For that, I thank you. While I am still bitter about Dick Gordon not winning, not even close, and I am aghast of everything going on, I stare at the TV. Sa susunod, di ko na susundan ang aking puso.

And I find amusement of media’s victory,because this is their victory as well. I see TV stars, I am reminded of Estrada’s inauguration.Yeah, I know, they are different.

Anyways, not minding the current events and my disapproval of everybody in the government, I mean every single one, and my growing irritation of Kris Aquino, let us celebrate the day!

For today, I will wear my favorite black shirt and go out on a dinner date with my favorite conversationalist.

Thank you, Noynoy, for what you’ve done. You have laid out a beautiful front of unity at a time where there really isn’t. Let us ignore how this government, just as before, represents the bifurcation of the classes in our country. I thank you for your self-righteousness and ignorant altruism, for as you say, you carried the obligation of being an Aquino, sacrificing whatever you say, to rise to the challenge of being Chief Executive after your infant stay in the senate. This, as willed by the people who placed Arroyo in her seat, is the voice of the people.

May the gossamer of illusion never fade and may it inspire us all.

May you learn from the lessons of the past, of your predecessor including your mother. It does not matter if I think you are an idiot, because we live in a democracy and the will of the people is to be followed.

Thank you. At least, I have a free day out of work and I will be watching, too, keeping my fingers crossed. Pag walang korap, walang mahirap. Sana nga yumaman na tayong lahat!

God, I hate Mike Enriquez’ voice.

So we woke up early, left the house at 6:30 AM. We were given numbers, I was number 68. I am beginning to hate being give numbers. And we were able to sit down and vote at around 8:30.

Not minding the long lines (or the absence of it), the humid weather, the noisy people, the drunk man at the upper floor in the balcony who picked a fight with blood dripping from his lips, the the shouting, the senior citizens (who are still very strong) who wants to be in front, the people who can not understand simple instructions, the familiar faces of people I can no longer recall a name with, so far, it was OK. Maybe because we got there early.

Last time, I went straight to the precinct. Now, we have to wait. Last time, I wrote the names. Now, I shaded the circles. It was faster now, as far as filling out the ballot. I think that they should have more machines to accommodate the people. And I wonder with all the issues they have with the manufacturers and technology the machines have, why can’t they just use the same technology they used with PCSO’s Lotto system. Nakatipid pa sila! Hehehe.

On the way home, outside the elementary school the government used, natabig ng tricycle ang Nanay ko. She was angry kasi napakasakit pero naawa sa driver. So ayun!

I plan to be healthier this year. I am sure people will be scoffing at the thought, I sense disbelief but I really want to do this. I want a fresh start but because that cannot happen, I want to make the most of what I have. Being healthy is part of that. I want a brand new me.

I also plan to read more books. Plenty of books. I have been reading less this year.

I don’t know what I feel with the recent developments in my life but it’s better than feeling pain. I don’t know what to think anymore, and who said I want to think about pain? I am tired of pain and I want to move on. I feel anxious about the future.

I turned 27 a couple of days ago, and my life is still a big question mark.

Where I will go, where it is headed and who is willing to come along… I will just wait and follow the flow. It’s surprising that with how little I invested in life, I have so many things to lose. People expect a lot from me.

I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about myself and the people around me. I conclude that I am messed up and irresponsible.

There are no true, purely good person in the world. Magnanimity is only true for books. If they do live, they are pretty much 1,000 to one. If you meet one true magnanimous person in the world, he won’t be someone close to yourself. You wouldn’t know.

She was right that I have lost a sense of myself but she was wrong in some parts as well.

I always have this heavy feeling, and I would want it to go away. I want to fix that gap in my life. The mistake of thinking too well of other people.

Life is still beautiful if you know where to look. You look for beauty from the sunrise on your hotel window, the smell of the one you love, the sweet taste of alcohol… but all is flux, fleeting… and you look for it again over and over.

I guess that’s how life is, fragments of chaos. People not understanding each other. Seeking fleeting bliss. Being as decent as you possibly could.

I will be happy because I deserve it, and so do you…

At work, because earnings season is over, there is very little to do. Many of us are helping out with the Christmas decorations yesterday. The theme for our department is Santa’s factory. They are making a big deal about it. There is a contest for it, and the Asians Equity department always win.  Let’s face it, as creative as we Filipinos are, if pitted against a group comprising of Koreans, Chinese and Japanese, we stand a small chance (I think it’s a cultural thing) plus they earn a lot more money than we do (just think of their budget — big). But who knows, with the effort they are giving into it… Baka manalo kami.

