or an organization, it’s always on the brink of collapse and everyone’s finding their own way out.  In high school, it got a little bit closer to literal when I joined a youth group with a ship as its emblem—imagine the pun, so not intended.

But I digress.  I don’t really know how to feel about it, but lately, at least four co-workers have inadvertently cut their stay in the company short.  One, I heard from the grapevine, was even ousted, while the other filed resignation in protest.  I mean, I haven’t even established decent relationship with these people yet and they’re all going bye-bye already.

Then again, maybe I should take that as a silver lining.

This got me thinking real hard about what I’m doing.  I’m still new to the industry and I can say that I’m having a really swell time so far.  But the thought of people leaving the company—or, god forbid, even the industry—to pursue other careers is just a little bit discouraging, even a bit short of disheartening.

It’s a bit harder for me because I’m a people person.  As long as I keep friends in a certain group, I’d be fine.  I’m a very social person, so it’s really important for me to have a companion wherever I am.  Throwing me alone in a pond full of old-timers is equivalent to murder.

What keeps me going is the fact that I’m enjoying writing and that I’m learning a lot from what I’m doing.  Maybe if I stop meeting interesting people or when I stop learning from my job, that’s when I’d show myself the door and find myself another house to serve.  But as long as I’m still finding it fun to do what I do, I guess I’m gonna have to stick it out for long—sinking ship or whatever.  Just like what Miley Cyrus said, “there’s always gonna be another mountain.  I always gonna want to make it move.  Always gonna be an uphill battle, sometimes I’m gonna have to lose.  Ain’t about how fast I get there, ain’t about what’s waiting on the other side.  It’s the climb.”

MileyfreakingCyrus.  I know, right?

My life has been a whirlwind the past few weeks, but it mainly gravitates towards a domestic financial issue I’m currently grappling with.  It’s not that I’m refusing to help in my family’s finances—on the contrary, I give most of my monthly pay to my mom.  It’s just frustrating how even if I give my whole earnings, it doesn’t seem to do so much as dent my family’s debt payments.  I’ve given everything, I’ve given most of what I have, yet I still don’t see where this is going, or if I’m even contributing at all.

It’s frustrating.  And many times the past weeks when my mom and I would talk, she would always break down in tears.  The last time she held it tight pretty well, but suffice to say she was on the verge.  I can handle heart problems.  I can handle academic problems.  Heck, I can even handle sexual problems (don’t ask).  But financial problems?  There’s only so much I can do.  And it’s a bit disheartening that it is I whom my mom turns to for this aspect of family.

Ummm, whatever happened to the two other males that came before me?  So much for patriarchy and machismo.

The past few weeks, I’ve been blaming soap operas for taking the drama out of real life and reproducing it as artificial reality.  Whenever I’m faced with this predicament the past few weeks, all I could think of was—hey, these things only happen in soap operas.  Well, I gotta wake up!  This is real life!  Family issues and financial burdens don’t only happen on soap operas!

UGH.  FML.

The first time I saw this photo, I immediately fell in love with it.  I love distant views and night lights, so what better to love than a very distant view of night lights, right?

When I shared this to a friend, she immediately retorted, "But that's not possible!  The other half of the world should be in daytime."

I wanted to correct her, to tell her that of course, it was digitally manipulated, that different photos at different times showing different places were stitched together to complete the view of the world, but at the course of thinking of an intelligent remark I stopped myself midway and thought... oo nga noh.

Some people operate differently talaga than other people.

Last week was a blur, albeit being one of the busiest weeks I’ve had thus far. I did quite a lot of new things for work last week, including doing an advertorial and writing an event coverage. Suffice to say new things like these keep me up on my toes once in a while, so they’re a welcome change to what I’ve been used to doing.

Last week has also been one of the hardest, still, because of an ongoing domestic issue. I refuse to divulge much about it but let’s just say that I find it ironic how the word “debt” is simply an enunciation away from the word “death.” What’s worse is that I don’t know what to do about this problem, and honestly speaking it’s been eating my morale bit by bit the past few weeks.

