My Own Private Suicide

Letting the Guilt Go

2011-06-17T02:53:00.000-07:00

It's been a year since my grandma passed away. I used to think that it would be easier as time went by. In a way, it is easier. But in every idle moment, certain images still haunt me. Whenever i find the time to stop and think about all the things that have happened, whenever i find the time to reflect, all those painful memories come rushing back. A year has passed and i still feel as lonely. A year has passed and i still feel as guilty as i have been a year ago.

Every now and then our relatives would ask me if I dream about her. They are a superstitious lot, especially the old ones. They believe that dreams are one of the ways that those who have moved on to the afterlife communicate with those who are still living. I do not believe in such nonsense, but to answer their question--- yes, I dream about her. A lot. Not because she's communicating with me, but because she remains in my consciousness. And even at those times when i'm preoccupied i still think about her subconsciously. She's always present in my mind.

On most dreams, we are simply talking, as if she's still alive. And i remember waking up with a smile, and that warm feeling would quickly vanish once i realize that it was all a dream and she's long gone. Several times i dream of the last day she was alive, but i did things differently, things turned out well and i managed to save her life. Everything's fine, and i would wake up feeling so happy. And like most dreams about her, that great feeling that everything is all right with the world would disappear the moment i realize it was just a dream. All those dreams were so surreal, all those dreams were so vivid, i always thought that they were real instead of make believe. But that's just the way my life plays out. It gives me one fleeting moment of happiness, then in an instant it would take it all away and push me back into the darkness where it chooses to keep me.

I had several dreams about here which were so horrible that i wake up shaken and afraid. I never could remember what those dreams were about except for one, which was as vivid as it was disturbing. Again the last day of her life was being played out, but this time it was in an old, gothic, dilapidated hospital, the type of building you'd see in an old creature feature. Cobwebs abound, mysterious eyes shone in the dark, the floors would creak with every step--- stuff you'd usually see in those old horror movies. In this dream my grandpa was still alive, and we had to carry my grandma's body down to the morgue because in that hospital, it was the duty of the deceased patient's loved ones to bring the patient down. As we were carrying her i noticed that she wasn't that heavy. I remembered that i couldn't carry her on my own when she was still alive, but at that time i thought i could carry her easily. With faulty logic I just figured that's just how it is when a person dies, a lot of her weight would disappear. The morgue was filled with lighted candles, and there were a lot of coffins inside. I wanted to hug her for one last time so I pulled back the sheets that were covering her body, and it turned out all that was covered underneath was her spine connected to her head, her intestines, plus a big blob of blood. There wasn't any skin. Blood poured down on the sides of the stretcher, then my grandpa vomited. From out of nowhere my dad came out shouting at me, blaming me for something i could not understand. Then a little boy came out of the darkness, splashing about the pool of blood on the floor. He then reached for her intestines, then started nibbling on it. While he was chewing on her innards, he was looking at me and he was smiling. That was when i woke up.

My life as it is right now is in shambles. The fact that she's gone just makes things so much harder to bear. I never realized it back then, but she used to give me a reason, she used to give me a sense of direction. Now I don't know where i'm headed.I'm like a sailor out at sea, with no specific destination. I have always been lonely. I have always been angry. But not to the extent that i am now. Ever since she passed away all these negative feelings have been magnified. Oftentimes, i just feel like crying for no apparent reason. Not a day goes by when I don't lose my temper. Not a day goes by when i don't want to beat someone up. Whereas before i can easily keep my emotions in check and keep all the anger inside, nowadays i always feel the need to show it. For the past year i have provoked a lot of people into fighting me, just so i could release all the hate inside of me, but so far no one has been stupid enough to fight back. I've know what it's like to beat the hell out of someone who has done you wrong, and it felt so damn good, i have actually been craving for it. The satisfaction it brings is immeasurable. But the opportunity to release all this anger onto another person hasn't presented itself yet, so i have to be content with spending several hours in the gym. Some people think i've suddenly turned into an obsessive compulsive health nut. The truth is, i've been going to the gym frequently to release all this anger. Lifting all those weights and hitting that punching bag again and again is strangely satisfying. I just have to imagine that I'm hitting another person... someone i despise... someone who has done me wrong. And somehow, as i transfer all the pain onto an imaginary being, the pain i feel inside would go away, even for just a fleeting moment.

If she had told me that she was ready to die, maybe it would be easy to let go. But the very last time that i looked into her eyes, i knew that she still wanted to live. By the time that we've managed to get her inside my car, I already knew that i let her down. And with the way i'm living my life right now, i'm letting her down again and again and again. I know i can't let go of her memory, but her memory is entwined with such great feelings of loneliness and guilt, it makes the very act of living so damn difficult. It would be so easy to just give up, especially since i still have no apparent purpose, and i see no compelling reason. I know it's not the sane option, but giving up may be the only way of letting go of the guilt that's continuing to haunt me in this life.

Nines

2011-06-06T10:12:00.000-07:00

I've had a number of close encounters with death in my life. Just a slight miscalculation, or one seemingly negligible change in the chain of events could have led to a very different outcome. I have cheated death more than once, and i wonder why it had kept on evading me. The existentialist in me would believe that i still have a purpose, there's still something that i have to do in this life, that's why it just can't let go of me. But the pessimist in me would dismiss such beliefs as hogwash. It's all coincidental. There's no higher power. There's nothing more to it than luck. Nothing but pure, dumb, stupid luck.

When I was 10, i remember floating in outer space. It was such a vivid memory. I felt so serene and at peace, but that feeling didn't last long. Aliens appeared out of nowhere and they began to chase me. No matter where i would hide, they would always find me, and i was so afraid of them. They could catch me any minute and i was sure that they would kill me. I didn't want to die, but that's exactly what's going to happen when they catch me. I couldn't fight them, there were too many of them and they were so strong, running and hiding was my only option. I felt as if my heart was going to explode from all the fatigue. If they didn't kill me, i would die of exhaustion instead... but that would still be the better option. Better than dying in the hands of those space creatures. It lasted for days before i finally escaped. And the visions of outer space and my intergalactic horrors slowly faded, at first merging with reality before disappearing completely. I was bedridden at home for a week before they admitted me to a hospital. Everyone thought that it was just a simple fever, but it turned out i already had meningitis. The doctor said they administered the antibiotics in time. If treatment got delayed for even a day, i probably would have died. I didn't understand all the fancy words i was hearing back then, but i understood that it was serious condition, and i was so thankful that everything turned out right. I was 10, i had so many things to look forward to, i had so many years ahead of me. I was happy to be alive.

I can't exactly remember the reason why i felt so bad at that time, but back when i was around fifteen, i thought my whole world was falling apart. I felt that there was no other choice, i had to escape. On hindsight, i believe it was a combination of multiple superficial and insignificant things that just piled up. To my present self, whatever problems i faced back then were nothing compared to the ones i encounter these days... but back then, things were so different. When you are young, everything is amplified. Nothing is insignificant. Even the littlest things can cause a great amount of pain. That was when i found myself standing on the top floor of our house. After an hour or so of crying, i decided that it was time. There's no other way, all i had to do was jump and it would be over. I stood up, i closed my eyes, and just when i was about to leap forward, a strong gush of wind pushed me back and i fell on the floor. I was a religious person back then, and i saw that as a sign. That I still had to keep on fighting, i still had to keep on living. I still had a purpose. I could almost feel death breathing down my neck, and just like that, i decided against it. I saw something, but in truth there was nothing. I believed that a superior being pushed me back and kept me from making a huge mistake, but in truth it was all coincidental. I was the only one up there on that ledge and no one else. No one prevented me from jumping but myself... back then, i just couldn't see that. It was easier to believe in superstitions. When you are young and you haven't encountered all the different types of shit that life throws at you, it's easier to turn a blind eye. It's easier to pretend and make believe.

It was a few days before Christmas on December 2003 when i fell asleep driving on my way home. I had a number of exams on that week, and i slept for only 2 hours each day. The night before it happened, i didn't sleep at all. I came from my friend's place and i left as soon a we exchanged Christmas presents. The last thing i remembered was i was driving at about 140 km/hr on the highway, and then i woke up with a lot of people surrounding my car. Someone was knocking on the windshield. I looked ahead and saw that I crashed into a parked car and its rear end was totaled. In order to get there from where i was, i had to make a U turn, do a quick right turn and pass by an intersection. I couldn't have possibly done that unconsciously... to be able to make it that far without hitting someone, without crashing into something else was quite impossible. My faith was already wavering that time, and i doubt if some superior being had any hand in it, but i had to admit that what happened was a miracle. My car wasn't damaged as much, and i didn't even have a single scratch on me. Everything about that event was nothing short of a miracle. It's probably dumb luck, but it was really miraculous just the same.

January 2008. That was when my highly publicized accident happened. My car was a total wreck, it burst into flames and nothing could be salvaged from it. It was funny. I could no longer count the times when i went home drunk and still managed to come home in one piece despite the fact that i couldn't remember how exactly i got home when i wake up in the morning.... and on that one time when i just had a few drinks and i wasn't even tipsy, i decide to drive too fast just to get that adrenaline rush and then ---- BAM! Driving on a curved road above the speed limit was a disaster waiting to happen. It was all over the evening news, and the footage can still be seen on Youtube up to this day that my friends continue to bring it up every now and then much to our amusement. I could laugh at it now, and i could poke fun at the fifteen minutes of fame that the incident brought me, but it wasn't funny back then. My life was already a mess back then, as messy as it is now, that if i died back then i wouldn't even care. If there was an afterlife, i'd probably be looking at the wreck, looking at my lifeless, bloody body and i'd most definitely be smiling. Because it's all over. It's finally all over. But I had a friend with me at that time, and that made all the difference. I may not regard my life as much, but to take another life with me as i throw away my own, whether intentionally or not... that's not something i could bear. If i was driving alone, i would have wanted things to turn out differently instead. It would have spared me from all the shit that i had to deal with in the succeeding years. But i wasn't alone, and that's one time that i have to thank my dumb luck. It was one of those rare occasions wherein luck was on my side instead of against me. It wasn't divine intervention. It was just plain luck. Something that happened by chance, something coincidental. To put reason into a non specific chain of events would be over analyzing. But for the sake of argument, if some superior being did keep on saving me all those times, then it must be a superior being with a wicked sense of humor. A being that finds it so amusing to keep me in this rut. I couldn't put much faith in such a being now, can it?

