confession

it took me more than nine years to finally have the courage to write this letter. in truth, i should have done this the day you treated us out to snacks just before our high school graduation. but i haven't got the courage then; afterall, sixteen is fairly young to say what I would like to say back then.

i do not know where i borrowed the courage now. i claim to have learned a lot of lessons through the years. and through those, i've learned that i am strong and brave, and that there is no subtitute for the truth.

maybe it is in knowing that you are leaving the country soon. there is a bit of comfort in knowing that there is that blanket of certainty that i will not bump into you and risk the awkwardness. afterall, this confession is nine years overdue.

maybe it is just now that i have realized that i am ready to take the leap and take flight towards my dreams. and in doing so, i need to free myself from all the loose ends i have had through the years.

or maybe, i just thought that a girly-teenage confession is way passé at our age.

so whatever the reason for this sudden courage may be, i just want to confess that i've been inlove with you in high school. i was inlove with you.

so there, that's the truth that until this time, i never had the courage to admit to anyone. sometimes, not even to myself.

but please don't feel burdened about this in any way. it was never my intention to pass the burden in writing this. i just want to be true to you and to myself.

i wish you the best in everything that you do and to wherever your dreams may take you. soar high. live for your dreams. be happy.

God bless you.

cowardice

dearest,

i claim to own the words sometimes. i claim to know how to use them to tell people how i feel. i claim to have the strength to say the words and bare my heart. in truth, i cannot. for every word that i would like you to read is a piece of my heart. i am not a writer, i do not own the words. but i own my heart.

and right now, i cannot find the right words to borrow to let you know what i feel because in truth, i cannot define it. there's no song for it, but i feel the music.

i will tell you sometime, but until then, i'd go looking for the words until i find them. for they are the only ones that can tell my story.

someday i'll take the leap. someday...

signed: me

on seanachies and word artists

currently transporting favorite entries from my other blog in multiply.

i rarely have the urge to write something that really conveys my thoughts, my feelings and myself. to be honest, i find it scary. i don't know why people would sometimes automatically label me as 'writer' just because they know that i took up mass communications and majored in journalism. in my mind, it won't automatically make you a writer. so when people tell me, "so writer ka" or "writer ka pala", i just shrug or make a facial expression that suits my mood at that moment. i think it conveys my thoughts about the matter clearer than any spoken word.

the thing is, i do not really consider myself a writer. i know most people would argue, especially because i have been known to make a living claiming to be a writer. i write articles, speeches, programmes and scripts and sometimes copyread the written words. i had a stint in maintaining a blog, professionally. but i am not a writer. the above mentioned are things that i do to make a living and it seemed enough for the employers, the ones who pay me to do those things, and the ones who believed that i am indeed a writer. i beg to differ.

my personal definition of a writer is not just someone who writes words. an accountant who does accounting professionally might not consider himself an accountant. it just happened that accounting is what he does for a living. what you say you are should convey a whole lot about you not just what you do to make money. it should be borne out of your passion, your heart and mind, your soul. it is not that something you went to college for. what you went to school for is a formal education. something that we need to get a job and make a living. something that answers the 'occupation' part on a personal data sheet and something that you tell people when they ask you "and you are?..." which of course translates to query about what you do for a living because that would be how people would judge you and assess your worth.

a writer should write for himself first, for others, second. i have not known myself to accomplish the first; and i pass as a writer doing the latter. so when i sometimes forget myself and claim to be a writer, forgive me and just forget about it unless you are a potential employer. it was a slip, and i am probably drugged and delusional at that moment.

i claim to do many things, but for now, i just want to be a storyteller.

comfort food

Okay . . . picture this really) worst-case scenario: It’s cold and raining, your boyfriend/girlfriend has just dumped you, you’ve just been fired, the pile of unpaid bills is sky-high, your beloved pet has recently died, and you think you’re coming down with a cold. All you want to do other than hiding under the covers) is to curl up with a good book, something warm and comforting that will make you feel better.