Yesterday, I was doing letters. We already made letters to Santa. This time, we did it in foreign languages. It would have been fun if we didn’t need to cut it out. I asked what the flap (see image below) is for? Nobody really explained it to me. Nobody could. And I, having the weak personality that will suitably fit in a communist country where everybody just followed (partly because I am too bored and I don’t want to do the exercises we’ve been subjected for the past four months).

Between that, I was asked to help out to make Styrofoam windows. The types you see in churches.I don’t know why they have to ask me for help. I did some drafting. Drafting, something I have not done since High School. They want to make it as if to look like stained glass (and they used cellophane). I would have been more impressed if they could have made patterns on it like Madonna and Child or something like that. But unfortunately, they only have red and green for colors and they don’t have time or maybe he skill for it.

Back to my letter writing, that is interrupted by the fake stained glass. I am content on writing and since nobody among us really understand many languages, I have letters asking Santa for unreasonable things like new parents, people dying a painful (but very slow) death, a new job, complaints from whiny spoiled children. Some I searched the Internet because I need to finish 45 letters. I have them translated to Spanish, German, Hindi, Catalan via the help of translate.google. I enjoy writing the Arabic and Hindi but not the Chinese or Japanese ones, I’d hate the real Chinese people at work seeing it due to the unreliability of the translations and my poor replication of their special characters.

And it is a good thing that I have multiple handwriting due to the years of experience making forgeries of parent’s signatures in my youth (I do it for myself and some people in class).

Then we saw the humongous ribbons. I was not bothered by it but it seems some coworkers do. I am just here to write my evil letters to Santa. They are quite pretty unless you know the content (there are a few that actually  are innocent), I still insist I have beautiful handwriting. I was happy to even do a letter to Santa from the notorious Inday.

Thos humongous ribbons were not really that pretty. When my almost friends asked our gay co-worker how relevant it is syempre kabadingan! Okey. He was too preoccupied by his stained cellophane window (which turned out rather nice). He is trying to compete against the atrocious Cathedral window some other people did.

The ribbons were like three feet wide and they hung it with nylon thread above each other (see image above). The color scheme doesn’t really compliment each other. But I couldn’t care less. On with my writing Santa letters, it was fun until I got tired.

I heard that the other department is putting snow on theirs. Goodbye prize.

P.S.

Visit meow’s blog. She’s starting to blog again.

It’s always nice to know that in this depressing world, she is always there to remind me not to lose my way. Our relationship had rough beginnings. And when I say rough, I mean it was weird. For someone like me, people probably wouldn’t believe it. I was on the way to become one of those people. Jaded people who temporarily escape their frustrations by doing superficial things to fill the void inside their being.

Life can be pretty meaningless. I’d tell myself, it is up to us to make it meaningful. Easier said than done, I can sometimes forget that. I am not immune to feeling that hollowness. I get lonely too. It’s not the world that is depressing, it’s the people in the world that is depressing… making life depressing.

I have that capacity to stray. I was 25, I have become anomic, numb, hopeless, jaded. I was about to accept that I have reached the end. Life ends here. I am doomed to o this all my life and I have no chance for happiness. I am not like many people and I should just accept that. I can be like them, I can drown my conscience in that hedonistic pool of sex and other vices. Why should I care? Nobody cares for me.

I was wrong.

Meow saved me. There are still good people in the world but they don’t get it. Meow did.

She’s a live breathing person unlike the great, understanding people on the net. I can touch her, I can hear her. I can still remember the scent of her old shampoo.

I could have been like them. I think I was about to.

Meow taught me that there are still things in life that we can do. It’s not easy but we can still pursue the things that we want. We need to work to have the means to live, but we don’t live to work. I remembered how it is to dream. I started to remember who I was again.

I am reminded that while man is weak, we have minds. We can think and we have a conscience regardless of our tenets.

I am afraid that I will stray. Man has a capacity to forget and lose himself. I am afraid of the day I become unworthy of her love.

She is my lighthouse, I was lost and she brought me home.

We may be apart,  I know she’s there. When we’re together, I can breathe better and be myself.

Happy Birthday!

Oops! They did ask me, I didn’t reply, just too lazy. I take that back. I can, just need to be forced to defend my work.

I could not wait for the program to start, so I left before the announcement of winners. I don’t think I will win anyway. There are better pictures there by more deserving artists. I was there for two hours. Patience is a virtue I don’t possess. It’s already unlike me to stay alone for that long without sitting.

