Sometimes I think that maybe I should have stayed where I was. I could have dreamed the same recycled dreams, and lived life according to prescriptions. I could've walked the same road, and I would've been able to hold a hundred people's hands.

And perhaps I would have had a better idea of where to go, what to pray for, what I need. Instead of lumbering towards a chaos of unknowns, where there are hardly any rules and the facts are only what I make of them.

I feel nostalgia for things I never had. I feel the need to remember things that never hapenned. Because I was somewhere else, maybe.

In the dark you reach out, not knowing what it is you're reaching out for. In the dark you fill yourself with imagined memories. Because I live inside, where no one else can see. I live inside, and no one remembers the way.

Sometimes I sit at the peak of a mountain I know will fade away soon. I see where I've been, but where I'm going is covered in mist.

I see my fairytales mixed up, uncertainty where there should have been a happily ever after. I see Prince Charmings who fell by the side of the road, lured away by better princesses. I see knights without armor, and damsels rescuing other damsels. I see monsters who aren't really monsters, and witches who cry in their sleep.

I take the hands of people I don't know, and in their palms I find my comfort. I walk a little more, and I think I'm okay. But when I turn around, I forget where I am. And sometimes who. And sometimes why.

And I don't know where I belong anymore.

Cry in the Dark, Juliana Hatfield.

Do you cry in the dark because it's easier to be alone than to talk?
When the words aren't working and you don't know how to explain these thoughts
Every look and every emotion has a deeper meaning
Everybody hurts nobody only when they're dreaming

Do you cry in the dark?
The light hurts when it hits your face
You don't want anyone to see you this way
You only want to be loved and taken away by someone
So you cry in the dark

And the picture of you holding hands by the fire is fading fast
And your heart is closing and you don't know how to get off this track
Every day you mime a prayer though your faith is shaken
Your godmother has got nobody because everybody's taken

Do you cry in the dark?
The light hurts when it hits your face
You don't want anyone to see you this way
You only want to be loved and taken away by someone
So you cry in the dark

This emotion is an ocean
The waves are getting high
I'll find an island, call it mine
I'm swimming for my life

Do you cry in the dark?
The light hurts when it hits your face
You don't want anyone to see you this way
You only want to be loved and taken away by someone
So you cry in the dark

Just another song floating in my head. Rij shared this one with me awhile back. Now I'm sharing it with you. Decisions, decisions. Think everything through, and know exactly what it is you're getting into, what the players are willing and not willing to sacrifice, what you're willing and not willing to give up.

Whatever path you choose, I hope you end up happy.

Not Radio is Dead.

Why, oh why??? Mr. Henares, why? Oh, and a question for you folks: what has happened to UNTV? Did it hemorrage money so bad that it had to be taken of the air? What hapenned to Strange Brew? And to Tado and Erning? Or is it just my cable company that doesn't have that channel?

And yes, just a plug. Let's all troop over to Asia-Pacific College in Magallanes this Saturday, August 1. Camoi's PinoyStories is playing. So are ChicoSci and HappyMeals. Also a bunch of other good bands whose music I've been deprived of these past few months. See you there.


Aisa's party last Saturday.

Nice. She even had kanto food for the balikbayans (UP isaw and cholesterol laden sisig).


Etc.

My mom wants me to get my hair "rebonded", which will cost Php 6,000 (or about $110), at least. I don't think I'm vain enough to justify that expense, even to myself.

That's about it. I know I sound incredibly shallow, but that's because half of my brain is still asleep.

Makati Siege Over

I wonder if Glorietta's open today?

It's a bit sad though, because you can see the idealism in these junior officers faces. And you can see that they believed in what they were doing... and you also know that their accusations are probably valid. But they should've known better. People in this country are so used to coup attempts that these things don't faze anyone anymore. They should've been a little more creative.

Business as usual, as everyone says.

