Flashflood

Hunyo nanaman kaibigan. Parang
kailan lang
nang sumilip ako sa butas
ng bintana.
Sira ang capiz sa isang
parisukat
at nasilayan ko ang buhos
ng ulan
na rumaragasa sa iyong
bagang.
Hunyo nanaman kaibigan umuulan
nanaman
ngunit hindi ko na mahanap
ang patlang.

bob ong moment
may 25, 2009
2:00 pm

habang nag-aantay ng masasakyan (ako papunta sa trabaho, si tris pauwi):

d: tanginang shet yan, ang init.
t: oonga e, summer e.
d: (grunt)
t: siguro love is summer.
d: huh?
t: parang summer--mainit, malagkit, nahihirapan ka, nakakainis. pero summer e, kaya masaya ka.
d: hahahahaha

*sabi ko nga.

happiness is a nice nice dress :)

image by joules clothing

today was an eventful day. i got to touch a living man's brain.

some days the glass is half empty. others, like today, the glass is half full.

L: yosi tayo

D: kaka-toothbrush ko lang pero tangina sige.

L pushes the screen door and D follows. both take their respective seats in the dark.

L: (sings a rico blanco)... siguro yung iniwan ka na ng eroplano parang modern version ng ikaw na naiwan sa platform habang umaandar yung tren no?

D: huh?

L: yung normal description ng pinagiwanan ka na ng oportunidad tapos ikakasal na yung babae pero wala ka nang magagawa.

(silence)

L: 25 na tayo...

D: tangina, oo nga e. pero isipin mo nalang, hindi pa tayo 30. tangina minsan naiisip ko kung ano naiiisip ni mustasa ngayon. maswerte pa tayo may five years pa tayo para tumino. kesa naman yung trenta ka na at nagsisimula ka nang magpanic, kakapit ka na sa kahit ano. lalo na kung yung kahit ano e tried and tested na.

L: tangina oo nga no.

D: naisip ko din kung ano iniisip ni ku ngayon. nag-aalala ako kasi parang hindi siya sigurado. kasi kung sigurado siya sana noon palang ginawan na niya ng paraan talaga.

L: the wisdom we gain from rico blanco. tsk, tsk.

D: sabi nga ni T sa akin, yun daw yung pinaka-ayaw niyang mangyari sa kanya--the curse of indecision.

(silence)

D: nagrerebelde lang naman talaga tayo sa mold e. kaya ang hirap.

L: oonga. nagrerebelde tayo sa kung anong normal pero at the same time nagrerebelde din naman tayo sa kung ano talaga tayo. dapat pag nagrebelde tayo, sa isang bagay lang. like ako, kung seseryosohin ko lang 'tong tanginang (mentions a start-up consultancy firm) na 'to e okay naman e. tapos ikaw kung mag-aaprentice ka lang at gawin mo na yang portfolio mo e di okay. wag mo nang takbuhan 'yan. kasi naman e. malapit na ang November.

D: pota. oonga. yaaaaaayks.

L: hindi kasi tayo nagwa-100 percent e. we should embrace this, d.

D: oonga, kung tutuusin wala naman tayong problema e. ang tanging pumipigil lang sa atin ay ang ang mga sarili natin.

L: teka, parang kahapon lang andito nanaman tayo a.

D (thinks of Beckett's Gogo and Didi and doesn't know whether to laugh or cry)

L: (laughs) at least ngayon alam natin na mas maswerte pala tayo.

D: (laughs) yan yung masaklap. parang yung sinabi ni Queen Elizabeth sa last scene ng movie:

"I am called the Virgin Queen
Unmarried, I have no master

Childless, I am mother to my people

God give me strength to bear this mighty freedom

I am your Queen

I am myself."

