For most people, it’s easy to think the worst out of people who are different, who are strange. And in this age of hidden agendas and conspiracies, it seems easier to think the worst out of people who open themselves to the world.  Every wound, every quirk, every bad habit, out in the open. Too much honesty about one’s self, sometimes to the point of debasing herself, can be very suspicious, right? Because no one seems to be honest about one’s self these days, right? In this day and age of social networking sites, everyone’s instinct is to hide himself under awards, and achievements, and happy family pictures, and MA degrees, and designer bags, and expensive gadgets, and good manners, and flawless grammars, and cups of coffee to be had in posh shops. And if you see someone who doesn’t feel the need to “hide” herself, she must not be trusted, right? She probably has an ulterior motive, right?

Forget about the possibility that maybe, just maybe, she just doesn’t believe in pretenses. Forget about the possibility that maybe, just maybe, she never felt that she has the need to put on a mask of someone who she is not, because maybe, just maybe, she celebrates who she is, her uniqueness, her individuality, even her flaws. But no, she is too honest about herself, therefore, she shouldn’t be trusted, right?

I failed him and he failed me—
Together our skinned glance makes a sorry bridge
For some frail specter who can't get through.

I failed him
               but maybe it was the lamp that failed,
Maybe it was the meal,
Maybe it was the potter
Who would not intervene, maybe the clay,
Maybe the plateau's topaz, too steady to help,
Or was it the meat cut two days late, was it
The deciduous branch and its dull wait for bloom—

But I remember the small thing rotating in us
Towards hunger, how it did not fail to guide,
And that we made no request of our souls or all souls
Or the one perfectly distant soul
                                         and so did not fail in what we did not do,
Never begging at the sky but moving
On the islands beneath it, hungry together by its rivers and bones. 

Who told us we had failed
If not the human world gone wrong? 

It was the world?

Ah, then we will fail again and again in the waters apart,
Bridging nothing, bridging nowhere
Towards what we, failures, are.

(Trying out WordPress Mobile again)

Posted with WordPress for BlackBerry.

The top shelf of a five-feet-tall DIY rack I bought from Ace Hardware, for instance, is filled with photos of loved ones, both friends and family, plus knickknacks given to me by those who I hold dearest.

The un-removable window blinds, on the other hand, became a growing repository of more photos of loved ones as well. I’ve likewise attached colored print-outs of things I find beautiful, from artists who I admire, who inspire me.

I also managed to turn my bed into some sort of a canopy, with two whole yards of red cloth draping over the pillows. And I also brought, from home, my favorite stuffed toy.

On the floor are books, stacked together neatly. Beside them are scented candles, an aromatherapy oil burner, and a framed zombie-themed “Keep Calm” poster. It reads “Keep Calm and Destroy the Brain.”

I do get homesick, every once in a while, and I make up for it every time I go home to Cavite. I snuggle next to my pregnant sister during sleep time (with her husband on the other side of the bed), I cuddle up with the parents, especially Mama, every time they’re back from Leyte. But in Cavite, I do miss this small place in Pasig. I miss being able to soak in the quiet, the solitude. A place for introspection and conversations with the self.

Here’s an excerpt:

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You wake up to one of those episodes when you try to control yourself from wailing. You wake up to extreme pain in your stomach, and you feel like you’re practically paralyzed.  It’s as if someone, some invisible entity, was sharpening his knife through your stomach, through your intestines. Back and forth…back and forth. In and out…in and out. Twist…twist. Is this knife sharp enough? No? Back and forth…back and forth. In and out…in and out. Twist…twist.

Last night, it was different. Migraine came over you, and it was merciless. You turned all the lights off out of fear that a tiny flicker of light could detonate something inside your head, explode, and scatter your brains all over the place. You cried out loud last night. Your neighbors probably thought you were dying. One of the perks of living alone is, in times of extreme physical pain, you have no one to come to you, to buy medicines for you, to massage your wildly throbbing little head. So you hugged your stuffed toy and phoned your mom, just to give you an illusion that you are not alone in this little unit you are renting.

Mama, help…Mama, help, was all you could say over the phone, in between loud sobs and in between the sound of you lightly pounding your head against the wall. Mama, help…Mama, help, was all you could utter. In which your mom panicked and screamed: Where are you? Where are you? Are you kidnapped in Mindanao (her constant worry)? Baby, what is happening?? You try to be intelligible for her sake. You didn’t want to cause a heart attack. Migraine, was all you could say. And then she completely got it. How many days and nights before have she massaged your head as you screamed in pain?

