I’ll probably erase this tomorrow.

​So many things have happened since the last time I was here, by here I mean in this blog – and I want to apologize for not writing about all the shit I should be writing about. A lot of these events involve a decent amount of sentiment and for someone who is days away from taking her midterms, I dont think I have the luxury to pause and assess how I am holding up. Trying to keep my cool has always been my forte pero mahirap pala. Ah basta, not now.

I didnt even plan this post. A minute ago I was just trying to lessen my backlog in admin law but Rico Blanco played over Spotify and valentines day just ended so my strong-and-independent pretense is at its limit. I wonder if I should cry again. I wonder if I should cry for my beloved uncle who died and who still isnt home, for the pressures to do well this upcoming exams, for my indecision whether reading all my backlog in full text is a wise move, for missing how it feels to have someone I can disturb and talk to at any second of the day without feeling guilty for being a fucked-up burden, for friends and for so many realizations I still dont want to accept.

Joke lang. I’m okay, just a little tired.

Dark ages

I took some time off of Facebook for the hope of saving my grades this semester so when my last exam for the week ended, I knew that I had to install the application back to catch up with all the current events and news I missed.

Never have I thought that reactivating my account would make me sick just after few scrolls. What was once a casual hobby of scrolling over and reading about what is happening around would make me question the necessity of inventing platforms like Facebook and Twitter. I cannot even help but imagine of a world where people relied less on these platforms and actually engage in real life conversations, even real life debates, rather than spouting foul words while hiding behind their keyboards and monitor.

I blame Mocha Uson and all of these heartless, chauvinist and violent people lurking around the online world behind fake accounts (the real ones included too, of course) who spend day and night pinning people who oppose the administration down.

After the President has been elected, his supporters have been very vocal about dismissing oppositions and criticisms over the way Duterte handles crime and drug-related problems. Now I am in no way saying that they do not have the right to speak up, only that the way they ‘argue’ bothers me – some threaten the critics, use really offensive words and curses, blame the past administration for all the problems of the country, among others.

For example, just awhile ago I read a comment written by a woman wishing a girl to end up raped so the kid will learn to shut up and move on from the airing out her sentiments with regard to the burial of Marcos in the LNMB and the Martial law era. What ever happened to compassion and humanity? Why condemn a person to suffer such a traumatic assault just because of her political beliefs?

You see, the irony of our society today is that while the administration has been very insistent with its policy to eradicate drugs and crime, it doesn’t really make anyone feel safe in reality – or at least that is how I feel.

These are dark times.

You speak up in social media and you end up eating death and rape threats for breakfast. You question the prerogative of the President in implementing supposed-solutions to our poverty and economic crises and you end up getting slammed in aid of legislation, condemned even before you are put to trial before the proper courts of justice. You defend alleged drug users and other accused of crimes because it is a part of your oath as a lawyer and you end up getting shot multiple times in your car. And if you’re truly unlucky, some person will run up to you one day and put a bullet in your head plus a cardboard bearing statement such as “drug user ako, wag tularan” or something similar to that.

What ever happened to our concept of due process? And even that of ethics?

They say that the innocent has nothing to fear because unless you are guilty, the police or whoever may be playing God will spare you of their brand of justice. But do tell me – who pulls the trigger? Who gets to decide who dies and who deserves another chance at redemption?

The worst part is that before Duterte got elected, I never expected people to be as verbally (and publicly, may I add) cruel and savage but I guess when your Head of State has tacitly encouraged lawlessness in the first place, it’s just a matter of time before the hidden prejudices of people come to the surface. And here I was thinking that the whole social contract theory is a bullshit, defending the innate goodness in people. Hay buhay. This is going to be the longest six years in our life.

Robin Scherbatsky

Sometimes I wonder how it feels to be just like every other normal girl: the one they write stories and songs about; the type who gets casted in every Nicholas Sparks movie franchise; the sentimental one often chasing over the wrong guys, only to get their heart broken into several pieces in the end.

Do not be fooled though. I know how to love and I have loved too well for the past few years. The difference between I and the girl in sunny dress is that I do not place my heart on my sleeves, wager around things uncertain and painful and optimistically let the feeling solve every crises I see along the way. I can and will let go.

At a very young age I witnessed how letting your feelings get the best of you lead to series of bitterness, arguments and vicious cycles of loving and getting hurt. I barely even started having serious crushes when I swore to myself that I will never let love ruin me or control me in any way, that being a martyr or a hopeless romantic is plain stupidity and that sticking it out til the very end when you know it is becoming painful is the worst decision you can ever make for yourself in the long run.

It is for these very reasons that I find marriage scary, if not totally absurd, because the sanctity of the institution compels you to fight it out together with your husband, in sickness and in health, til death do you part. I am not sure I can do that.

During the last meeting for our Seminar 2 class, our instructor shared how his mom and dad had some issues regarding fidelity on the early years of their marriage. Just like my parents, his own decided to stick together and overcome these problems for him and his siblings. I immediately recalled how mom would have the urge to leave dad whenever they fought badly but would recant at the last minute and tell us the same reason the parents of my instructor had: she does not want us to grow up without a father, she is going to be with dad for us.

I hated it. I hated having my mom compromise just because she has no choice but to have to make it work. I hated being one of the reasons why she and tatay had to endure the sufferings they had to go through. While it is true that my parents are relatively stable today, the picture of my mom sobbing with her eyes red and her pillow drenched in tears is still very vivid to my memory up til now. My father has had his fair share of disappointment and heartaches as well but he hid it better over few bottles of beer and late nights outside our home. The bottomline is, at some point, I saw that they were both very miserable with their lives.

Perhaps many children would really want their parents to reconcile but I was always the one wishing they would get separated instead as it was more painful for me to watch them hurting each other together than living their lives apart. Besides, it affected us eitherway having to grow up in such a depressing cycle.