Well, except for my sister because her high school (she goes to Assumption, which was my high school too BTW) is only about a 5 minute drive from the site of the so-called siege. So no classes for her.

So.

I just got email from Sunshine Cinema. Movies I've been waiting for are out, and I can't see them because I'm thousands of miles and an ocean away.

I have been feasted on by bugs. Yes, various kinds. Mosquitoes being the majority.

I, in turn, will be feasting very soon. As to be expected, I've been playing hostess to a myriad of visitors these last couple of days, and they always bring food with them, perhaps because they are under the impression that I've been deprived of good eating for all the time that I've been away. I've got ensaymadas and silvanas from "The House of Silvanas", lots of cookies, a tupperware of laing, bilaos of pancit, beer, wine, other types of unknown liquor, a plate of Bicol Express, and enough tapa to feed an army. The fates are kind. My mother's dietary ways have been defeated.

And I've been thinking. Maybe I should just put my boyfriend's picture in a frame and hang it by the door, since the aforementioned guests (who are always welcome, their food even more so *lol*) usually ask for a photo album (which I don't have) right after the Hi-I-missed-yous +hugs. It's the inevitable request, only it's usually more of a stern command. Everyone needs to see his picture, as if the future of our relationship depends on whether his photographic image passes some unspoken character analysis/test. (And John, they mostly think you're guapo, so don't worry.)

Will probably go get a glass (or four) of wine today. Beer can wait until tomorrow.

Mona Lisa by Guster

If in the morning you look up
Fake a smile and you sigh
Don’t fear the future
In the years to come you’ll learn
I used to sit and watch the pouring rain
I used to wish to be back home again
I hadn’t the strength then
I hadn’t the chance to reveal it
But it’s all in your hands
When do we begin?
Although you’re so sad
Discover things never had
It makes you wonder
A life alone you’ll learn
You’ll learn
When do we begin?

Just a song that's playing in my head.

So I'm back in Manila.

I just surprised everyone I know -- including my mom, who cursed at me for a full 5 minutes -- by showing up at our house, totally unannounced. I'm only going to be here until the 8th, and then it's back to New York.

Just a few notes while there still fresh in my head.

I'm happy to be here, but I miss New York already. I miss the place, the friends, but really, I guess, I miss my boyfriend.

My boyfriend has become a very important of my life -- a fact I've had sneaking suspicions of, but have not fully realized until just now.

It's kind of strange how everyone here just sort of took up where we left off. My mom for instance. She left for Hong Kong today and gave me grocery, bills and take-your-sister-to-the-doctor instructions without missing a beat. I am, once again, just like I never left, mom by default.

I miss doing my laundry -- because I do it just so and I love the smell of newly-washed clothes.

I miss John.

I miss John.

I miss John.

Eh paano na kung ("baka, hindi ako sigurado, ayoko magbitaw ng salita") mahal ko nga siya?

So.

It's so very strange. I feel myself being pulled in two very different directions, and I want to walk both ways.

I don't think I can be completely still again. I guess that's what happens when you plant your roots elsewhere. You scatter pieces of yourself, you feel yourself growing, you feel each part of you digging deep to find its anchor.

And wherever you are, a part of you will long to be somewhere else. Even if you're happy at the moment, even if you don't really want to leave.

It's a form of nostalgia, I guess. Nostalgia for the other roads you didn't choose, the roads you've only just left behind, the roads you will once again visit. Only sometimes, you don't know whether you're visiting or staying, because you've spread yourself and you've thinned the edges.

And suddenly it feels as if you don't really know what home means. You begin to doubt you ever did.

I miss my boyfriend.

Ohmygod.

I have become the girlfriend monster. I am the girl I used to love to hate.

But yes, I do miss him. Very much so.

Ugh.

I must strive to retain some measure of my old self. So for tonight, I will endeavor to function as I did in my pre-John state. I shall proceed to the Music Building, drink, and lose myself in the gripping, intense, let's-do-mental-cartwheels type of conversations that I am usually only able to have with certain types of people -- a type that seems to be in abundance here. (Alleluia.)