L: siguro netong dalawang araw nakaubos tayo ng tig-isang kaha.

bob ong moment
bahay lang
10:00 ng gabi

may mga bagay na sadyang di natatapos
at kailanman di matatapos
parang inabandonang gusali
na punung-puno ng mumu

*this time, it's the weather

I am a pencil. I am a yellow pencil resting on top of a wooden table. I am energy in potentiality. For movement, I need an outside force. At least that's how I feel. And I am not proud of it.

Tonight, I find myself in a coffeeshop near my apartment. I usually bring some work here. At home, I could not work even if I force myself to. But tonight, I find myself in this coffeeshop without the usual stack of papers, without the usual laptop. I brought a book, though. Sontag. But I quickly put it down after a couple of pages.

I bring out my black notebook, instead and begin to write. I want to string thoughts together like notes in a 4/4 measure. But they come out in staccatos, spurts of some things, but nothing when taken as a whole. In a failed attempt to "en-word," I let my pen slide across the page in circles. I try to draw trees. A face. Doodling and sketching are not really my thing, I resign. The images produced do not give justice to the memory.

A friend, who had been writing her pleadings eyes me suspiciously and asks if there isn't anything that I was supposed to be doing. She's someone who sleeps two hours a day just to keep up with what the world hurls at her. She looks at me half amazed, half exasperated. I say there was. In fact, there really is. I have to finish two case studies that involves a lot of interviews and field work by the end of the month. But my pen continues in a rythmitic motion. Nevermind if it spews out nonsense. If others could only function properly by "cleaning the pipes" once in a while, I needed word masturbation.

In a results-oriented society, this kind of exercise is considered a folly only for those who have the luxury of time. But most of this society does not seem to understand that this is simply how some people know how to live, that they cannot live any other way.

And in the wee hours of the morning, while in between surfing and tearing myself away from the internet, I happen to stumble across a college classmate's blog. Waps posted a piece written by one of our lit professors, Ms. Rica Bolipata-Santos which describes appropriately this condition. I post excerpts below:

Why I Write
Rica Bolipata-Santos

"...My days are consumed by the one need to name moment to moment – enfleshing the world into words so that they may be turned in my hand, in my palm, and what it is that sits in my heart, can sit in my hand instead, and be thrown away into the sea; or kept in my pocket as keepsake. I walk the seashore of life and decide which rocks to keep, which to discard, which to put away so that I may mix and match at some later date; call upon a memory to authenticate a point; call upon a look I hit upon to explain character motivation; always, always keeping score.

Moment to moment I think to myself, there must be a word for this obliterating kind of joy. There must be a word for this travesty, or this tragedy, or this grief. What is the word at the center of my grief? This word is both identification and spell. If I can say the word, and only say the word, I shall be healed.

People wonder what it is a writer does and it is difficult to explain as it is a job that requires treading the line between real and imagined. Another writer-friend when newly-married complained once that everyone in the house she lived in with her husband would constantly ask her to do errands after all, “she wasn’t doing anything.” People want us to produce pages to prove that we have written. In writing, production and product are severely different things. I am asked often, ‘where you able to write?” And in my head I think, well…I was able to think, which is the lifeblood of all writing.

So, to many most of the time we really look like we’re doing nothing because part of writing is the hocus pocus part. For me, that requires hours of staring and sitting. It is ephemeral, the work of catching and matching words with experience. I need to keep still to do this. And sometimes, the opposite is true: I need to keep moving for the experience to catch me this time. There are those sought for moments when it just magically happens, when crystallization occurs. But when one writes long enough, one knows that the Muse also paces her gifts so that cannot always be relied upon.

I know the signs when I know I have hit upon something. There comes an incessant need to nest, i.e., to decorate, beautify or simply move furniture. I get weepy and for some strange reason, a British accent takes over and I mull over words and my tongue lolls around them like candy. I drive around Manila uttering sentences I’ve written, pondering on cadence and rhythm, the musician in me descending. My husband says I have this faraway look and cannot be reached. And eventually that voice comes to me and propels me to write. It commands me to document..."

bob ong moment
bustos, bulacan
11:03 ng gabi

"Para kang diabetes, you're a lifetime condition. Kailangan ko pa ngayong magstock ng insulin shots at umiwas sa matamis."