Thus my vow to never letting love precede over reason.

I know this is probably a little bit soon to say since I do not see myself getting serious with anyone anytime soon but the next person I fall in love with must be willing to accept that I am probably never going to change anymore. I will never be the girl who will chase after you, beg you stay or even throw you sweet gestures here and there just to win you back. I will love you truthfully and will be loyal and as sweet as I can be but please do not take it as an invitation to control me or hurt me because I will leave as soon as I know that I have to. Okay fine, maybe I will give it two or three more tries before really deciding to leave, depending on how much faith I will have in what we have.

Make me love you and I will be yours wholeheartedly. I will probably even cook and write cheesy essays for you. But please never make me choose though because if it comes to a point that I will have to pick between you, my family or dreams, sorry darling but I will let you go.

Never take me for granted as well. No one deserves that.

And when it is all finally over, I will leave a hollow so vast you will despise but symphatize with me at the same time because of how borderline bipolar I will treat you: some days I will try to reason with you and let you see where I am coming from, then some days I will just ignore you altogether or even bitch about what went wrong. I will leave you confused and hurt enough to make you doubt whether you ever knew me or not.

I am not a person worth your time so leave me be, and trust me when I tell you that there will always be countless of better girlfriends out there.

Kapal ng mukha pero iba nalang please. Wag ako.

Attempt at adult-ing

I’m turning twenty-two next month, can you believe that?

When I was younger the idea of aging was something I was really looking forward to. I hated how kids had to take a siesta after eating lunch when they allow my sister to do whatever she wanted to do; I hated being forced to take countless of vitamins which taste so bad; I hated being denied of the chance to sit at the adult table and discuss things with my parents; I hated having my hair fixed, my clothes designated, my back showered with Johnson’s baby powder on days when I wanted to go outside and play with the other kids. I was just so eager to grow up.

But now that I’m turning twenty-two, and over the past few years that I have been trying my best to act like an adult, there are times when I wish I can skip the need to be mature and responsible.

Our society today puts us in a lot of pressure to have our lives figured out: where to see yourself in a few years, what job do you want and how well does it pay, are you still single, where are you going this summer, etc. etc. The standards are remarkably high especially when people feel like you ought to be doing something grand while at the peak of your youth so much so that doing something less than what they expect make you mundane, uninteresting or even helpless.

Of course, the best way to settle this problem is to actually deliver the expectations of the society not to please anyone but simply because you can. Some people are lucky at this having already figured out their lives as young as twenty then just constantly becoming the adults that they want to be. The problem lies then when you do not even know what to do yet or in my case, it is taking you a little bit longer to reach the potentiality that you have set out for yourself – putting it negatively, how do you not crack at the pressures of being and acting like an adult?

I wish I can help you answer that but I am just in the same dilemma as you are. I have been trying to memorize twenty seven provisions for tomorrow over coffee in a room with messy bed sheets, leftover donuts and some dirty dishes by the sink. The last person you ought to be hearing life changing advice from is me. Hehe.

But you see, another way to look at my situation is that you – whoever you are, whatever you are doing right now – are not alone. The crisis that you are going through is not something that you should be keeping to yourself because just as how clueless I am with what to do, I am very much interested as well in hearing your stories, like being a party in a role-playing game of how-to-adult or how-to-not-screw-up-in-life. Talk to your friends or siblings, even to your parents if you are comfortable with opening up to them.

Sure. Maybe it is desirable to have our lives figured out already by this point but it does not mean that not having that grand vacation to Europe by 23 or six-figure starting salary makes you less of a successful individual. We have to go back and look at ourselves on the inside: have you been a good person lately, are you wasting time hating on and envying people, when was the last time you gave yourself a pat on the back and rest more than you think you deserve, are you at least trying to find something that you are passionate about? These are questions which do not require affirmation by whatever standards and pressures that the universe is trying to put on you. These are some questions that you should actually be dealing with because it is very personal – since the idea of what success is should be personal in the first place. Having a timeline helps you set your path but a little deviation from it would not hurt you or damage you in any way. Take little steps. Breathe. Then conquer at your pace.

Okay. Aral na ko ulit.

Half-asleep

Hello, blog and – non-existent blog readers, I suppose?

So today is Sunday and this weekend has been the most relaxed weekend I have had so far for the past few weeks. Last Friday, I turned in my final draft and then submitted few papers, took some exams. It was hell, too much of hell that I spent all of the allowance I have left on a liter of ice cream that I ate alone, using a large cooking spoon as a scoop. Of course I regretted it afterwards but what the heck, I was really depressed.

And so most of the time of this weekend, I was asleep. Frankly, I felt really happy over not having to set up an alarm before going to bed and not even opening my school bag, worrying what to do next. I know this war is far from over but I believe that I deserve to sleep and breathe every once in a while and so I blissfully did.

Other than that, I am proud to announce that I am finally close to finishing Dragon Age which is really long overdue. To be honest, I really don’t want it over yet – I just want to finish the Landsmeet arc so I can finally be Alistair’s queen. Yay! On second thought, I am considering letting Alistair marry Anora since I also think it will be weird to have the Grey Warderns ruling the kingdom. Yes, I take these things seriously.
So what else?

Hmmm my eyes also got a lot worse now. It was less than a year ago when I last had my vision checked but now, I am wearing glasses with grades 175 and 200 for left and right, respectively. I really wanted to buy a new frame for my glasses because the one I am using now makes me look old but this is a gift from my boyfriend’s mom so I think it will be rude to replace it just for vain reasons.

This entry is really random and it’s embarrassing to even re-read it. Haha! I just woke up from twelve hours of sleep and my head is feeling really light. But at least I got to sleep so I guess that is okay.