I have cheated death so many times, i often ask myself if there's a reason why. Do i really have a purpose in this life? is there really something that i still have to do? can i really make a difference? With the number of times that i have cheated death, anyone who's even slightly superstitious would probably say yes. Something like that could be seen as strangely logical. If i have some sort of purpose in this life, i am not seeing it. If i have to do it in the future, how many more years do i have to wait? how much longer do i have to languish in this purgatory? I would say that i have touched the lives of a few people. I know of two people who have said that their lives are better because they got to know me. And for some weird reason, someone told me once that i gave her inspiration. In my line of work, i know a number of people who are alive because of me. Either i've directly treated them, or because i was able to help them financially to afford the medications and procedures that they needed. If that's my purpose, then it's not enough. Those things do not happen often enough. I need something like that constantly, i need something that would keep me pushing and fighting continuously. Opportunities that happen sporadically aren't enough. Everyone needs a purpose to go on through life. It may be something that inspires you, it may be something that drives you insane, but either way, it keeps you going. To live a life without purpose would be dull, uneventful. It's like you're not living at all. A life without purpose is a life without meaning. You'd often wish you were just dead because it would seem you're not really living anyway. Your body may be functional, but everything else is just lifeless. It wouldn't make any difference whether you're still alive or already dead.

Through the Negativity

2011-05-30T09:47:00.000-07:00

I couldn't say i was surprised. It's just that i was hoping that i was wrong. I suspected it when my cousin was diagnosed with shingles. He was fit and healthy, he was not in any undue amount of stress. There has to be a reason why he became immunocompromised. So i forced him to undergo some tests, just to rule out certain possibilities. When the results came out, i was right.

So yeah. He's HIV positive. And he also has hepatitis B. At first he was just laughing about it as he told me on the phone. He kept making jokes, injecting humor in a very serious situation. So i went along with him. But the next day i received a call from his sister, and she told me that when she visited him he was laughing at first, but the wall that he surrounded himself with suddenly fell down, and all his tears came rushing out all at once. He told her he wanted to kill himself. Maybe he would ask for my help so he can get his hands on a lot of prohibited meds, swallow all those pills in an instant and let it all be over and done with. I didn't know what to say. I would say that we're pretty close, but i never saw that side of him. I've always known him to be that happy go lucky guy, that guy you can always count on if you want to have a great time. He's the guy you can count on if you want to leave your problems behind... albeit temporarily. Come to think of it, that was how we became close. He always gave me some sort of escape whenever i needed to.

I've had several misadventures with him. During my carefree days, back when i didn't give a fuck, he showed me all the perfect spots, where to pick up the hottest girls for the cheapest price, where i can really have a good time. He taught me all there is to know about the trade. You could say that he was my mentor. Maybe it was inevitable, that he would catch something serious. Two years ago he got infected with gonorrhea and we were laughing about it as i was treating him. He got laid very often. There was a time that he got laid almost every night, and each night it's with a different girl. And he never practiced safe sex. Whether it's with prostitutes, with some girl he knew from work, or some random chick he met at a bar, he never wore condoms. I always tell him to wear condoms, but he would just give me that cynical and smug look of his whenever i told him that. The fact that he knew for a fact that i don't always practice what i preach makes me sound like some sort of a hypocrite i guess. He even got laid two weeks before the results came out. And he still had shingles back then. I didn't know what surprised me more. The fact that he could still have sex even when his arm was painful as hell... or the fact that some chick could get horny as fuck that they would screw someone who had a lot of lesions in his arm.

I saw him the other day. I made a medical certificate for him, diagnosing him with some bullshit sickness, the most plausible illness that i could think of just so he can get transferred to the morning shift. Morning shift = less stress. That was how i justified my recommendation without going through the specifics. He wasn't ready to tell people yet, and i understood him. No matter how much people say that they understand HIV and AIDS, discrimination still exists, especially in the workplace. People will avoid him, like that asshole brother of his, who left their apartment the very minute he found out because he believed he will get infected. He could even lose his job if his boss makes up some silly excuse just to get him fired. Stuff like that happens. And he cant afford to lose his job, especially with his many future expenses. If they ever found out that i made some bogus diagnosis, i could get reprimanded... heck, i could get suspended but i didn't really care. All I wanted to at that time was to help him, and i was willing to do everything i could.

When he entered the clinic, i no longer saw that smile that he always wore. now he doesn't even make any attempt to hide his true feelings. As I was explaining to him the results of all the exams, as i was discussing his illness and his prognosis, he became teary eyed. And then he started to cry. There was nothing i could do or say to make him feel better. Any word would just seem like horse shit coming out of my mouth. So i just let him cry. After a while i told him that i knew what he was thinking. His sister told me that he was contemplating suicide. It's not the end of the world. He could still live a normal life. He still had so many years ahead of him, he can still do all the things he wanted to do. There's no need to let go of his dreams and ambitions. But we both knew that wasn't exactly true. We both knew that i was just trying to make him feel better. His condition may not change everything, but it changes a lot of things. On many drunken nights he had told me his goals in life. How he wanted to start his own business. How he wanted to earn a lot of money so that his mom no longer had to work. How he wanted to send her niece to school and finance her education until she finishes college... because his good for nothing brother didn't want to have anything to do with his own kid. And how he wanted to have a family of his own someday, once his family didn't depend on him as much as they do now. For someone who seems so frivolous on the outside, this man has such noble goals. His dreams in life prioritizes the needs of other rather than focusing on his. There are so many things that he can no longer do. Several of his dreams can no longer be turned into reality. And i guess that's what hurts the most--- to have your dreams crushed in front of you, just like that. As i look into his eyes, i see myself in him. I knew exactly how he was feeling. We both wear this facade, we want to show the world that we are carefree, that we have no worries, that there's always something to be happy about. We always wear this smile, we try to project this aura of happiness just so we can hide the mess that we are inside. I know what it's like to be filled with dreams, and just like that, because of some bizarre twist of fate, everything is taken away from you.... leaving you with no hope, leaving you with no purpose and no sense of direction, leaving you in such a state of disarray. After our long talk, i've managed to cheer him up a bit. He told me that somehow I've managed to give him a little bit of hope. He's probably lying, i know. He's just trying to make me feel better, as much as i was trying to cheer him up. It would talk more than several inspirational words to lift me out of a state of misery. If nothing can pull me out of this present state i'm in, i doubt if anything can pull him out of his either. I may not be able to make things better for him, but i wanted him to know that i'm here for him. And unlike the many people surrounding him, i understand exactly how he's feeling. I'm pretty sure he's not aware of it, i've never taken off my mask in front of him... but I am a kindred soul. As we continue walking through this joke that we call life, we can't really do much. It's either we give up now, or we keep moving as we laugh along with it. And as long as i'm able to, i would be laughing along with him if he chooses to.

Of Dogs and Men

2011-05-13T10:16:00.000-07:00

People seem to assume that I like dogs. That’s not exactly true. Yeah, my username on different websites usually has the word dog attached to my name… but that’s just something a few of my friends called me in high school--- and it stuck. Because dogs are always horny, that's their explanation. I wasn’t really a horndog back then, but you know how high school life is. Once people start branding you with something, it’s gonna stick no matter how far it is from the truth.

Now back to our canine friends. I’m not really fond of dogs. I don’t hate them either. You can say I’m indifferent, but when they start becoming overly playful they become incredibly annoying… especially if I’m not in the mood. Yeah there are times when I like playing with dogs, especially when I’m incredibly bored. But after a few minutes I’ll grow tired of the game. Then they become annoying as again... sometimes they get too annoying, that i have to keep myself from kicking the hell out of them.

It’s not just dogs. I’m not very fond of pets in general. It wasn’t always like this. I remember when I was around 5 or 6, me and my siblings used to collect hamsters. At the peak of our hamster hoarding phase, I think they reached about 30 in number. We couldn’t keep track of all of them, and it wasn’t unusual to find a dead hamster tucked beneath some furniture on any given day. I didn’t really care for them. I viewed them as some sort of commodity, and I never developed any form of attachments to those creatures. When one died, we just bought another one. I guess the only time I got attached to a pet was when I was about 9 years old. Each of us had a rabbit, and I frequently played with mine. But one day we made the mistake of leaving them outside during a storm, and by the time we checked on them they were all dead. When I saw my rabbit, I cried so hard. I was the only one who cried, and I got so embarrassed, yet I couldn’t stop. I kept crying until the next day. I even made a makeshift coffin and grave for my rabbit, it even had a makeshift tombstone. The next week our grandpa bought new rabbits for each of us, but it just wasn’t the same. I never grew fond of my new rabbit. She just wasn’t as affectionate. I left her outside on most days, and after a few months i didn't even bother to see it at all. After two years when I was told that it had died I just shrugged m shoulders. I just didn’t care at all.

We always had dogs inside our house. Even the big and burly ones, we kept them inside our house. My sister is very fond of dogs. When one died, she’s gonna ask for a new one. At first she preferred those toy dogs, but as she grew older, she began to prefer those big dogs… and I found them more annoying. They slobber twice as much, they make more of a mess, and they stink the hell out of our house, especially when it gets really warm.

Around that time when I had that rabbit, my mom had a dog named Max. Our neighbors were so afraid of that dog. He was big, and any time he saw a stranger, he was ready to attack. I wasn’t really fond of him, because he was big and stinky, and he loved to slobber all over me especially during the mornings when I’m about to go to school so I’d have to clean myself up all over again. But all that changed after one incident. I don’t remember the reason, but my dad was so angry at me that time that he was about to beat the hell out of me. He pushed me once and I fell on the floor, and just when he was about to hit me, along came Max. He barked so loud and was about to bite my dad on his hand. My dad managed to pull his hand away just in time, then Max chased him to his room where he locked himself in. I never saw my dad run so fast. I was crying so hard that time, yet I couldn’t help but laugh at the sight of my dad acting like such a big pussy. After a few minutes of barking and growling at the locked door, Max came back to me and he licked my tears as I hugged him tight. How could I not possibly love that dog. It’s impossible not to feel affection for a dog who’s so loyal. He was on my side, and that meant a lot to me. On that fateful day when someone forgot to close our front door and Max got out, I knew just how sad my mom was feeling back then. For about two weeks, my mom kept preparing his food, just in case he came back on his own. She knew that was next to impossible, yet she kept hoping. I heard her crying for so many nights, and I knew exactly how she felt. That feeling of loss was so great because Max wasn’t just an ordinary dog. To her and to me, that dog was part of the family. In fact, I felt closer to Max than some people in our family.

When I came home a few months back, I was surprised to find a new addition to our kennel--- My brother bought a beagle. Great. Another dog. In addition to the mixed breed we keep outside, and to that huge german sheperd that kept on shedding its fur inside our house. It was kept inside a small cage, so I figured it’s not really going to bother me. But everytime they let it out, it would try to hijack one of my shoes, and it pees and shits all over the house--- so many times in a span of a few minutes, I often wonder where all that shit and pee were coming from. But no matter how annoying that dog is, what annoys me more is my brother. He bought that dog, yet I never saw him take it outside except on Saturdays. During weekdays, after coming home from work, he basically ignores it. On Saturdays after spending an hour or two with it, he’s gonna go someplace else and he’s just gonna leave it in the house for everyone else to take care of it. And now he’s out of the country, guess who’s taking care of his dog. It’s been more than half a year since he bought it and that dog should be potty trained by now, yet it isn’t because no one’s training it. If you buy a dog, then it’s your responsibility. Jesus, he’s not a child who could just buy a dog due to impulse, and expect others to do the real work for him. If you can’t handle the added responsibility, then don’t buy a pet for Christ’s sake. That’s why I don’t buy pets. I just can’t deal with the added responsibility of caring for another living thing. I have enough things to worry about at this point in my life, and I don’t have the patience to deal with the idiosyncrasies of any specific pet. I guess that also explains why i'm content being alone most of the time. I don't want to deal with the excess baggage, i want to be free from any complications that any sort of interaction might bring. On my free time I would prefer to just sit back without worrying about anything at all. I’m not someone who’d buy a pet just for company. And I’m not someone who could easily pass the burden to someone else the minute I find out I just can’t handle it.