What do you read?

(Any bets on how quickly somebody says the Bible or some other religious text? A good choice, to be sure, but to be honest, I was thinking more along the lines of fiction…. unless I laid it on a little strong in the string of catastrophes? Maybe I should have just stuck to catching a cold on a rainy day….)

i often find myself reaching out for my comfort books whenever i feel depressed which, i think, constitute some 30 percent of my time.

when i read the question, two books came to mind. they are: charlie and the chocolate factory and harry potter and the sorcerers's stone. i like the writing styles of roald dahl and jk rowling. roald dahl is my favorite author. and though some might argue that the harry potter series is not really a very cheerful lot, i'd still say that harry's story, especially the first one, gives me comfort.

times like that, i'd go for some light reading thus roald dahl's books came to mind. truth is, i don't really mind if the first one that i have grabbed is matilda or the witches, as long as it is one of roald dahl children's classics. the good point about charlie and the chocolate factory is that i can almost smell and taste the chocolates, which in turn will make me grab /buy a chocolate and voila...intant happiness! hahaha...

of course, i don't recommend it if you are on a die-t...

other books i'd recommend:

robert fulghum's books

eoin colfer's artemis fowl series

edward eagers' children's stories

blogger

i'm currently experiencing lay-out troubles huh...

bits...

post transported from my other blog in multiply.

i have to write this, i really do.

i had the craziest dream last night. in that dream, i was alternating my 'reality' between baguio and diliman, and mountain province, and writing down entries in this blog.

i miss baguio and UP, and i think, that due to the rather nostalgic visit to sayoterepublic yesterday, that i had this dream.

begin dream...

i was in a some sort of lodge with tita, tito and raymond. and i was looking out of the window, admiring the view of UP Baguio among the landscape of trees and mountain. and i was writing in a blog on tita's laptop to peaches de guzman (a talented photographer whose work i admire and whose site i almost always visit; and the friend of my friend george). i was writing:

dear peaches,
you should see the view of UP baguio after summer. the leaves are just beginning to fall and i couldn't help but wonder at the beauty of God's creation. the leaves in green and brown, perfect against the landscape of greenish-bluish mountain; and the view of my beloved alma mater in green and maroon, majestic against it all. you should see it from where i am...

and then forgetting i do not know where i am, i nudged my cousin raymond, who was blissfully reading a book, beside me.

i asked: "asan nga tayo ulit 'aymon?"

and he said, "mountain province" without so much a glance at me.

i can remember my exact words as i write it in my blog because i was reading and re-rereading it; though i do not doubt that i cannot see UP baguio from a small lodge in mountain province; or that i'd exchange correspondence with peaches de guzman.

and then before i realize it, i was in UP baguio, in the spot where manang mane used to be, but by now a rather lonely looking visitors' lobby of the new UP baguio (its structures in white, pink and green haha). there was some campaign going on, with students infront of oble, holding some assembly of sort. i can read the ACS and CADUA banners, and the frats, soros, confrats and org banners lining the covered walk to the guard house. and i approached a girl wearing a CADUA shirt.

i asked her, "gurl, are you from the north?"

and she said, "hindi po, taga-sorsogon po ako."

and then i asked, "do you know the meaning of CADUA?"

and then she looked at me with that look that said "duh?"

and then i realized we were in diliman, infront of the UP theater, and i saw a former schoolmate named Au (short-haired lady, i do not really remember except for the name and appearance and that she's in the batch below us. i can't exactly remember by how many years), looking at me rather contemptuously because i was talking to the girl in CADUA shirt.

and the girl i was talking to whispered to me: "galit yata siya ate, kilala mo ba siya?"

me: "sino? si Au? oo, schoolmate ko yun. sa up baguio. ikaw ba?"

the girl: "hindi, diliman ako, nung first year pa."

and then i was back in UP baguio, talking to manang mani in the old UP Baguio and i was telling her, "miss ko na po dito. yung lumang buildings, ung 20's at yung hagdan papuntang HD (humanities division)."

and then i woke up. no joke. i woke up, sweaty and nostalgic.

as i've said, i miss baguio, and UP baguio and the people i used to know.

goldilocks

transported from my homeground

"So, this is my question to you–are you a Goldilocks kind of reader? Do you need the light just right, the background noise just so loud but not too loud, the chair just right, the distractions at a minimum?