I go.

I feel incredibly illiterate. (And incredibly brain-dead. Need mental stimulants. Coffee machine broken.)

I have not read Sappho. I have not read Chekhov. I have not read Katherine Mansfield. I have not even read Flannery O'Connor. And, horror of horrors, I have only read one piece by Samuel Beckett and that was Waiting for Godot. There are so many authors out there that I haven't even begun to appreciate and I feel so inadequate. I have these conversations with all these people, especially the intellectual wannabes, who are mostly into post-modernism and modernism, and I end up flailing my arms as I find myself drowning in a sea of unread greatness.

Funny how I actually felt sad when Alex suggested that I thin out my reading list to a manageable number. Apparently he was starting to notice that my bibliography was taking on a life of it's own. He said that he understood my desire to turn my brain into a literary sponge, but unless I find a higher life form to take over my brain and turn it into an absorption unit that can suck up all the great literature in this planet (and maybe beyond), 2 dozen books is just not feasible. Even if we take insomnia and a history of mental abberations (those who share my gene pool prefer to refer to it as an intellectual gift) into consideration.

I realize I am blabbering on about nothing. I apologize. Last night a bunch of us stood around in a circle for four hours to talk. Yes, just to talk. Yes, outside. Yes, for all those four hours, we did not break the circle, even to sit or go to the bathroom. Something to do with the fear of breaking the intellectual/creative energy coursing through the circle. And yes, we're writers. Reason is sometimes viewed as myth.

So please excuse me if my brain is under strain. Parts of it are still in la-la land. (Yes, that would include the part that controls coherence and cohesion.)

Oh god, it's true. Athena has deserted me.

My advisor for this term KICKS ASS.

Truly. I am so excited to start this semester that everything right now just revolves around setting up the perfect environment for hitting the ground running. Boys and girls, if you find yourself at odd ends, bored, or just plain curious, my advisor's name is Alexander Chee and his debut novel is called "Edinburgh". Do a search on him on the net and you might get a glimpse of why I'm so incredibly ready to just plunk down for the (inevitable and) impending mental hemorrhage.

And, not only is he a good writer, he's also an amazing teacher. And he's a really nice and cool person to boot. They set up a "party place" down at the Music building across from the Lilliputian Bridge, and he'll just a grab a beer and sit down with you and talk. He's not one of those notoriously boundary-oriented mentors running arounbd campus. He's accesible, he's smart, he's critical, he was a smart-ass kid in college who made his teachers cry. What's not to like?

Alex, Alex, he's our man. If he can't do it, no one can. Yes, I realize that I have metamorphosized into a one-woman fan club. (Pompoms and cheerleading suit not included.)

Ah. Now that my gushing is out of the way, let me address an issue brought up by my dearly beloved cousin, now to be referred to as "Wando". Love is an entity my consciousness does not want to stand face to face with right now. It's enough that I "care" and he "cares". It's enough that I "like" and "respect" and "trust", and that he does the same. All the necessary implications, foregone conclusions, epiphanies, and emotional reflections that come with taking said entity by the hand and leading it down to the chaos inside me will, maybe, come in time. The only thing I'm sure of at the moment is that the time is NOT now.

I'm not rushing, neither is he. Maybe I'm standing in front of this entity already, and I'm only afraid of the articulation. And if that's the case, then does the lack of verbiage matter? Words, after all, are only vessels of the essence of things. In the end, at the most, they merely give the essence a more tangible form. Sometimes, they even mean nothing.

I don't want to be inundated with unnecessary attachments. If we can function within this state of "being together and yet not defining the space we are together in", then I'd like to hold on to that for as long as I can. There's enough time to concretize and delineate and identify in the future (presumably). Right now I would just like to continue floating in the sphere of his gaze, and walking down the tracks of his hands, and swimming in our "us".