Early this morning, after I had my breakfast, I saw it staring at me from its cage. Normally I wouldn’t even let it bother me, but it just looked so sad and lonely. If you’re kept inside that small cage all day, who wouldn’t be. When my sister is here she would let it out and play with it, then clean up the mess afterwards, but it’s been a week since she’s been here so the poor thing has been kept inside its cage all week. I must have been incredibly bored this morning because I let the dog out, got her leash, and took her for a walk. For real. She peed at least twice, but it didn’t matter since we were outside. And for some reason, I didn’t get to see any poop. When i was walking her, she wasn't forcing me to go anywhere i didn't want to go. If I didn't know any better, i would've thought that she was trying to be in her best behavior, because I know for a fact that she's not like that at all. Everyone describes her as being a huge pain in the ass. I carried her and she didn't make a fuss. I let her sit on my lap and she didn't make a big fuss. In fact, she just remained still. She seemed perfectly content as I was. The whole scenario just felt so weird and alien to me. Maybe being kept inside that cage for so long affected her behavior somewhat. Or maybe her doggie sense told her that I'm not that type of person who was willing to play games with her. I'm not the type of person she can mess with. Maybe it was just perfect timing, and maybe the exact scenario may never happen again, but it felt so odd and so good at the same time. That was when i thought that this could work. Something like this can actually work. Like the way we interact with other people, sometimes it's all about the right place, the right time, the right circumstance... even one small alteration in any of those parameters can spell the difference between animosity and harmony. I guess everything was just right on that Friday morning. I guess there's a chance that i can form some sort of attachment with a pet after all. Up until I took that dog for a walk, I've always thought it was impossible. No matter how much I try to deny it, there are times that i find myself letting my wall down. This wall has kept me from being hurt and it has kept me free from additional emotional baggage, but every once in a while, it feels good to let the wall down. No man could thrive in complete isolation after all.

Typical.

2011-05-05T00:09:00.000-07:00

Man, that was one horrible weekend. I need a vacation from that vacation. I was foolish enough to believe that it would turn out otherwise. I mean, it was doomed from the very start.

It was early January when my dad called me, telling me not to make any plans on the last weekend of April because the whole family was going to attend my cousin's wedding. And he told me that he was about to buy plane tickets because air fares are cheaper when you book months in advance. Fast forward to a month later. Yup, he hasn't bought any plane tickets by the time i got home. We finally bought tickets two weeks before the scheduled flight. And he had to use my credit card because he had no cash on hand at that time... and by the way my credit card was blocked because he paid my bill with a check that bounced. And what about our tickets for the flight back home? we bought it a week before, and apparently he never talked about his planned duration for the trip with my siblings who can only afford a few days off from work. And what's so fucked up was the fact that i was coordinating things between all of them. Jesus, why couldn't my dad call them instead? and why the fuck did he not talk to them months before? Well, that's my biological father. The word planning is not in his vocabulary. There's minimal amount of responsibility and initiative in his body. I wouldn't be surprised if there wasn't any at all.

The flight to our destination was awkward. He sat beside me and kept on making small talk. The fact that i kept of tinkering with my ipod should have been enough for him to realize that i was in no mood to talk to him. But no, he just kept on blabbering and blabbering. By the time we landed, i asked him about our travel plans. The day after the wedding, we were supposed to rent a van to travel to the beach a hundred miles away. Then we were supposed to stay at some resort. I wasn't surprised to find out that he hasn't made any arrangements. We'll just rent a van when we get there, he says. Find a place to stay when we get there, he says. The two days we were there, he never made any fuckin' calls. He never made any arrangements. Good thing my aunt offered to lend their van when he asked my dad how we were going to the beach. And this happened a few hours before we were supposed to leave. That's my biological father for you. Everything has to be served in a silver platter to him. He can't do anything by himself. For anything to happen, some other person needs to do things for him.

Oh yeah, we got delayed because he just couldn't get up early, even when necessary. And again, he didn't call for any airport transfer service until the last minute. How typical. And we almost missed our flight home because he kept on insisting that we didn't need to leave early because the airport was only an hour drive away. Never mind the fact that we kept on telling him that we should leave early. He just told us to trust him. Jesus fucks, we've known him all these years. Did he actually think that we can trust him? That we can depend on him? And hasn't he heard that there's no way that the time spent traveling by land would be constant. It's either more or less, and when you have to be someplace important it's better to be early because you never know what you'll encounter on the road. But that's my biological dad. He doesn't believe in the saying that it's better to be safe than sorry. His motto in life is just to fix things as you go along. Trouble is, he doesn't really have the capability to fix things. He just has this penchant to consistently fuck things up. And what's worse is the fact that he was shouting at the person driving us to the airport telling him it's his fault that it took so long for us to reach the airport. The same way he shouted at the waitress at the restaurant earlier because the coffee that was served with his breakfast wasn't brewed, even when it says clearly on the menu that the included coffee in his meal was anything but brewed. The same way he shouted at the airport employees, ordering them around as if he ran the place. That's my biological dad for you. He always acts like he's king, like he's such a big deal even though he's not. He's always boastful, he's always bursting with pride even when in truth he has nothing to be proud about. He thinks of himself as everything, always going for the shock and awe approach and he manages to fool a lot of people. But for those people who can look closely, for those people who can see what he really is, they know that he's nothing. A hollow, shallow, empty space filled with nothing but fluff. He's just a huge chamber filled with nothing.

I realize that the main reason i enjoy traveling to different places and why i enjoy going on vacations is because i am far from him. Sure i feel great when i get to explore new and different places, when i get to do different things, when i meet new people... but the location doesn't really matter as long as it's far from him. At home i'm always pissed. At home i'm always sad. It's just either one of those. When i'm far away, i feel content, i feel happy, even when i'm not doing anything at all. A real vacation is something that keeps your mind off the negativity, even for a short while. It's won't be a vacation at all when you bring that negativity with you. In my life, most of the negativity centers on my dad. He's someone that i wish i can always leave behind.

Bygones

2011-04-19T20:11:00.000-07:00

It's been more than a year since i've been to the top floor of our house. That was February of last year, two days after i came home. That was when my grandpa was asking about the things that were happening to him, and i gave him one wrong answer after another. On that top floor, there was my grandpa's room. Adjacent to it was a makeshift basketball court where my brother and i used to play when we were kids. On the rooftop was a small garden, and when there weren't too many building around almost twenty years ago, we could see as far as the ocean back then. Back then, it was some sort of sanctuary from me. Back then, it was all serene and quiet, and i used to go there when i needed to get away from it all. It was yesterday afternoon when i decided to go upstairs. There was no specific reason. I just thought of going up there all of a sudden.

Most of plants have died now, save for a few which were beginning to wilt. The soil was dry and cracked. The iron chairs we placed there were now all rusty. Privacy and serenity were things of the past. Before our house towered all above the others, now several buildings were around us, and the tenants of the apartments right next to us can see me clearly if they chose to look out their windows. I could no longer feel a breeze, i could no longer breathe fresh air. I could no longer see the ocean. All i see are smog and skyscrapers blocking the view. It's no longer a view that can foster joy and relaxation. The sight i see now is simply depressing.

I went inside my grandpa's room, and it looked as if a bomb hit it some time last year. The sight that I saw shocked me. The last time i was here everything looked okay, it didn't seem so dilapidated. I dunno, maybe it was and i just didn't take notice. Now all the paint on the walls were peeling. Thick dust covered his bed and the floors, i left shoe prints everywhere i walked. I saw family pictures beneath the glass covering one table, our faces unrecognizable due to the damage caused by water that had managed to seep through the walls. It's amazing how a year of neglect can make such a difference. Before, proper maintenance managed to hide all the wear and tear. Now it's exposed for all the world to see. If i didn't know better i would've thought that this room had been abandoned for years.

And then i looked up and i saw the basketball ring. I was never good at that sport, i never played it unless i had to, like during our physical education classes because i had to be graded, or during intramural games in high school because our class lacked players. But playing with my brother when we were kids was the exception. There were no rules, there was no pressure to perform well. We played by our own rules and we made them up as we went along. Come to think of it, the only times my brother and i got along well was during play time.... until we argued about something about whatever we were playing, then we'd end up fighting like we always did. lol. But I spent many summers up there with my brother, and during the extremely warm days of summer when i close my eyes and everything's all quiet, i smell fresh grass. I smell the flowers on our rooftop. I hear birds chirping. i see myself playing on the streets with people i've already lost touch with. I see the view of the ocean from a distance. i see myself playing with my brother on that makeshift basketball court in our rooftop. And I hear my grandpa cheering us as he watched us through the window of his room.

I have no idea when that backboard broke and how it broke. I guess 20 years is a long time for even the sturdiest of boards. Twenty years is a long time for anything. Anything is bound to break sooner or letter, all things tend to pass away some time. It's funny how time flies by so fast. It seems like it was only yesterday when everything seemed so much different. People just become so preoccupied with many other things, most of them unnecessary, that we tend to become blind to the changes happening around us. We tend to ignore the changes to the things that we become familiar with, to the changes in the things that we used to cherish. To the things that were once essential, but has since lost relevance. I guess i went upstairs because i remembered the feeling of peace i felt back then, every time i spent all those afternoons alone on the roof top alone... and i really missed that feeling. It was something that i wanted. It was a feeling that i was yearning for. But when i went up, i discovered a very different place. It all seemed very alien to me. It could no longer offer the peace of mind that i was looking for. Its time had passed a long time ago. I never went back when it could still give me that reprieve that i needed. Like may things in my life that i have somehow neglected and disregarded, the realization came too late. It's a sad fact of life. For most people, regrets always come in the end. All we could so is wish for a way to turn back time, but there's nothing more we can do but wish for the impossible. We failed to act when our actions could have meant something. We never think of doing something until it's already too late.

A Reason

2011-03-25T16:09:00.000-07:00

I've been thinking a lot about life these past few days. About how ephemeral it is. About how insignificant and superficial one's life is in the grand scheme of things, yet at the same time eerily profound. I've been thinking about how it holds great importance to some people... no matter how miserable their lives are, they still see some sort of beauty in it. Some people just see life as redundant. An endless cycle that we have to do again and again just to get through with it. Life brings no misery, yet it brings no joy and excitement either. It's just one monotonous episode after the other. To others, life brings nothing but pain, and that they would do anything to be free from it, no matter how beautiful and blessed that life is to to other people. I've been thinking about how life can be viewed differently. Depending on which perspective, depending on the circumstance, depending on who's living it. There are so many facets in life, a single person can't possibly see each one of them. We can't really see how life is through another person's eyes, and we can't really see life in its entirety.