Meowy was genuinely happy for me. Too bad she was not there because she has work, she plans to treat me dinner tomorrow. I should be glad. I have the picture of my most loved dog on display until Sunday. I am planning to go backwith someone when I am in a better mood.

I sometimes wonder what’s wrong with me… I guess it’s one of those days that I am not in touch with the Planet Earth.

Went to McDonald’s where there are these loud, happy people while I eat  food with saturated fat. An unknown song played by  probably some pop singer I don’t know. A slow, haunting song about longing for something that’s over, whether it was love or just something else, I did not pay attention.

I went out to smoke a cigarette, feeling smug and everything, I sat in the sidewalks of Ayala. It was nice and cool… finally. There I was  content with this quiet bliss  when this lady approached me and bursted my personal bubble.

“Pwede maki-text?” she asked.

“Sorry. Wala akong load.” (Ayoko nga!)

“Pwede pasaksak na lang ng SIM. Low batt na kasi ako.”

“Sorry, hindi pwede.”

I said no several times. Call me selfish but I won’t do it for friends or my siblings. Heck! I don’t even do that with my 2 SIMs. I won’t do that for some random stranger in the open street of Makati.

Whether it’s an emergency or not, I DON’T CARE. I am in no mood for charity!

And there she was repeating her request despite my firm NO and she would not leave me alone. I walked away. I hear her say, “Ang damot mo naman, parang nanakawan!”

“SINABI NA NGANG HINDI!!!” I caught myself with my loud (deep-scary-psycho) voice. I could have gone on forever but stopped.

Letse! Mas maganda pa ang cellphone mo sa akin at malay ko ba kung anong klase kang tao. Di ko nga naisip na manggagantso ka but thank you for making me suspect that you are. Thanks for the humility! And THANK YOU for driving away my melancholy and replacing it with anger! Thank you, bitch.

And I went home grumpy and miserable. Good night!

Monday morning, I have work again tonight. I was planning to dedicate most of my week off to Susanna Clarke (her book has been with me for a month and I am unable to have time to filp through its pages).

Last Saturday, I was drinking with some co-workers,  I guess I was a bit sad and I ended up drinking more than I should… got very loud, my digestive system went through some really bad calisthenics and I ended up whining like a sissy on my cellphone. Ah, yes… a day I wish to wipe out from everybody’s consciousness (much like most of my life).

So yes, just when I was about to say that I have extinguished and lived a somewhat healthier lifestyle, I go on a mortifying relapse… Hahaha!

Bakit nga ba naman kasi tinamaan pa ako ng lungkot… hopefully, I was nice. Most of the time I get into trouble when I am drunk, I get too abrasive and often offensive.

At least I had a good night sleep (which I think totalled more that 12 hours after dropping in bed), I remember having really fun and weird dreams of cabaret dancers, people praising me for my intellectual superiority and so more that my head no longer recalls with much clarity. Must be the alcohol.

Nursing my hangover, I still have to go to my girlfriend the following day. She came back from Baguio to give my pasalubong which comprises of strawberry preserves, Lengua de Gato and silver frog-shaped earrings (she thought it would look really cute on my left ear). The earrings was hand-crafted and had some intricate design on it. It did not look feminine, it looked weird, one reason she bought it (methinks).

Her mind’s still afloat the whole day. The only thing that roused her from her idle disposition is the recollection of a terror threat in the bus and she had to remind me of my intoxicated paroxysm the day earlier (dapat talaga nilalayo ang cellphone pag lasing ako)… This we discussed over  dry red wine (she with cranberry juice dahil ayaw nya na uminom) and lumpiang shanghai na tuna. Mga tira-tira nila. It was still nice.

I am at home now after sleeping a good nine hours.

Now I will have time for good old Susanna, for good ol’ Mr. Norrell is not yet done in reviving magic in England.

The past two years was spent at work. Birthday ko na rin sa 27th at nung nakaraan na taon I spent it at work. It is pleasant to have it different this time.

Nung na-approve yung leaves ko, may nag-isip kung di ba pathetic. Sabi ko kasi excited na ako magkulong sa bahay! Yeah, I intend to lock myself at home: Browse the Internet, watch TV, read books, make drawings and eat.