*this is what no sleep and a 12 mn deadline does to you. =p

Of separations and hang-ups, of good company and attractions, of potentialities and wrong timings, of creative collaborations and honesty even without words, of reconciliations and making choices…

I took out my favorite scene from this wonderful little movie I watched last night. It’s a film from Dublin called “Once” and tells of two people meeting at the point of their lives when they are the most stuck. Their week spent together becomes the most important transition in their own personal stories.

I’d like to take out and post the other scenes in the movie which I like but that would defeat the purpose of me wanting you to see the film chronologically in its entirety. I leave you instead with an excerpt from a movie review which I think is spot on:

"It seems silly and grandiose to lavish praise on a movie whose dramatic crux is the recording of a demo tape, and there is some danger that the critical love showered on “Once” will come to seem a bit disproportionate. It is not a film with any great ambitions to declare, or any knotty themes to articulate. It celebrates doggedness, good-humored discipline and desire — the desire not only to write a song or make a recording, but the deeper longing for communication that underlies any worthwhile artistic effort.

The special poignancy of the movie, the happy-sad feeling it leaves in its wake, comes from its acknowledgment that the satisfaction of these aspirations is usually transient, even as it can sometimes be transcendent."

-- from Some Love Stories Have a Better Ending Than the Altar By A. O. SCOTT, Published: May 16, 2007

homaybutanding!

homaybutanding!

Sixteen Daaaaaaaaaaaaaays??? Sixteen days to train?! Crap. Haven't ran in two years. I dunno how I'm gonna pull this off. Quit the cigs when the fire month dawned. I figured 21 days of not having a drag is worth the effort. Besides, 21 days of doing something regularly (or not doing something regularly) results to a habit. On the 22nd, after the race, I might treat myself with a celebratory stick. I bet it will be really good. Hahaha. Or...I can celebrate some other way. We'll see. Might be time to really take up good life-long habits, yow.

For more informayshun, click the link --> http://www.condurarun.com/ Taraaaaaaaaa! Lesdoit!

wisdom from unlikely places

Kamakailan, dahil naaalibadbaran na ako sa sarili kong repleksyon sa salamin, dali-dali akong nagtungo sa isang salon para magpagupit. Binati ako ng isang baklang nagngangalang Mody. Maitim, mataba at malalaki ang mga mata nito. Kulot at mahaba ang buhok niya na parang nilagyan ng sandamakmak na hair product dahil tila basa at mabigat. In short, nakakatakot siyang bading. Naalala ko tuloy yung landlady ko eight years ago na nahuli kong tumatawa sa kusina mag-isa -- yung tawang mapapanood mo lamang sa teleserye, yung tawang si Jean Garcia lang ang nakagawa noong kasagsagan ng kanyang kasikatan bilang Madame Claudia sa Pangako Sa ‘Yo. Nagpapraktis lang daw ang aking landlady noon. Geez. Ang wirdo ng mga tao sa mundo.

Ininterview muna ako ni Mody pagkaupo ko sa silya. Humarap kaming pareho sa salamin at tinanong niya kung anong gusto kong gupit. Sabi ko bahala siya. Gusto ko lang magpa-trim. “Alam mo, magpahaba ka kaya ng hair?” aniya. Tinignan ko siya ng masama. Iyan din ang sinabi sa akin ng kaibigang itago nalang natin sa pangalang Chabelita. Ngunit iba ang ibig sabihin ni Chabelita noon (tumutukoy sha sa isang bagitong mananaliksik na kakalipat lang sa aking opisinang pinagtatrabahuan). Nagka-visual flash tuloy ako--na ako’y protagonista sa isang short-film project ng ilang estudyante na kung saan ang running theme ay pagpapahaba ng buhok at ang various meanings nito. Pinaglalaruan parin ba ako ng tadhana?