I've been thinking about work. I guess it's about time i ended this routine of doing nothing productive and move on to the next routine--- one where i could at least do something of worth, no matter how small the impact may be. I've been unemployed for more than a year now. I'd much rather sulk all day, lying alone on this bed, wallowing in guilt and misery... but i realize i can't go on living like this for the rest of my life. I've got to do things to keep me distracted, to keep me away from certain thoughts... at least temporarily. For the time being, I have to pull myself up.

During those years that i have been working at different hospitals, i've gotten to know a lot of patients. There were those who were completely devastated when told that there was no cure for whatever ailed them. There were those who would move heaven and earth just to receive the proper treatment. There were those who would stubbornly hold on, even when all hope was lost. When i looked into their tearful eyes, i saw the same thing. They were asking for mercy, for another chance, practically begging me for it... as if i had the power to change things. Most of them were old, most of them were weak, most of them weren't well off. And therein lies the irony. I never knew them well enough to know how they lived their lives, but i guess in their eyes, life was beautiful. Life wasn't something you'd give up just like that.

On the other hand, there were also many who didn't give a damn at all. They were usually the young and the strong, those who seem to have great potential. Some were rich, some had great jobs, some had a lot of things going for them. They come in after a failed suicide attempt, and they look at you with hatred as you're treating them because you have deprived them of their chance to escape... to escape that life that seemed so perfect to others. And then once they've calmed down, they look at you as if you have betrayed them. They look at you as if asking for mercy, because they know you have the power to make things all right again. Sometimes I wonder if we were doing the right thing back then. I could never know how life was for them. I'm not them, i wasn't living their lives. Life must be really bad for anyone to consider doing such a thing. Sometimes I wonder if we should just let these people be. Because what happens after we have saved them? Most never recover completely. A lot of them would suffer from a lifelong depression. Then there are those who are left completely paralyzed, there are those who could only feed via an intravenous route for the rest of their lives, there are those who can no longer speak, hear, or see... what kind of life did we give them? WHat kind of second chance? I'm not sure if we really did save their lives if we only made their lives so much more miserable. We had to sacrifice their own happiness just to make their loved ones happy. If it wasn't considered a crime, if it wasn't considered unethical, maybe it would be better if we just put people like them out of their misery.

As i'm sitting here alone inside my grandparents' room, I've been thinking about life. I guess it's my room now. I've been thinking about the past. I've always thought of my grandpa as some sort of a fighter--- he's not gonna give up without a fight. He wouldn't let go just like that. It was early March last year when i heard him say the words I'm giving up. Those words took me by surprise, because I never thought of him as a person who'd give anything up. But when i looked at him, how weak and tired he looked, i began to understand. He wasn't used to being so dependent on others for anything. He wasn't used to being carried all around, he wasn't used to being spoonfed, he wasn't used to being treated like such a baby. We never told him that he was dying, but I'm sure he knew. A few months back he could do anything he wanted, he could go anywhere. And then last March, that was what he was reduced to. By that time, life already had no meaning for him. There was nothing left. If he still wanted to do certain things, he must've realized that no longer had the strength to do them. He depended on others for every single thing, and to him, that wasn't living. When a person has reached that certain point in his life, that's the time to give up. We will all reach that point in our lives, some sooner than later.

This is the room where my grandma breathed her last breath. In fact, I'm facing that chair where I found her slumped and no longer breathing. For the past couple of years I guess i was the one she depended on mostly... at least next to my dad. Whenever i went out at night, she would ask me to come home early. I used to think that was just her being overprotective as always. And every time i'd get annoyed. But as her health gradually worsened, I saw an increasingly worried look in her eyes, as if anything could happen any minute. She had a point. My grandpa had a separate room upstairs, my dad didn't live with us, and my brother was seldom home. If she needed to be brought to the hospital, no one could bring her there immediately. She had to call me or my dad. That happened several times during the last few years, but i was always at work when it happened. I guess that was just dumb luck. She had to wait a few minutes before my dad came, but they always made it to the hospital just in time. Maybe that's why we have grown complacent. She always made it in time. She always had that worried look, and that's how I know that she's the type of person who'd continue clinging on to life for as long as she could. On her last few days I thought she had already given up. SHe refused to go back to the hospital no matter what. She'd rather stay at home. But somehow she found a reason to keep fighting near the end. That woke her up from her state of temporary hopelessness. But it's just her luck that I was the person at the house that time and not my dad. I know, i did everything i could and things probably wouldn't have gone any different if my dad was the one at home with her that time, but that's one fact i can never erase. I was the one who failed to bring her to the hospital in time.

My grandpa didn't find any reason to keep on living, that's why he gave up so easily. My grandma found one and that brought her in a proper state of mind, though that realization came a little too late. That's what gives every person the strength to move on. At least one reason to keep on fighting, one reason to keep moving, that one reason that continues to give hope. I'm looking at my past, and there are so many things that i regret. There are moments of happiness, but they are all mixed with so many painful memories, things that i wish i could easily forget. I'm looking at my present life, and i fail to see anything of worth. There's just nothing. I try to look at my future, and the uncertainty is just so damn depressing. There's a hint of certainty, but that certainly looks bleak. It's that certainty that i do not want to face. It's not the future that i was hoping for. But i guess i'll just have to go with the flow, go wherever this monotonous life takes me. And I hope that somewhere down the road i would finally find my reason to keep fighting, my reason to keep on living. A person can only take so much, a person can only wait so much. It is uncertain at what point our travels would become tiresome. Without a definite target, to keep on walking would be deemed pointless. Without something to hold on to, sooner or later, any person is bound to give up.

Year After Year

2011-03-20T11:36:00.000-07:00

People have been greeting me all day, and i find it hard to force a smile, I find it hard to say thanks. I find it so hard to pretend. How could I, when i find no reason to be happy at this point in my life? How can I, when I feel so fucking miserable?

For the past week my dad has been bugging me to throw a birthday party. Jesus Christ. After the bad news that I received last week, he actually thinks i'd be in the mood to party? He actually thinks i'd be in the mood to celebrate? Celebrate what exactly? 3 decades of going nowhere? more than 30 years of living a life that is so far from the life that i wanted to live? Jesus fuckin' Christ, how dense is he? I didn't even want to get out of the fuckin' house, I don't even want to socialize with people. It wouldn't take rocket scientist to figure that out. It's written all over my face. To keep on bugging me to do something that I really do not want to do is not just annoying, it's downright insensitive.

But yeah, about a day before my birthday, we arrived at some sort of compromise. If i didn't want to invite my friends and our relatives to join me on this momentous occasion, we should at least eat dinner at a nice place outside. Just us, just our family. Just to get it over with, i agreed. But before we left our house, he told me not to forget my credit card. I asked him why. He told me didn't have enough cash at the moment so we're gonna use my card to pay for dinner, he'll just pay me when my credit card statement arrives at the mail. Oh my fucking God. Another one of so many facepalm moments. If he didn't have enough money, why choose such an expensive place to eat in the first place? And need I remind him that it was his idea. I didn't even want to go out. Eating dinner at home would be fine with me, but of course something as simple as that wouldn't be appropriate for such a glorious occasion.

During dinner, I was looking at the people I shared the table with. Seated across from me, there was that man that I've grown to despise so much after so many years. I recognize his great efforts to reach out, I can see that he has genuine concern for me. But all those things could never cover us his past mistakes, his past misdeeds. I don't think i can ever forget some of the things he has done. Too many huge missteps. Too many major fuck ups. Nothing could ever cover up those past sins. Absolutely nothing.

On my left was the guy whom i grew up with, but i never really had the chance to form some sort of a bond because we spent most of those years fighting and arguing instead of having some sort of meaningful conversation. I don't hate him now, but i don't feel any form of attachment with him either. Nothing.

And then there were the three women whom i only saw once a week. Sometimes weeks went by without seeing them at all. I felt no animosity towards them all those years, save for very few occasions... I never developed hatred towards them, but i never developed deep concern for them either. I just never had a chance. Maybe if things were different when i was growing up, I would have learned to care for them more. But with the way things were, i just never had the opportunity.

I looked at everyone seated at the table, and I never lost that feeling that somehow, the whole picture felt incomplete. This year marks the very first time I've celebrated my birthday without that one person that i'm closest to. Without that one person that I truly cared about. That one person who looked forward to this day every year more than anyone else. Maybe if she was still here i wouldn't feel this sad. Maybe the impact of that terrible news i've received last week would be lessened somehow. Maybe i wouldn't feel as depressed. Maybe I would have answers instead of unending questions, maybe the road ahead wouldn't be so unclear. If she was still here, maybe I wouldn't feel so fucking miserable.

It's been such a long time since my birthday meant something to me. For the longest time I have been apathetic. For the longest time I have been cynical. Now my birthday has some sort of meaning again. It reminds me of all those years i've wasted, it reminds me that i am still going nowhere.

When i was a child, my birthday was that day i looked forward to more than Christmas. When i was young, I couldn't be more happier than I was on my birthday. Now my birthday no longer holds such meaning to me. I no longer feel happiness nor apathy. Now my birthday is just depressing. So fucking depressing.

Now and Then

2011-03-17T11:47:00.000-07:00

This is definitely one of the worst weeks of my entire life. The weeks leading up to it were bad enough. That sense of uncertainty kept me anxious, i thought i would go crazy. But i thought everything would turn out right in the end. All the stress that I was feeling back then would disappear in an instant because the pay off would be big. But as always, luck wasn't on my side. I guess it never was. I got no huge payoff. All i got was a huge disappointment. And that feeling that once again, I am a failure. I didn't just fail myself. I also failed all those people who believed in me.

It was probably doomed from the start. On hindsight, I guess it was. Overall my whole application was weak. I was lacking in many areas, yet i thought I would still pull through in the end. After all, I know several people who had worse credentials and they made it. Surely I will. But I never considered the fact that they had connections to important people. I never considered the fact that applying right after graduation made such a huge difference. And I never considered the fact that some people always seemed to have luck on their side. Pure dumb luck.

The reality has not set in yet. I thought I'd be in such a mess, but as of now, I'm not. I don't feel a thing. I don't feel anything. Maybe tomorrow when several people are already in a festive mood, i'd finally feel all the pain. I'd finally feel guilty that I've wasted my grandmother's money. I'd feel guilty that I won't be able to fill in my grandma's role of paying for the education of my cousins. I'd feel miserable because I'd be stuck in such a shitty, fucked up, god forsaken country. i would hate myself so much, because after all that time and money spent, i still have nothing.

I have to renew my driver's license tomorrow. Trouble was, I couldn't find a certain form that i needed. Good. Now I had something to do to keep my mind off things. My file cabinet was a mess. It's full of papers gathered for so many years, mostly unsorted. I didn't know where to start. As i scanned through all that junk, i figured I might as well throw a lot of those in the garbage. I even had reviewers back from high school and college for crying out loud. Brochures from different universities. God, I had junk from eons ago.