You have to understand that 2007 was a weird year, I thought of myself as a boring person but in retrospect, it was an oddly intense year of alcoholism and other stuff not suitable for younger people. It is a path that I don’t think I will tread again. And I think I am glad. I think in life we should never make regrets, just learn from our mistakes. But I still think it is OK to drink once in a while. Di lang dapat araw-arawin. 2008 is great, it is pleasantly boring and except for me resigning from work and being in a relationship,  but it is otherwise uneventful.

Boring is good. Boring is what I want to be right now. I guess it’s great to be solitary again and opening your door only to the people you want it to be open to. There are a lot of good friends that I have neglected and I wish I can bake amends for that.

Merry Christmas everybody!

Di ba parang adik lang?

The day Manny won. I woke up at 2. I thought I cared but I didn’t, di naman gaganda ang ekonomiya ng Pilipinas, ano man ang mangyari sa laban nila ni Dela Hoya. I woke up and got up to Church with my girlfriend (it was her idea), it was like strolling in a museum, we observed the architecture and the Interiors. It has been years since I paid our Church a visit. Since being agnostic, I don’t go to Sunday mass anymore but it was nice visiting.

The Day we went to three malls. We went to Ever, then went to her house to watch Naruto. There are times that Naruto’s obsession for Sasuke is almost gay. My girlfriend wants them to end up together…

Alam nyo yung feeling ng di mapakali pag di nabibili yung gusto mo bilhin? yun ang nangyari sa akin. Di ako mapakali habang di ko nabibili yng fixative na gagamitin ko dahil tunuturuan ko sarili ko gumamit ng charcoal. Kaya pumunta kami sa Robonson’s Galleria and Megamall.

Goodbye, Third Molar. Nakakdiriri yung binunot sa akin na third molar. It’s gross. Pinakita sa akin ni Manang dentista, kadiri nga, fractured yung ibabaw, tapos may abcesses pa sa ilalim. Hahaha! At least wala na. Letse! Di ko na-enjoy ang leave ko dahil nasa bahay lang ako. Nagpa-deliver pa naman ako ng isang bucket ng chicken na di ko naman kinain kasi masakit sa ngipin… mali, tinanggal na pala, masakit sa gums.

Currently by my bed: Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell. Ang ganda kasi ng title. Hahaha!

This year balak ko paunlarin ang sarili ko kasi the past year, parang naging milestones lang ng buhay ko ay (a) learning I can drink 12 hours straight; (b) Half-sex; (c) weird sex; and (d) Getting really drunk and not knowing what happened in between waking up. Naging patapon pala ang buhay ko ng 2007. So this year, I will try to go online more often and do the things that I have been doing before like… wala pala akong ginagawa masyado dati, I take that back. This year I intend to resign from work.  Find myself (pag nakita nyo, sabihin nyo sa akin agad) and probably write more (I used to write mediocre poems and sell essays to classmates when I was in college).

————–

The past two days, I have been reading a lot. Parang possessed ako, di ko man lang natingnan yung Discovery channel na ini-launch sa Cable namin.  Sa tabi ng higaan ko meron akong 2 science books, 2 short story collection, 1 collection ng essays, 1 travelogue-novel tungkol sa China, at yung Dialogues ni Plato. natapos ko na rin yung Fragile Things ni Neil Gaiman kahapon… pa-skip-skip ako ng libro.

Medyo sumakit ang ulo ko kaya nagkaroon ako ng strong desire na humarap sa computer. Kasi mula nang umuwi ako ng umaga noong Sunday, libro na ang kaharap ko… matutulog ako… pag gising ko, iinom lang ng tubig tapos basa ulit… tapos tingin ng konti sa TV, tapos maiinis ako sa mga palabas kaya basa ulit, light meals lang in between reading. Pumasok lang ako sa trabaho kanina at umuwi ako agad at nagbasa ng libro. Now, that’s how I celebrated my New Year. At iniisip ng mga tao na pag-inom lang ang pinagkakaabalahan ko. Nagulat sila kanina sa komento ko tungkol sa breakdown ng carbohydrates kanina nung nag-uusap sila tungkol sa diet. Ganun na ba ka-bobo ang hitsura ko?

I have to admit na di na ako nagbabasa ng libro for the past couple of months kaya ewan ko kung anong sumapi sa akin ngayon. Last time na nagbasa ako ng ganitong ka-heavy ay nung nagpaka-bum ako ng 3 years after High School. Not really my finest hours, I mean days, I mean, not my finest years.

There’s something going on with me right now. Di ko pa alam. At least productive ang hindi ko ma-explain na force na pinagbabasa ko. Kahit pagod, basa pa rin akong basa. Para akong naka-reading-steroids!