“Gusto ko din magpahaba ng buhok,” ang sagot ko, “kaso tuwing hahaba ng kaunti, ang sagwa nanaman ng itsura kaya ako nagpapagupit uli.”

“Ahhhhhhhh. Mainipin ka kasi,” ang biglang balik ng bakla.

Tanginang baklang yon. Hindi ko akalaing sa loob lang ng tatlong minutong pagkakakila namin ay nahusgahan na niya ang aking buong pagkatao at nakapag-suggest na rin siya ng gameplan para sa aking buhay. Pero kung sabagay, napansin ko na ako nga ay isang tao na hindi mapirmi. Minsan namirito ako ng isda at dahil sa pagkainip ay agad kong ibinaliktad ito. Tulad ng inaasahan, tumalsik ang mantika sa aking braso at nadisporma ang isda na noong bago ko lutuin ay katakam-takam at sariwang-sariwa sa paningin. Ayun. Di lamang ako napaso, nagutay-gutay din ang isda at nagmukhang kaawa-awa nang ilapag ko sa mesa. Tsk.

Mula noon, sanay na ako magmirito ng isda. May timing 'yan e. Kung ikaw ay mapagmasid, malalaman mo kung kailan luto ang isang isda sa itsura nito, tunog ng mantika at amoy ng usok. Ngunit bakit hindi ko ‘yan mai-apply sa ibang aspeto ng aking buhay?

Natulala ako sa tunog at ritmo ng pagtabas ng gunting sa aking buhok. Tama si Mody. Natural lang na sa pagpapahaba ng buhok, may mga awkward stages na kaakibat. Sa madaling salita, sa bawat goal o target, may prosesong pinagdadaanan. Sa dinami-dami ng taon ko sa mga organisasyon na lumilingap sa mga maralitang tiga-lungsod bilang isang estudyante at isang manggagawa, hindi ko alam kung bakit tila nakalimutan ko na ito samantalang ito ang idinidikdik sa amin sa kilusan.

Noong ako’y nasa isang pulong kasama ang mga organisador ng isang grupong sangkot sa usapin ng pabahay, may isang lider na nagsabing “in our kind of work, it is important to be able to unlearn frustrations and celebrate small victories.” Napaisip ako doon. Napakadaling dumausdos sa mentalidad na wala naman patutunguhan ang iyong ginagawa, lalo na kung ang pakiramdam mo ay bigay ka nang bigay ngunit wala paring konkretong pagbabago sa lipunan, o, sa personal na konteksto, sa mga ugnayan mo sa ibang tao. Ngunit napagtanto ko na hindi lahat ay nasa iyong mga kamay. Maraming mga bagay na labas sa iyong kontrol at masisiraan ka lamang ng bait kung iisipin mo na responsibilidad mong baguhin ang lahat.

Kaya din, katulad ng pagpuri sa mga ibang parte ng iyong mukha sa salamin habang nagpapahaba ka ng buhok, sa trabaho at sa personal na buhay, mahalagang ipagdiwang ang malililiit na tugumpay kasama ang mga taong sangkot. Hindi ito paglinlang ng sarili ngunit isa lamang pag-acknowledge na may mga dapat ikatuwa sa mga prosesong ito. Isa din itong pasasalamat sa pagsisikap ng iyong mga kasama at pagtanaw na may hinaharap na bubuuin ng madami pang small victories at excited ka na! Sa kasamaang palad, ito ang nakakalimutan ng madami, kasama na ako. Madaling makakilala ng mga bagay na nakakapagpasaya sayo, kaya lang, medyo may kahirapan sa pagsisiwalat nito. But victories are only half-victories when they are not shared, yan ang aking natutunan at a cost.