Then i saw my report cards from high school. Straight A's all through out. Not a grade below 90. Jesus, I was such a nerd back then. Funny thing was, i didn't really do a great deal of studying. I still had time for a lot of stuff. Sure there were times when things were difficult, but those times were rare. Most of the time, i breezed through school effortlessly. With those high grades, I could pretty much go to any university that I wanted. Then i saw the letters from two universities who kept asking me if i would still consider enrolling even after I have already enrolled at the university where i wanted to go. Man it felt good to be wanted that way. it made me feel so important. It made me feel as if i had achieved something great.

But then came college. I had a little too much fun after freshmen year. I discovered a lot of things. I began to discover that life wasn't all about school, it wasn't all about studies. What can I say? I stopped being a nerd when being a nerd actually started to matter, when being one could have made a huge difference in my life as a whole. College was great. it was probably the best four years of my life. But a person can't have everything. After freshmen year my grades were no longer extraordinary. They were bordering on average. I almost flunked one subject for Christ's sake, and that feeling was so unfamiliar to me. looking back, that was really stupid. The subject matter wasn't very complicated at all. I just didn't bother studying. As a result, i didn't get into my med school of choice. But things turned out right anyway. If i went to that med school, i wouldn't have much of a social life. And I wouldn't possess as much skills as I have now because their curriculum was extremely lacking in many important areas. All I would get would be bragging rights and nothing else. But I didn't study as much in med school either. There were several high points, but mostly I remained an average student.

Somehow, i just couldn't study the way I did before. I guess I could if i really wanted to... and there lies the problem. I just can't commit all of my time to studying knowing that there are a lot of things that i can do. While studying for the local board exams I went out a lot. while studying for the MLEs I just couldn't give up my work because my pride just wouldn't let me depend financially on my grandma and my parents again. It's bad enough that she had to pay for all those expensive exams. I couldn't depend on her for my everyday expenses again. I guess it's a mixture of wrong decisions, wrong timing, and just plain bad luck. So here I am now.

I wonder where i would be now if i took some other course in college. I didn't know what I really wanted to be back then, but if I went to the other universities I'd probably be doing something generic by now. Generic, but financially stable. Laymen look up to doctors, some even see them as Gods. But if they only knew the ins and outs of the profession, being a physician is just like any other profession. We just play a different role in society. We do our duties like everyone else. It's just not as financially rewarding. The road we travel is long and uncertain. And if you're not lucky enough, it may never even be rewarding at all.

The past decade of my life has been made up of one wrong decision after another. If only i could go back to the previous decade when everything seemed all right, I would. I would try to do it all over again. Start from when i did that first huge mistake and redo everything. But doing something like that would be impossible. Probably as impossible as the dreams and ambitions that I have right now.

So what the hell do I do now? As I see it, there are three options. If i choose the first two options, I'd have to wait a few months. As for the result of those two options, they are both clouded in uncertainty. The third one however, is immediate, certain, and permanent. If you just based your decision on those descriptions without really knowing what they are, which one would you choose? I'm willing to bet most people would choose the third. And that's the option that seems very attractive to me right now. i've grown weary of all these uncertainties. I've become afraid of making another huge risk and making another huge mistake. When it comes to a solution, most people would be looking for a permanent one. And that's exactly the kind of solution that i have in my hands right now. I've already got everything that I need right here. With the present mood that I'm in, it's no longer a question of if. It's just a question of when.

The List

2011-03-13T12:46:00.000-07:00

I've always kept a list of things I wanted to do before I die. Things I want to experience at least once in my life. Some of the things I've written on that list were simple. If I'd only exert a little effort i could cross them out immediately. But I've made that list years ago, back when i thought that someday, I would be living an ideal life. Someday, it would be easy to do all those things in my list. It was so easy to be optimistic when I was still young. I haven't encountered much of the harsh realities of life back then. It was so easy to dream. But as years went by, I began to realize that some of those things on my bucket list aren't really feasible at all. And as I've gone through different experiences in life, the list has evolved. Some things were added, some things were scrapped. One of those things that used to be on that list was to view the Earth from outer space. Even if I lived to be a hundred, i doubt if i could ever experience something like that in my lifetime. That's right, I was one very delusional teenager. haha.

My grandma used to have a bucket list too, although she never called it that. Some didn't require any effort from her at all. If time was on her side, all that she had to do was wait. One of the things that she kept saying again and again during the past few years was that she wanted to see all of us graduate from college. Once we have all graduated, her list was modified. She added other things. She wanted to live to see the day when my cousin would graduate from college, because she was the one paying for her education. And she told me she wanted to see the day when i'm finally stable financially. And she wanted to see the day when I got married and have a family of my own. When we all have families of our own. She wanted to see her great grandchildren. But time was no longer on her side. I don't know when those things would happen or if they would ever happen, but when that time comes, she's no longer here to see them.

Some of the things required some effort. She used to travel a lot during her younger years, but she had to stop that pastime of hers when the four of us started school. When we had finally graduated, she told me the places that she still wanted to see. But her health was no longer on her side when that time came. Traveling across the globe was no longer feasible. So she settled on that one place about a hundred miles away. That serene and allegedly holy place that she kept hearing about. She asked me and my brother to take her there, but for some reason, we never could find the time. I told her I'd finally take her there the last time she was confined at the ICU, but I knew she probably wouldn't be able to travel that far. When we took her home she told me to forget about it, she no longer wanted to go there. I had a feeling she still wanted to, but she knew that she couldn't. Her last request before she died was for me to take her to the mausoleum that was being built for them. She just wanted to see what it looked like, even though she had no idea that she was going to die two days later. My grandpa made the same request to me, since i was the person mostly at their side during their last few days. I was just waiting for them to get a little bit stronger, to get a little bit better so that they could be fit enough for traveling a short distance. Their situations only got worse instead. I made the same promise to both of them, a promise that i never kept. That was probably the only thing left in their bucket list. They asked me for help, and i failed to deliver. Like so many other things that happened last year, things that were probably predetermined by fate... I still couldn't help but feel that i was partially at fault.

They say that we should live each day as if it is our last. I have my bucket list saved on my laptop. I was looking at it a few minutes ago. If I was going to die tomorrow, next week, or the next few months, there's no way i could possibly do most of the things on that list. And i don't want to die without getting to do at least half of the twenty things I have listed. I've managed to cross out some of the things already. I've learned how to surf. I'm no pro, but I can ride a wave easily using a longboard. I've learned how to play the guitar. I'm no expert, but I can already play those songs with simple chords. See Green Day perform live--- I've done that last year. Travel to California--- I've done that thrice already. Give a substantial amount to charity--- I've done that two years ago. Save a life on my own--- I've done that many, many times. But the other things? Go on an Amazon River cruise. Have my picture taken in front of the great pyramids of Egypt. Good luck with those two. Go Skydiving? I don't think i could afford that in the near future. See Avenged Sevenfold and Slipknot live.... I've already seen two of my favorite bands perform live so i could probably scrap those other two off the list. Besides, I already have DVDs of their live concerts, and I could watch those DVDs again and again. Have a son and name him Connor--- oh boy. I've tried taking care of a baby a few months ago, and there's no way i'm ready to have kids of my own in the near future. LOL. So instead i'm putting other things. Things that are feasible. Things that I can do at this point in my life. Instead of skydiving, I can just try wakeboarding. And mountain climbing. Instead of traveling to other continents, there's still this one place a few hundred miles away that i can probably visit within the next few months. There's no use creating a bucket list if it would take so many years to cross everything out. Better to just keep things simple, to keep things attainable. If both time and luck are on my side, and if opportunity would permit me to try and do greater things in the future, then I would just modify my list again. If this year is going to be my last, i'd rather go out knowing that i've done most of the things i've wanted to do in my life. I don't want to die with the realization that I haven't lived my life to the fullest... that the life that I have lived for 30 long years was and still is incomplete.

Duality.

2011-03-07T15:41:00.000-08:00

I push my fingers

into my eyes.
It's the only thing

that slowly stops the ache.
But it's made of all

the things I have to take.
Jesus it never ends,

it works its way inside.
If the pain goes on

I'm not gonna make it.

The Memory Remains

2011-03-04T11:53:00.000-08:00

I did it out of boredom. I didn't have anything to do this afternoon, so i thought i might as well clean up my room. All my things were in such disarray when i got back and i never bothered fixing things up. i just didn't feel like doing anything. Part of it was laziness. But it's mostly because I didn't really care. It took me about an hour. I finished much sooner than i expected, so i figured I'd go clean up my grandma's room as well because no one else would bother to do it. Although we weren't planning to get rid of most of her stuff in the near future, I thought it would be wise to start sorting all of her things. Truth be told her room has a lot of junk stored in every corner, it would take days to sort everything--- from those that we could keep, to those that we would donate, and to those things that were unsalvageable. And besides, the room was in such a sad state of disarray, i figured it wouldn't hurt if i restored a bit of order. After all, i stay in that room often. It wouldn't hurt to make it look as if someone still uses that room.

I finally cleared her bed of all those papers, envelopes, and photo albums. Now i have a great deal of real estate whenever i would sleep on her bed. I placed all of those clothes that remained outside for some weird reason inside her closet. I noticed a lot of those clothes had holes in them, yet she still uses them. I used to wonder why she kept wearing the same set of clothes whenever we went out. I used to think that those were her favorites. But I guess the real reason was she didn't have a lot of nice clothes. When i opened the closet, there were the those clothes, the same ones i kept seeing in pictures taken from the past couple of years... all five of them. I saw that one pair of shoes that she always wore, and they were really worn out. I opened one of her drawers and saw a lot of my old socks, the ones i used to wear in college. I remember setting them aside to be thrown out because they were already worn out and too loose. Yet there they were, inside her drawer. All along i thought I had gotten rid of them. Apparently she still used them at night whenever her feet got cold. We always had the luxury of wearing the nicest clothes, of having things of great quality... thanks to her. Yet she never availed of such luxuries even though she had the means. Rather than using her money to buy her own luxuries, she'd rather spend all that for the things that we wanted to have.

God, i wonder when this stage of grief would end. Every time i think i'm already over it, that overwhelming sense of sadness comes crashing back in. I wish these tears would stop flowing already. I'm so fuckin' tired of crying.

One Man's Escape

2011-03-01T11:00:00.000-08:00

I couldn't believe it at first, but i've actually made a friend online. I find the whole thing weird because i never believed in online friendships, save for the superficial kind. But the thing i have with this guy is something much deeper. I've told him things i've only told my closest friends. Heck, i've even told him things i've never told anyone before. The fact that i don't know him personally does make things easier. I mean, so what if i tell him something inappropriate, or something highly disturbing. It's okay, i might not even get to see him in person in my entire lifetime anyway. He doesn't know anyone i know, he can't possibly tell anyone about the things i've told him. And even if he does, why would anyone care? It's not like I'm someone famous. And if one day i realize that this person knows a little too much about me, if that makes me uncomfortable i could just choose to cease all forms of correspondence. That's the beauty of online friendships. It's so east to start them, and it's just as easy to end them.