That incident got me thinking—what if, ten, twenty, thirty years from now, would I still have the same set of friends I have right now, who’s been my stable support system in the midst of all these trials? I know I’ve had my fair share of promising to be there for a lot of people in my lifetime, and we almost always know it’s not what happens in real life. Sure, the idea of staying friends with the same bunch of people is one sweet thought, but how do you make sure you preserve the friendship, and not just the thought?

The weekend proved to be a testament, what with the bonding time I devoted to Chururus, my college barkada, and to IA and Elsie, two of my precious gems. Still, I’m not sure if this friendship is forever; I could only hope. Nobody knows, and frankly, nobody should even care. If it is written in the hands of time, then it will be carried out.

All I can say is, love will keep me alive. And friends are definitely love. ♥

I know rainy days generally appeal to my melancholic sentiments, but gloomy weather often instantly spell a bad day for reporters like me who have to go out in the field to gather news.  Yes, I can ride a taxi to whatever coverage I’m attending, but money can only be stretched to a certain length, so mass transportation—or, more often than not, walking—is often highly recommended.

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I did an interview with a company executive this afternoon for an advertorial, and I just have to say, it’s probably one of the most difficult interviews I’ve ever done.  First, the executive was a foreign national, so I had a hard time understanding his words through the accent.  Then, he was being a bit tough, choosing his words wisely like I’m doing a big investigative report on their company or something.  But this was simply an advertorial!  For all intents and purposes, he should’ve been pimping his company to me for all I care!  Good thing their marketing officer provided me with some fliers to help me out.

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I’m finding it hard to continue writing for this raket I currently have.  Sure, it pays well, and it actually helps fund my lavish so-called lifestyle, ehem ehem.  But the articles are becoming a drag to write and the research just takes up most of my time.  In fact, I should be completing around 22 articles tonight, but here I am, blogging like the night will simply decide not to give way for the day.

I’m thinking if I should completely give the gig up, or simply ask for a lower quota.  I miss my weekends.  :(

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I’ve been coming to work immensely early these days, and I really don’t know why.  I guess I’m getting comfortable with actually being in the office, trying to accomplish things.  And… let’s just say the house is meant for sleeping, and the office is meant for working, and I’m quite on a roll with work these days.  Let’s all hope this drags on for the rest of my stay with the company.

Blech.  I hate it.  I feel so old.

My face is not as makinis as the everyday master-kinis-guwapo artista you see on TV. Yet even if it reflects lines and waves of stress and sleepless nights, I don’t usually get pimples. This is because I make it a point to wash my face everyday. Not a day would pass that any brand of facial cleanser did not touch my skin. That is why from time to time, one zit would rear its ugly head in the morning but would swiftly disappear the next day.

Imagine my surprise when at some point last week, I had a total of five pimples spread across my face. Usually I would just ignore my zits because they go away quickly, but this was a special case—this is a breakout, a sinister collusion of facial oil glands that resulted in an acne pandemic threatening to colonize my facial real estate.

Not wanting to be dominated by these stubborn zits, I easily resorted to a band-aid solution that would dry up the wells of these oil rigs and put them off to bankruptcy—literally. Benzoyl Peroxide on one hand—erstwhile known as PanOxyl, “the proven pimple treatment”—I dabbed on these pimples like a serial killer out to kill his next few victims.

And dried up they did, but I later found out that my face can outdo the rigs of Dubai in terms of oil production, so they all came back eventually. Tortured by the thought of having a face dotted with nasty zits, I doubled the dosage of PanOxyl, maniacally laughing inside my head at the thought of drying them off like an El Niño plague on steroids.

Of course, just like what the Spice Girls have said (conventional wisdom through pop culture at its best), “too much of something is bad enough.” The overdose of pimple-killing ooze didn’t come with a hefty price: it dried up the wells of acne, alright, but it thoroughly burned my skin, producing darkened spots and discoloration around the area. I swear, two more spots and I would've formed a beautiful new constellation.

To wit:


I’m just glad that it’s starting to be all okay now. I’ve just removed the burned skin which was starting to peel off this morning, and now the exposed skin burns from being exposed to the elements. Lesson learned? May mga bagay na lalo mong pinagtutuunan ng pansin, lalong lumalala. So to all my future pimples, I only have one thing to say: KEEEBBSSS!!!