Mabilis natapos si Mody sa paggupit ng aking buhok. Maigsi na siya to begin with. Sa kahit na anong kultura, uso ang pagpapagupit kapag may mga mahahalagang pangyayari sa buhay ng isang tao. Nagpapatabas ng buhok bilang therapy, rebellion o di kaya’y pagbabagong buhay. Ikaw? Ilang beses mo na bang inisip magpaka-Baby Ama? Kung mag-quarenta ka na, pupusta akong maski dalawa.

Ngunit sa tingin ko mas tumpak na simbolo ng pagkakaroon ng isang kamalayang nagkaka-gulang ang pagpapahaba ng buhok. Dahil katulad ng pagpapahaba ng buhok, ang buhay ay isang mahabang proseso and you just have to be patient with yourself and with things you can’t control while celebrating good things with the people you care for. At kahit man may mga awkward moments, kung alam mo kung ano ang gusto mo at hindi mo ito kalilimutan, pagtratrabahuan mo ito at babalewalain mo ang anumang awkwardness na kaakibat nito. Diyahe siguro para sa landlady ko noong natiyempuhan ko siyang humahalakhak mag-isa. E sa pangarap niya maging soap-opera queen e, wala akong magagawa. Kung tutuusin, sino ba ang mga nagtatagumpay sa buhay kundi mga taong hindi takot sa awkward, hindi takot maging wirdo?

Napabuntong-hininga ako, nagpasalamat kay Mody, nagbayad, at, sa paglabas ko sa mundong umiikot parin at hindi nagbago, nagdesisyon ako: mula ngayon magpapahaba na ako ng buhok.

music exercises

music exercises

I know, i know... This should be a (facebook!) shuffle game. I couldn't help it. I answered the questions as is. Without an ipod. Oh no, I'm reduced to answering these quizzes.

IF SOMEONE SAYS 'ARE YOU OKAY' YOU SAY?
Take a Picture - Filter

HOW WOULD YOU DESCRIBE YOURSELF
Intuition – Natalie Imbruglia

WHAT DO YOU LIKE IN A GUY/GIRL?
Sad Eyes – Bat for Lashes

HOW DO YOU FEEL TODAY?
Intuition – Feist

WHAT IS YOUR LIFE'S PURPOSE?
Cochise – Audioslave

WHAT'S YOUR MOTTO?
Within you and Without You – the Beatles

WHAT DO YOUR FRIENDS THINK OF YOU?
Comfortably Numb – Pink Floyd

WHAT DO YOUR PARENTS THINK OF YOU
Nowhere Man – the Beatles

WHAT DO YOU THINK ABOUT VERY OFTEN?
The Only One – The Cure (Nyahaha! Right…)

WHAT IS 2 + 2?
Thirty-three – Smashing Pumpkins

WHAT DO YOU THINK OF YOUR BEST FRIEND?
Universal Heart-Beat – Juliana Hatfield

WHAT IS YOUR LIFE STORY?
Intuition – John Lennon

WHAT DO YOU WANT TO BE WHEN YOU GROW UP?
Put Your Records On – Corrine Bailey Rae

WHAT DO YOU THINK WHEN YOU SEE THE PERSON YOU LIKE?
I’ll be Your Mirror – Velvet Underground

WHAT WILL YOU DANCE TO AT YOUR WEDDING?
One Day at a Time- John Lennon

WHAT WILL YOU POST THIS AS?
Panaginip – POT

okay, okay. my 25 random things.

I am slowly being reputed by my concentric circle of friends to be "oh, the one who isn't on facebook." It's just that it takes too much time to maintain all these social networking sites. Everybody tells me to sign up because it's fun and it serves as a good distraction. I wonder if it can really be a good distraction from another distraction. Would it work? Haha.

So the other day, Tintin thought she had tagged me on facebook to make up my 25 random things. I told her i'm not in facebook so she sent me her 25 things through email and urged me to email her back. Since i had a long day working on a project and i wasn't sleepy yet, i obliged.

Here are my 25 random things. I'm posting them here until i do sign up at facebook.