Yeah, all those things do play a part. but more than anything, i feel great when i'm talking to him because i've found a kindred soul. It started with random comments on our blog entries. Then we exchanged messages that were about superficial stuff at first, but they gradually evolved into really deep shit. Our outlook in life, our thoughts about philosophical concepts, the personal demons that we have to face everyday... like i said--- seriously deep shit. It's amazing how we are alike in so many ways. I actually found it eerie. We have the same tastes in music and movies. We have the same sense of humor. We agree on polarizing subjects like religion and politics. And most of all, we both think that our lives suck so much even though almost everyone around us think otherwise. And we both agree that people can't really be certain about something like that. It's one thing to observe how another person lives his life. To actually live that person's life is something so much different.

It was inevitable that i would ask him about his thoughts on that thing that continues to remain in the back of mind for the past couple of months now. That thing that rarely surfaces, but never completely disappears either. He told me that to even consider doing such a thing is selfish. It's selfish because doing such a thing causes a great deal of emotional pain on other people. And that even if he reaches that absolute lowest point in his life, he still won't consider doing such a thing, because he just can't bear the fact that his actions would cause such pain on people who cared about him. Even when you think no one cares, there's always someone who does, we just fail to see it. And paying back such love with pain is just plain wrong. No one deserves to feel that much pain, especially someone who cares so much about you.

But wouldn't it be selfish on the part of other people to prevent someone from doing something that he really wanted to do? If a person thinks there's no other way, wouldn't it be selfish of us to deny him of his only form of escape? it's selfish to think of the pain that you would feel without even considering the pain that the other person has to deal with every day. And there's no way we can understand what that other person is going through because we are not living his life. If it ever comes to that point, we should understand that to that person, there's no other way. It's something that he has given a lot of thought about, and it's something that he would really want to do. The pain of loss is fleeting. it could take months. it could take years. And the initial impact may seem a little too much to bear. But such type of pain is fleeting. It's not the type of pain that we have to deal with for the rest of our lives. It's not the type of pain that drives us to that tipping point, it's not the type of pain that closes our doors to all other options. It's the type of pain that allows us to move on. Instead of depriving a person of his one shot at happiness, of his only form of escape--- maybe we should all just learn how to deal. It won't be easy, but sometimes we just have to learn how to let go.

Afterlife

2011-02-06T02:44:00.000-08:00

Like walking into a dream,

so unlike what you've seen
so unsure but it seems,

cause we’ve been waiting for you
Fallen into this place,

just giving you a small taste
of your afterlife here so stay,

you'll be back here soon anyway

I see a distant light,

but girl this can't be right
Such a surreal place to see

so how did this come to be
Arrived too early

And when I think of all the places

I just don't belong
I've come to grips with life and realize

this is going too far

A place of hope and no pain,

perfect skies with no rain
Can leave this place but refrain,

’cause we've been waiting for you
Fallen into this place,

just giving you a small taste
of your afterlife here so stay,

you'll be back here soon anyway

This peace on earth's not right
No pain or sign of time
So out of place don't wanna stay,

I feel wrong and that's my sign
I've made up my mind

Gave me your hand but realize

I just wanna say goodbye
Please understand I have to leave

and carry on my own life

Loved ones back home all crying

’cause they're already missing me
I pray by the grace of God

that there's somebody listening
Give me a chance to be that person I wanna be
Oh Lord I'll try so hard but

you gotta let go of me

I don't belong here,

I gotta move on dear

escape from this afterlife
’Cause this time I'm right to move on and on,

far away from here
Got nothing against you

and surely I'll miss you
This place full of peace and light,

and I’d hope you might
take me back inside

when the time is right.

Without Noise

2011-02-03T00:47:00.001-08:00

My privacy. That's one of the things i value most in my life. Because for me, it's a necessity. It gives me a welcome reprieve when the world bombards me with too much... too much of the things that I can't take. My privacy keeps me sane. It gives me time to think about many things. It gives me time to dwell.

I have several active blogs all over the net, but it is this one that I cherish the most. Because mostly, i have kept it anonymous. i don't have to censor my thoughts, i don't have to edit my feelings. I don't have to be pretentious, I can put away that carefree mask that I always wear elsewhere. I don't have to be afraid of the things i say, because there's no face that people can equate with these words. At least it was that way until i made several people aware of the existence of this blog. Even if they are close friends, i still can't help but wonder if they can handle all the words that i write, if they can tolerate all of the messages that i'm trying to convey. It's impossible to predict people's reactions, and it's also impossible to read people's mind. There's no way of knowing what exactly goes on in another person's head. Even when people say that they do understand, we can never eliminate the possibility that what they are really thinking is the opposite of what they are saying. As long as I know that there are people who know me personally who aware of the existence of this blog, i can't really say everything that is on my mind. I can't risk pushing away the very few people that i trust. I can't reveal the darkness inside me. We all have that darkness--- the sort of darkness that we should keep to ourselves, because no one can understand it besides ourselves. We can reveal almost everything to people we trust, except for that part. Some of our demons can strengthen relationships when revealed. But that certain part, the one that's deeply entrenched into our being--- that sort of demon only pushes people away. It is often misunderstood, and it only serves to pull people part. As long as I know that there are people watching, this is probably as raw as I can get.

I lost my privacy in our house since the rest of the family moved in. I had to make room, I had to remove some of my stuff, I had to leave space in the closet, and at night I share my room with my mom and my sister. Every hour someone just goes into my room, ruining the perfect world that i created for myself. Every now and then my mom goes inside, trying to start a conversation while i'm busy watching movies and TV shows on my laptop with earphones on. Clearly, she sees what i'd rather be doing. And she must think her son is some sort of a weirdo. One who prefers to keep to himself instead of going out of his room, instead of going out into the world. But what gets to me is my dad. He's at home most of the time now. Now, he doesn't seem to bother pretending to have a job anymore. He just stays at home, waiting for the money from our tenants to come in. And he keeps bugging me with a lot of stuff, as if i'm one of those sons who have a good relationship with his father. And all his efforts to reach out only serves to further nauseate me. Too many people around the house. All the time. People that I'm bound by blood to, but couldn't possibly care any less. Usually i'm in the mood to pretend, but these past few days, i'm not. I just choose to ignore the world around me, but with them always around, i find it very difficult to do. Even with my earphones on, they still find ways to pull me out of my seclusion. They find ways of pulling me out of my therapy. The therapy that i desperately need right now.

Then I started spending more time in my grandmother's room. The room where no one else dared to go. I had my privacy back but it just wasn't the same. it wasn't my room. I don't have any of my stuff in here. Everything was just the way it was a year ago. Religious statues all around, bitter reminders of how people can be easily swayed with the pretense of faith. Numerous photo albums piled on top of each other. Old clothes folded neatly inside the drawers. Everything was the same, Except for the dusty floors, dusty sheets, dirty windows... and the quiet. The eery quiet that scares everyone else but me, because i find it so comforting. It's not entirely mine, and i can't really make it mine. But for now, this is all that i have. Unkempt and somewhat disregarded. A room that's all but forgotten. With all of the bitter memories that i have in this room, along with memories that i will treasure all my life, finding solace in it is quite fitting. As I lie awake, enveloped in the darkness in this room, no one would turn away as i reveal the darkness inside of me. I'm back in my own little world, away from all the noise and clutter of the world outside. In here, I can always be me.

A Foolish Journey

2011-01-29T19:02:00.000-08:00

Damn this respiratory infection. I've been blowing my nose incessantly, i have been coughing my lungs out, i barely have a voice. Oh, and did i mention that I have an ear infection too? Plus a fever and a massive headache. I can't possibly feel any more shitty. Being back home is bad enough. Having to deal with an illness at the same time makes things so much worse.

I feel so low right now. Downright miserable. I can think of only a few times in my life when i've sunk to such depths of despair, and this is one of them.

Being home reminds me of things that I can easily put in the back of my mind when i'm far away. And the reality that such an option may no longer be viable in the future is making me lose grip on my sanity.

I should've known that it was pretty bleak back then. Yeah it was possible, but it was going to be really difficult, and I fooled myself to think otherwise. I should've known that it was going to be such a long shot after i got the results of that first exam. I should've given up back then, but with the continued encouragements from my friends, i chose to continue traveling on this path. I swallowed my pride, even willing for the very least desirable option that i could at least tolerate, but even that wasn't enough. I could've saved a lot of our resources if i just had the sense to quit back then, but the promise of a better life for myself continued to give me that false sense of security. And now that I'm near the end of the line, it seems that i won't be able to reach it after all. And i would be left with absolutely nothing... and that makes it so much more depressing.

That's it. The end of the line. For everything. I hate the place where I'm in now and everything it stands for. I can't imagine working in this place again. I'd try to imagine working here again, but it just wouldn't work. The sense of disdain is too much, it can't possibly work out. I have lost all options. The very minute I got off the plane, i was enveloped in darkness again, that darkness that felt oh so familiar. And dark thoughts clouded my head once again.

I feel guilty for my grandma's death. Yes, it wasn't entirely my fault, but I played a part in it. The events have been on continuous replay in my mind on every idle moment, and every time, i would reach the same conclusion. No matter how many times i turn things around, I am partially responsible. Because I made so many mistakes. Because i just didn't try hard enough. And I just can't live with that.

I realized that I'm becoming exactly like my father. No, not becoming... Now, I am exactly like him. An adult with no sense of direction, someone who continues to live in a dream world. Someone who keeps on believing in that ideal future even when everything else points to the contrary. I have become exactly like my father, the man that I disdain, the man that i swear I never would become. And I just can't live like that.

And as I realize that I have been going through a pointless, futile journey--- a journey that my grandma has invested a lot in... I just can't bear the fact that even after her death, I'll be letting her down once again. The last chance I get to redeem myself and I completely blew it. I just can't continue living with such a burden. I can't possibly live with that. I just can't.

All I want is a way to stop these thoughts permanently. Right about now.

I just want to be alone. Everyone keeps on bugging me about things that I shouldn't be concerned about--- pointless, stupid little things. I turned off my phone, I kept the door locked in my room, and i was alone again in my own little world, i was at peace... until the rest of my family decided to move in, effectively eliminating my privacy. Now i share my room with someone else, depriving me of the alone time that i need so much right now. The false illusion of a happy family that my dad tries so hard to convey is so damn sickening, it barely succeeds to hide the indifference we feel towards each other, and the disdain we feel for him. All the pretentiousness around me makes me want to explode. It makes me want to fuckin' explode.