Or can you open a book at any time and dip right in, whether it’s for twenty seconds, while waiting for the kettle to boil, or indefinitely, like while waiting interminably at the hospital–as long as the book is open in front of your nose, you’re happy to read?"

i recall that a colleague once commented that reading is like sex. you either see it as something to do with passion or something that should be done as an obligation. ^_^

my answer would be: it is relative to 1) how much i like the book and 2) how badly i need to read the book (or any reading matter).

to number one, i'd say i'm pretty much amenable to any condition as long as there is light; and that i will not risk myself to early demise being run down by speeding vehicles.

to the second, i'd say i am very much the pampered goldilocks, i need to have a very comfortable chair (preferably bed), the right lighting, background noise preferably minimum to none (so i put on ear phones or read when everybody is sleeping), proper ventilation and proper mindset lol

though everything blows when i'm already cramming. Happy BTT!

statistics

transported from my homeground

"There was a widely bruited-about statistic reported last week, stating that 1 in 4 Americans did not read a single book last year. Clearly, we don’t fall into that category, but . . . how many of our friends do? Do you have friends/family who read as much as you do? Or are you the only person you know who has a serious reading
habit?"

i've been very lucky to be born in a family of voracious readers. my dad likes to read filipino (tagalog) novels; although when he does read one of my books, he has the uncanny ability to predict the outcome after reading few chapters. my mother reads too much romance novels; maybe that was why my siblings and i went out of our way to broaden our reading genre because subconciously, we don't want to read too much of (what in our mind's) mommy's mushy novels. my siblings collect their own books, they are into fantasy and adventure. between all of us, i think we've read all the books in the house.

my friends den and kat read as much (or even more) than i do so i really don't have much problem on that part. though some of my other friends, mostly from grade school and high school, do have this rather insensitivity to tell me "reading again?" or that "would you honestly read that?" when they see me holding a rather thick book that in their mind would constitute giving up weekend night outs in bars and singing videoke or watching movies. they pretty much keep up on latest and "famous" books by "watching" it in a movie. ^_^

indoctrination

transported from my homeground

"When growing up, did your family share your love of books? If so, did one person get you into reading? And, do you have any family-oriented memories with books and reading? (Family trips to bookstore, reading the same book as a sibling or parent, etc.)"

I so wanted to answer one of these BTT questions I constantly read thru den's and kat's blogs. And now, indulge me... this is my first BTT post ^_^

I grew up being fed by stories; and grew big eating junks hahaha . Aside from the poignant memories of my older cousins messing up my favorite red-nosed stuffed toy (it's not Rudolph) when I was young, I remember being lulled to sleep by listening to the monotone of my dad or Tatang, my maternal grandpa, reading bible stories straight from the bible.

I can't remember being taught to read, like (B+A=BA; BA+TO=BATO) in grade school. I can't even remember struggling through reading. I felt that I always knew how to read. Maybe because I used to think that reading, like eating and sleeping, watching the television and taking a bath are daily rituals. My mom bought me my first book collection when I was four, five thin, glossy pocketbooks of 'Bible Stories for Children' and my first ever coloring book with poems in them. I can remember reading the books, and messing up the coloring part. I was always adept at reading as I always sucked in arts. I read voraciously, from 'Funny Comics' to 'The Plain Truth' to john grisham's to 'Lord of the Rings' and self-help books.

need i say i love reading? ^_^

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