My 25 Random Things

1. I am a connection junkie. I am loneliest when I do not understand people and people misunderstand me.

2. I am an earth person. I like mountains. There’s something so comforting about the sights, sounds and smells while you’re in a mountain. Although I’ve never fully climbed one, it have always wanted to.

3. When I’m upset, I cook. Getting busy in the kitchen relaxes me. They say you shouldn’t cook when you’re sad or else the food will taste bad. I don’t care. I’m usually the one who eats what I cook anyway.

4. When I’m just a little upset, I spend time in the supermarket. I can stay for two hours in it without buying anything. The bigger the supermarket, the better. Of course, usually just a little upset escalates to really upset so I end up buying things and doing number three.

5. I pride myself for being koboy. I never can pull off being a damsel in distress. Sometimes, though, I wished I were maarte. Men like that.

6. My guilty pleasure (and the only time I’m maarte) are manicures and pedicures.

7. I love shoes. What? I’m a girl too, you know.

8. When I was younger, I wanted to be a writer. During high school, I always carried a little notebook in my pocket for when random ideas just occurred to me. Of course as I grew older, I realized I wrote crappily so I gave up on the illusion and contented myself with hyperventilating over good literature.

9. I think the universe has been good to me; it gave me signs for everything. Like I knew there had to be one big reason why I was suddenly feeling pretty low on new year’s day (I wasn’t PMS-ing), or why Eraserheads' "Huwag mo Nang Itanong" played while I was reading page 2 of a recently published local novel in an attempt to find answers to a hurricane of questions, or why a song that I liked wouldn’t download no matter how many times I tried to download it, or why Rodger Fed lost in the Aussie open, or why my phone’s #3 key suddenly failed to work one morning, or why Dexter the cat had been “caponated” against my wishes and so on and so forth…

10. I’ve always wanted to study in the Netherlands. Why? I don’t really know. I have this inexplicable affinity to the place.

11. When I was a kid, I’d shut my room and just dance… even without music.

12. My mom said that when I was three or four, I was crazy about onions. And I munched on whole white onions like they were just apples.

13. I am terrible with deadlines – I rarely submit my work on time, I pay my bills way past due dates. I am procrastinator extraordinaire.

14. I like being in transit. When I’m in jeepneys, buses, trains and planes, I am able to think. My roommate Majen firmly believes I will find “the one” in transit which is weird because I never even mentioned I like being in transit.

15. I cry at the silliest movie scenes. Like when I watched Ratatouille, I cried at the scene where the food critic tasted the food and was transported to when he was a little boy being comforted by his mother’s cooking after having a really bad day.

16. When I am nervous, I wear something red.

17. I had a long running crush on David Duchovny’s Fox Mulder. What can I say, I like ‘em brilliant but weird, angry, neurotic and unreacheable.

18. I once lived beside a very black river near an old bridge in Binondo.

19. I like architects. How they are able to balance art and science amazes me.

20. I like outdoor crowds. I hate mall crowds.

21. Stuffed toys annoy me.

22. I’m a bad gambler. I never win bets or raffles, for that matter. That’s why I don’t even bother with the lotto.

23. I have three brothers, fourteen male cousins and some very close male friends. Don’t blame me if I’m a little bit jaded.

24. I’ve never watched a concert ever before. The Eraserheads Final Set *might* be my first time. Fail.

25. I can be very hard-headed, determined and disciplined when I choose to.

...and now, back to your regular scheduled programming

I let out a big laugh when a second degree friend (i.e. a friend of a friend) greeted me "Happy New Year!" on Valentines Day. It was one of her preoccupied out-of-herself days when she was blurting out the wrong things at the wrong time. But for a second, I thought that it wasn't a wrong greeting at all, at least not for me. It was indeed the beginning of my new year.

Diskaril is a word that would describe my previous year. Sometimes, when you're walking through a straight road and are in the midst of a massive road block, or you plain just get tired of walking on that same road that you've been following for the rest of your coming-into-age life, you'd want to wander off to an untrodden area and see what is in there. For a time you forget the damned road block and forget the road altogether.