But all hope is not lost, as one friend said. It would be foolish for me to believe in such a thing again. It would be foolish to allow myself to be buoyed yet again with such false encouragements, but i have nothing else to hold on to. I've done all that I can, and all that I can do now is hope. Hope for the ideal. Hope for the improbable. Hope for that chance to finally escape. Hope for a new and better life. I want nothing else but to get away from this mess that i refer to as my present life. If fate deprives me of the chance that i'm hoping for, then i have no choice but to find another way. I'm just so sick and tired of my life right now, and i'm willing to do anything to be free from it. I'd do everything that is necessary to escape.

As I Fade

2011-01-04T15:58:00.001-08:00

Stay with me as i gaze through the window.

My heart filled with bittersweet sorrow

Stay with me as the sun says her goodbye

and I whisper back as she silently cries.

Stay by my side as I'm wallowing in hopelessness.

Be my light as I'm enveloped in darkness.

Let's just watch the stars appear one by one.

Be with me until all this is done.

Hold my hand as my sight grows dim.

Be my strength as it eats me from within.

Keep me in your embrace until the next morning.

Hold me until my heart stops beating.

Listen to the words I still have to say.

Hold on to me as I slowly drift away.

A few hours from now I will finally rest.

Please indulge me, i have one last request.

As i look back at all my days

You were always the one who showed me the way.

As I count the hours, I am left with none.

For tonight, just pretend that I'm still the one.

Year End

2010-12-30T19:30:00.000-08:00

Well the year is almost over. And again, i'm feeling shitty---- the exact same feeling that i get every time the year ends. While everyone else is in a festive mood, i pretend to be one with them in their festivities, but deep inside I'm bitter. Deep inside I'm sulking. Deep inside, I couldn't possibly care any less.

I wonder if there would ever come a time when i wouldn't feel this way on new year's eve. As the year ends, I tend to reflect on the things I've done during the past year, and every time all i see are the glaring mistakes. I spend the day enveloped in remorse and regret, drowning in self pity, thinking about the things that I should have done instead. And every goddamned year all mistakes for the previous years that i have completely buried beneath my subconscious would tend to resurface yet again. And when they accumulate as they always do, i tend to feel even more miserable. Mistakes from previous years pile up on one another as the year ends, making me feel more miserable compared to previous years.

Career wise, I'm still headed nowhere. And again I've been thinking what could've been if I did not resign from the job I had back in 2007. I've rationalized again and again, and I've realized that taking all things into consideration it was for the best, but again it has reared its ugly head. Now I begin to question my decision AGAIN. My batchmates are almost done with residency, and here I am, still at the starting line. Here i am, still lost and without direction. If I had at least done something of worth this year, I wouldn't even be thinking about that again. But since I still haven't done anything, since I haven't made any progress, I just couldn't help it. I've already realized again and again that even if it was wrong there's nothing more i can do about it, and there's nothing more to do than to just simply move on. And I have moved on---- for a while. With all the things that have happened this past year--- or should i rather say things that have not happened... i just find it hard not to look back. I find it hard not to hit myself in the head again for making foolish and haphazard decisions.

And so I begin to rationalize. Again. If there's anything good that came out from that decision, it was the chance to spend more time with my grandmother. If i was still doing my residency I wouldn't have spent as much time with her during the past few years. In fact, i would have barely seen her at all. And I wouldn't have been there to hold her hand, I wouldn't have been with her as she spoke her last words, as she breathed her last breath. And no one would have taken her to the hospital that time since everyone else in the family is busy with work and other stuff--- stuff that don't even matter in the long run. I had the opportunity to take care of her. That's the only good thing that came out of that decision. If I had to rationalize and convince myself yet again that the decision I made that time was the right one if I looked at the big picture... then I guess it was. If only this feeling of self pity would disappear as I begin to rationalize, maybe I can fool myself that it was. But as long as this feeling remains, there is still doubt. This feeling would linger. As long as I haven't done anything of worth, as long as I remain on a standstill, this feeling would resurface no matter how many times I would have buried it.

I'm getting tired of playing the same old game. I'm tired of going through the same old pointless routine. I'm tired of getting nowhere. 2010 is definitely the shittiest and most miserable year of my life and I'm glad it's almost over. It's a year of loss, heartaches, failures, and disappointments--- not only for myself, but also for all the people in my close proximity. I could try to be optimistic like everyone else and welcome the new year with a smile, but i can't force myself to do that. It entails too much effort for a tired soul. I could hope that the new year would be better for me, but that would only be wishful thinking on my part. Because looking back, every year seems to be just a shitty as the previous one. And with my dumb luck, the coming year could be even worse. There's no point starting over because in my life, I keep on making the same mistakes and same stupid decisions again and again. In the calendar of my life, the next year is always as shitty or even shittier than the last. There's just nothing there to look forward to.

No Reason

2010-12-21T22:00:00.000-08:00

On my way home this evening, i passed by a church and there were several people outside giving away flyers. They were wishing everyone happy holidays. And they were inviting everyone to a seminar of sorts. I threw the flyer away when i passed by a garbage can. But a part of the slogan stayed in my head. Three simple words.

Are you happy?

Honestly, I'm not. And while i was on the subway, i tried to think of those times in my life wherein i felt genuinely happy. The type of happiness that makes one feel warm inside, not the type of surreal and artificial happiness that alcohol brings. I tried to think of those times wherein I could say that I really felt happy... and I couldn't think of any. And now that I'm back at the apartment, i still can't think of much.

When I was given my first car, I guess I was happy then. I could go places. I could do things that i could never do before. And it gave me a certain amount of freedom. it was the shallow type of happiness that material things give you, but i was happy nevertheless.

When i first learned how to surf. And the many instances after that. The feeling you get as you ride the waves is indescribable. If I have to give it a word, it's nothing short of exhilarating. You wouldn't mind swimming back in again and again even when your shoulders become sore from all the paddling. It's temporary, and it's also shallow... but it's still happiness nevertheless.

When I first learned how to play the guitar. Even when all the songs that I knew how to play are those songs in the tutorial, i felt as if I've made some great accomplishment. It's something that I wanted to learn for so many years, and to finally learn how to play gave me a great sense of fulfillment--- and that made me happy.

When I saw one of my favorite bands perform live for the very first time--- i felt that I was in heaven. For years I've just listened to them on the radio, on my CD and MP3 players... and on that day, there they were, merely a few feet in front of me. To watch them perform with such gusto was surreal, and to share that experience with a few thousand others who share the same interest with you stimulated my senses in so many ways. That level of happiness was indescribable to me because that feeling wasn't familiar. It was such a great feeling, yet it felt so out of place.

Those times when I gave a few bucks to those beggars on the streets, and when they respond with such huge and genuine smiles, with wide eyed awe as if you've given them a small fortune even when what you've given them won't even last for a day. When they say thank you with all of their hearts, and you can clearly see how grateful they are, and you would be grateful yourself because you are so much better off--- during those times i felt all warm inside. i felt happy. Some sort of acknowledgment that I have made a difference in their lives, no matter how small and insignificant--- that makes me happy. Too bad only a few of them respond that way.

When I've helped several patients get well and they thank me sincerely and genuinely... even if they do not give me anything material in return, their gratitude made me feel happy. Even if their cases proved to be difficult, even when treating them involved so much work, all those hardships disappear in an instant when you see that you have helped them get well and they express their gratitude in return. Too bad only a few patients were that way. I'm aware that simply knowing that you have helped should be enough, but when people make you feel appreciated makes that much of a difference. Most say thanks in a very mechanical manner, as if they were required to do it, or as if they were only doing it out of habit. You could feel their lack of sincerity. Some are indifferent, some wouldn't say thanks at all. And there are a few who act as if you owe them a favor for allowing themselves to be treated by you, and some shout out expletives in return. Such patients amplify all your frustrations, and they make you wonder why you even chose to be a doctor in the first place.

When the plane landed in Seattle about a year ago. I felt genuinely happy. That was the first time that I travelled alone, and I felt as if i was about to undertake a huge adventure. And I had a great outlook in life then. There was so much potential. I was about to make my dreams a reality. Back then, it all seemed possible. Back then, it seemed that all was within arms reach. So early in the game i was a fool to believe in the ideal. I was ignorant, i was foolish, but i was happy.

Two months before my grandma passed away, i remember that one instance when we were talking in her room. We were smiling, we were laughing, talking about random stuff, talking about nothing... I was happy then... at least for a few minutes. Because after a while I wondered why we didn't do that often... just sitting in front of the TV and talking. I tried to think of the last time i've had a meaningful conversation with her, and I realized I had none. All those years, though I was always in close proximity, though I talked to her everyday... those conversations were all shallow and perfunctory. When it came to meaningful conversation, the type of conversation that would get to you, the type of conversation that affects your whole being, the type of conversation that you'd remember for a long time and cherish for an entire lifetime... i realized that we had none. Amidst the happiness that i was feeling that time, i realized something very depressing.

Happiness is essential to all human beings. We need happiness to continue living because it takes our minds off the negative, it distracts us from all the pain. When happiness evades us, we see all the darkness underneath, we see the pain of reality, we lose our shield from all the misery. Happiness gives us reason to live until the next day, it makes us look forward to tomorrow, it gives us the inspiration and strength to keep fighting. Happiness fools us into believing that there's still so much to live for even when there is none, it keeps us from giving up and letting go.

But when all happiness is gone, when nothing can mask the reality anymore--- what happens to the man who discovers that there's nothing there to live for?

I know the answer to that question. I've known the answer for a long time now. I just choose not to say it out loud.... not yet, anyway. But I will when all is certain and final. I will, when there's no more turning back. There are things that are better left in silence when there are still lingering doubts... but when all doubts are gone, i will have to decide. Things will fall into place in due time.

For now, I'm just waiting for a sign.

Fool's Journey

2010-12-17T16:52:00.000-08:00

The snow falls slowly on this cold December night.

I have traveled so far, still there's no end in sight.
I’ve done so many wrongs, I tried to make things right.
Yet I still live in darkness, in my life there is no light.

Back then when all hope seemed to be lost
This seemed like the right path to take.
For years I ignored the glaring clues
That this path that I chose was another mistake.

My body is bruised, beaten and weary.
My soul can no longer take all of the agony.
If you thought that I was more, if you depended on me
All this time I have failed you, I am gravely sorry.

All these years I have been going through a fool’s journey.
It’s nothing but a distraction for those wallowing in misery.
It’s a trick life plays to those who believe in new beginnings.
But for people like us, there are no happy endings.

Far from where I began, still no end in sight
I can choose to move on, but I’m too tired to fight.
I can choose to stay here, and just let things be.
I can choose to surrender, and then I would be free.

Soon all will just be a bitter memory.
Life is never kind, it only prolongs the agony.
I have already answered the question of how.
There’s no use moving forward. My journey ends now.

12/17/10

Hidden

2010-12-16T01:44:00.000-08:00

I put on a smile but my eyes still betray

the emotions that I carry every single day.
The world has no color, only different shades of grey
Life may have direction, but I could never find the way.

My eyes are windows to a damaged soul
It has been torn apart, though it never was whole.
I am careful not to show any hint of despair
We are all tortured souls, so why should anyone care.