The dark forested area pulls you in, you see some things that take you by wonder, you tread carefully but you go on. Somehow, the unfamiliar and the unknown beguiles you and becomes irresistable. You feel good and empowered by your taking chances and you go on. You discover that the place that seemed too dark in the beginning did have pockets of light streaming in from the canopy of trees and when you are touched by that light, you bask in it because it is the one thing that gives you strength. You love the warm feeling and you go on. You marvel at your newfound things and marvel at how you marvel at newfound things. You are alive and you go on.

After some time fear grips you and you realize you've gone in too deep. You have created a world for yourself and have begun to care for that world and those who share it with you. You consider living in that sanctuary but, sometimes, you remember the road and how you are supposed to be there. Is the road block gone? Should I have done my damndest to push it out of the way? You will think that the road may have been long but walking it was what you were supposed to do, you will be reminded that it was what you really wanted from the start.

And then you try to find your way back. You get caught up in quicksand, bitten by bugs, threatened by snakes, chased by unnameable beasts, bogged down by thick thick mud. You wonder why you never paid attention to these before. Somehow you knew they were there, but then, it was only those streams of light that mattered.

Although spent, grubby and bruised, it seems that I finally have managed to get myself back on the road.

Last week, I was at my old office for a meeting on a new research project I will be taking on. My previous boss had called me up days before for an offer. I would be part of a team that will evaluate Miseor-funded social housing projects in Metro Manila and the work will definitely fill up most of my year. That day I was supposed to meet the rest of the team in the office to talk about the research design and some administrative matters. I took my usual route to the second floor, made a bee-line to the washroom and entered my favorite cubicle like it was the most natural thing to do. It was as if I never left the place. It was as if the whole year of bumming around never happened. I paused at the realization and didn't know whether I'd feel happy or disturbed about it.

The incident stayed with me for a while and then it hit me: am I back on that road? Am I becoming more of who I am? Is who I am really the me I was before? Or maybe it's just that nothing can ever beat nostalgia. Am I hanging on too much to an old idea that just needed to be let go? Is this just me going back to what is comfortable because I am just too scared or hesitant to realize what I can fully be? But then again, what is wrong with comfort? Is it not an indicator of you being who you really are? Needless to say, it was an overwhelming feeling.

Although not without warning, my closest friends had watched me wander off to that untrodden area. They were there when I came back too shaken up to speak. You know you are at the lowest of the lows when a dear friend who loathes un-cool things, at a random videoke session, sings to you Abba's "Chiquitita" and does not kid. And you feel loved again when people step up and pep talk you up even though they've seen you do things so uncharacteristic of the person they once knew you for. And you feel lucky that a single out-of-the-blue phonecall helped you take down that road block and that little by little you are painstakingly renewing your courage and confidence to work around the road block and keep on walking.

Do I regret that one year in that dark magical place that only I and the forest knew of? No. While I was there, it was something that was all too real to me. Two opposing realities do not cancel each other out. But only one reality can exist at a particular time. And no matter how jarringly sudden, perplexing and excruciating the shift, you just have to learn how to accept this new reality.

That episode is part of who I am and admittedly has given me a new perspective on the road that I am currently walking on. It made me learn more things about myself and how I deal and am supposed to deal with the people most important to me, many of whom I had been taking for granted. It helped me be at peace with who I am. It made me no longer afraid of the person I really want to be.

It is true what they say that sometimes you need to lose yourself to find yourself again.

of happiness

i pity those who can't stand being around lonely people. i especially pity those who pity lonely people. to them, loneliness is a disease and, in a frantic effort to not catch that disease, they make fun of lonely people behind their backs just to feel good about themselves and the emptiness of their carefree souls. loneliness is not the opposite of happiness. i think that the only legitimately happy people are those who are most in touch with the loneliness that lies within their very core and accept it. the rest aren't really happy. they are just fooling themselves to be so.