I wander through the shores of anonymity
Amidst all of the hopelessness and uncertainty.
They say that they care, yet true motives have shown.
Amidst all these pretensions, I’m better off alone.

Why you choose to stick around, I never could tell
You keep trying to get me out of this emotional shell.
I built all these walls so that no one could see
Breaking them down would only destroy me.

Often times I wish you would just let me be.
Leave me here to dwell on my own misery
But you’re one persistent fool, that I can clearly see.
If you search a little longer, you might eventually find me.

12/16/10

Surrender

2010-12-15T13:31:00.000-08:00

How does it feel to be wanted?
When your actions are praised and not taken for granted.
How does it feel to be loved?
When you’re not left alone, when you’re not disregarded.

How does it feel to have someone by your side?
Whom you can show your true self and no longer hide.
When you have someone near to share all of the pain,
When you keep someone close, someone to help keep you sane.

How does it feel to have someone who can understand?
When you choose to turn away she'll keep holding your hand.
Someone who’ll never give up until the day you are free.
Someone who’ll try anything just to end your misery.

How does it feel to have done something of worth?
When you have a sense of accomplishment as you roam through this earth.
I am a failure, no matter which way I choose to go
That sense of fulfillment is something that I’ll never ever know.

To be touched by a person who cares as much as you do,
Who’d disregard all other things and do anything for you.
To make someone proud, to live until life finally makes sense...
Just a few of the many things I'll never get to experience.

12/15/10

It's in the News

2010-12-14T19:12:00.000-08:00

I don't like being idle. because the first thing I do when I'm idle is surf the net. And then i eventually end up in web sites that i don't usually frequent. Including sites that keep me up to date on the things that are happening back home. And you know how I feel about the things that happen back home. Sure, a few can bring a smile to my face... but a lot of things just make me sad. A lot of things make me feel ashamed and disappointed. And a lot of things can totally piss me off.

Just browsing through these so called legitimate and professional websites is enough to make one lose his temper. How can you have much respect for these news organizations when they often resort to tabloid journalism. They prefer to sensationalize everything, even the most insignificant things just to gain more attention. They prefer to add melodrama to everything, because that would tug the hearts of most people, and therefore increasing patronage. They have the gall to proclaim that as news organizations, they have no bias--- yet the very first sentence of every article screams bias. Instead of simply telling the news, they insert their own opinions. Some articles even begin with the opinion of the author, instead of presenting the facts first. A lot of these journalists insert adjectives, like how one party is rich while the other is poor, or how one party has a lot of supporters while the other has none, effectively imposing on their target audiences their own bias. Several news reports would focus on sob stories of one party, using all available tools just to elicit more emotion and sympathy from their readers, some extending to several pages without getting the side of the other party. And if they did, the articles about the party that they do not favor would be restricted to several paragraphs, or littered with words that would put them in a negative light. They aim to condition the minds of their readers to feel the same way they do, to empathize with the same people that they feel sympathy for. Some don't even lay out the whole truth, just bits and pieces of it. Then they embellish the article with their own opinions--- just enough to attract attention, yet at times they want it to be downright scandalous. It's the same with the news that they broadcast on TV. It's all about sensationalism so that they can get more attention, so that they can get higher ratings. Who cares if such actions could muddle police work, who cares if they could interfere with the judicial system, who cares if their actions could end up hurting a lot of people? These people claim that it's their duty to tell the news, that they're doing it as service for the people. What a load of bullshit. When things go wrong, they resort to pointing fingers, and they cannot be blamed because they were doing their duty. They act as if they are being oppressed, as if they were victims as well. Boo fuckin' hoo. Forgive me if I have no sympathy for these so called journalists. If they want intelligent people to believe in the things that they are saying, if they want us to believe that it's not all about the money to them, then they better start doing their jobs properly. Enough of sensationalism, bias, and melodrama. They belong in scripted shows on TV, not on the evening news. Opinions and bias should be placed on the opinion pages of newspapers, not on the front page. How can one have much respect for the media when they assume that people want sensationalism and melodrama? And even if the people do, how can one respect an institution that even patronizes and encourages such behavior instead of being a tool for change? How can one have much respect for these institutions when most of their actions reflect the selfish motives beneath that cloak of social service? They have the capability to promote change, they have the capacity to exert great influence, yet they do not choose to use that power properly. Because in the end, it's all about ratings, it's all about money. Anything that can jeopardize their place in the ratings game should not even be attempted. And how can one respect a nation's people when they allow themselves to be used by the media and certain powerful individuals, when they allow their minds to be conditioned in certain ways? How can you have faith in a nation when the majority of its population clamor for brainless, sensationalized and tainted journalism instead of demanding that they get the facts straight without all the embellishment--- without all the added stuffing that only serve to muddle everything? How can one have faith in his people when they let other people dictate beliefs on them, even when they are capable of independent and unbiased thinking? How can one still respect a nation when majority of its population fail to use their gift of logical reasoning because that always let emotions get in the way?

Oh, that's right. I've lost faith and respect for these people a long time ago. And so far, nothing that has happened during the past few months can restore my faith in them again.

...

So why do i still fuckin' care?

The Sea of Gullibility

2010-12-01T21:59:00.000-08:00

I'm having one of those moods wherein the simplest things completely piss me off. Now it's status updates and profile pictures on Facebook.

I've been seeing such useless propaganda for years now. It all started with the "causes" application. Sure it was a novel idea. But after joining one cause, what happens then? most of us just forget about it. As if clicking on the join tab would be enough. You think we've done our part because once we've joined one cause we promote awareness since that latest activity would be posted on our news feed? Let's get real. If we did not donate any money to a legitimate organization, if we did not invite more friends and talk to them intimately one by one about our cause and why they should also believe in it, if we did not do everything in our power to convince them if they do not share our beliefs, if we did not go out into the world to do something more for our cause--- we didn't do anything at all, besides clicking on the join button.

For the past year or so, things took a different turn. People started posted messages on their status updates, people posted certain pictures and they ask all their friends to do the same, because it's all for a worthy cause. A lot of them are shams, preying on people's inherent gullibility or stupidity, taking advantage of people who are prone to cease all critical brain functions whenever they are enveloped in their own little online world. A lot are completely fabricated by people who have a little too much time on their hands, and they just want to see how far their clever propaganda can go. A lot are these causes are silly, a lot are done just for fun, and people join such activities simply because they're fun and everyone else is doing it. But there are some causes that are legitimate. And some of these propaganda are done for worthy causes, and not just to expose the stupidity and gullibility of most people. But really, what do we get from them? When everyone would post such status updates, does this exercise really prevent violence against women and children? Do they really serve to eradicate racism and discrimination? Do such actions help us prevent certain illnesses and eradicate diseases? Do they give justice to victims of heinous crimes, do they help eradicate poverty, hunger, and corruption? By participating in such campaigns, can we really promote world peace? Do we really think that such simple gestures can make our world a better place to live in? One of the most silly campaigns was to post your bra color to raise breast cancer awareness. Now, did it really make most people aware of breast cancer? More than half of the people i know were scratching their heads when these women started posting colors on their status updates. It would have been more effective if these women posted pictures of their breasts instead. At first I was laughing when friends of mine were posting the color of their bras thinking they would make a difference, but when most of my women friends started taking part in such a ridiculous and pointless exercise, it just became so disheartening.

For one thing, it's depressing to see how your friends can be manipulated so easily. But it's even more depressing when your friends do not allow themselves to be manipulated, when they decide to join such campaigns after deep thought, yet they don't go beyond posting a single picture or a status update. They sincerely believe that by simply participating, they can really make a difference, no matter how small that difference is. What happens after that? Most people stop there, without even thinking if they can do more. Or they just wait until the next campaign would come along, and then they would join the bandwagon again in order to appear cool and trendy. Whatever happened to being proactive? I remember when people actually went out of their own little worlds and into the real world, when they actually did something concrete and productive, when they actually reached out to someone, when their actions would actually amount to something. Now all we do is click on buttons, and then we relish the thought that we've already done our part, no matter how little it is. It would be great if we have actually done a little. But when we don't follow up those status updates with something else, we have actually done nothing. If we could only exert more effort to get off our lazy asses, we could surely do something to help these worthy causes. It doesn't end with a single status update or a click of a button. It should only start from there.

I am so sick and tired of all this slacktivism. Everyone else should feel the same way too.

To Be Thankful

2010-11-25T23:02:00.000-08:00

We've always celebrated Thanksgiving. And from where I'm from, people would always give me a weird look whenever I told them that. I'd be weirded out too if someone told me they celebrated Thanksgiving in a place where no one else did. We weren't living in the USA after all, and we weren't expats either. It's just one of the many quirks of my grandparents... one of their many quirks that i've grown to love. People would ask me why we celebrated Thanksgiving, and I couldn't give them a straight answer. Truth be told, I couldn't even give a straight answer to this day. My grandparents just wanted to celebrate the occasion. They probably just have a lot to be thankful for. And I looked forward to that single day every year wherein we would have a Turkey dinner. It felt a lot like Christmas, only more simple and intimate, free from all that sentimental fluff. It was just us having dinner, and no one else. Thanksgiving was one of those rare occasions that i've felt that we were one family... that I was a part of a family. It was a yearly tradition... until last year. I was far from home this time last year, and when I asked my grandparents why they didn't celebrate Thanksgiving, they told me it was because our family wasn't complete. I found that surprising. That wasn't the first Thanksgiving that I've missed. I had to work at the hospital two years prior to that and still they had a Turkey dinner without me. They told me it was different because I was far from home. And when I'm thousands of miles away, it just wouldn't be the same. That still didn't sound logical to me... I was actually a bit irritated as they were telling me that... yet I agreed. There's no use arguing with my grandparents when they were in one of their cloyingly sentimental moods. I joined some other family for Thanksgiving, and that felt surreal. Unlike Christmas wherein i've grown tired of all the familiarity, the familiarity of Thanksgiving was something i could never grow tired of. And without that familiarity, it just wasn't the same.

I guess you could say that I have a lot to be thankful for in my life. But when it comes to the events that have transpired this year, I couldn't think of anything that I should be thankful for. Almost eleven months in, the year 2010 has brought me nothing but anger and sadness... disappointment and despair. Both of my grandparents are gone now. Thanksgiving would never be the same without them. Looking back only brings me grief, and it would be easier if there's something to look forward to... but the future only seems as bleak. All those rejection letters only serve to bring me down... as if I need further confirmation that I've grown to be such a failure. Thanksgiving has lost its essence for me. Now, it's just turkey dinner, devoid of all its deeper meaning. The people who have introduced me to this tradition are gone now, and there's no use of continuing this annual tradition when i do not share the same thoughts and feelings as theirs. The road that they have travelled is a different one, and it's not as bleak as mine. As I look ahead from where I am standing now, there's absolutely nothing to be thankful for. The future brings me as much grief as the past, and seems even more bleak as the present. My life is still the mess that it has been for the past couple of years. This isn't something that I should be thankful for.