She tried to comfort you, as much as she can, over the phone. Next time, stock up on painkillers and mentholated oil to soothe you, your mom reminded you. And pray. Pray, dear daughter, pray. In which you wanted to tell her that you’re not even sure now if there’s someone out there you could pray to. In fact, what caused this terrible migraine attack was the stress caused by the news: Sendong death toll now at 927. You cried hard upon hearing this news. Cried hard then wondered: Should I pray harder, or just stop believing that there is a god? What kind of god would allow such a thing to happen? Of course you didn’t tell your mom, a devout Catholic, your sudden lack of faith. You just allowed her to comfort you via phone, until her voice lulls you to sleep.

Then this morning, you wake up to another pain you are very familiar with. It starts with a growling sound in your stomach, then goes on as if you were being stabbed from the inside repeatedly. Again, you knew what probably triggered it. It wasn’t alcohol, because you haven’t had a drop since last Friday night. It wasn’t your “starvation diet” because you had cheeseburger last night. You are pretty sure it’s these extreme feelings. From being too emotional from what happened, from what you learned from the news last night, perhaps. Emotions make you weak, you keep telling yourself. In your case, you mean it not just figuratively, but also literally. You spend your entire life trying to manage the extreme shifts of your emotions and to no avail. And now, it has worked its way into causing you unbearable physical pain.

You look up to the sky and begin to pray. Pray that you would be able to transcend all forms of pain. Pray for the people down south. Pray that the souls of the 927 are resting peacefully. Pray that you become less emotional in the future. But you’re no longer sure who you should pray to. Maybe, just maybe, the sky really is empty.

I maybe quite moody, yes. I maybe too emotional, oh yes. But I still don’t consider myself as having a disorder…much more a borderline personality disorder (BPD), considering that I don’t manifest most of the symptoms in the BPD checklist. There’s this one line, however, in this Psychology Today article (republished this week) that had me pegged:

“In my experience, the person I know with BPD has TOO MUCH empathy and reflects too much about how others are feeling and cannot deal with the overpowering emotions it brings out in her.”

Boom. The speaker here described how I am exactly. I consider it a curse, because this is one of the main reasons why I can be unhappy sometimes. I am trying, however, to rid myself of this. I must be more pragmatic and less emotional. No more mercy for those who do not deserve it. No more urge to take care of a random person who seem to need it. No more endless feelings of frustration if I am unable/can’t do anything to help someone who seem to need rescuing. No more confusion on whether what I am feeling is being in love, or just wanting to be there for someone who needs it. No more. No more. It is frustrating. IT IS EMBARRASSING.

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You wake up to a hangover, from a night of insobriety. You mixed beer with scotch whiskey with coffee-flavored tequila with some yet to be determined alcoholic poison and without a single drop of water, so a hangover shouldn’t be much of a surprise.

Growing up, you were told by experienced drinkers that drinking lets you forget. That alcohol blunts your senses, numbing you, as if it were a garden variety medical anaesthetic sold in bars and liquor shops. More often than not, though, this doesn’t apply to you. Strangely, drinking heightens your senses. Blurred images sharpen to a blinding vision. Silence becomes a cacophony of songs and voices and curses. Dormant emotions come roaring back to life like an angry, vengeful beast coming out of hiding. You are made aware of thoughts, ideas and other nuances, which you never thought even existed in your head.

Which is why, no matter how you brag about how you love drinking (and you actually do), you are frightened of it. What will you remind me again tonight, oh dear glass of whiskey sour? What will you make me feel again tonight? –your thoughts before taking that first swig from the glass of your favorite alcoholic concoction.

Last night, in that party with more than 80 journalists, you successfully resisted the challenge of remembering, of “becoming aware” by rejecting even a single drop of alcohol at the first hour. And then you gave in. Clearly, you are not frightened of a little dose of self-awareness, aren’t you? You dared yourself. F*ck reason and sanity, you are doing this.

A bottle of beer, then three; a glass of whiskey; a shot of tequila. There goes the once happy and bubbly Lilith.

“Something bothering you, dear?”

“Nothing. I’m just chilling,” you lied. A terrible lie.

A terrible lie, a terrible lie, a terrible lie. What were you reminded again of, Lilith? Better yet: What emotion, which you weren’t even aware existed, came roaring out of hiding? Why are you suddenly trying to fight the urge to break down and cry?

And while you just wanted to go home and hide in one corner of your room with the lights turned off for all eternity, you kept your calm, kept that visage of a happy, bubbly party animal going from one table to another, trying to be funny, making sure that every single guest is enjoying the night, making sure that no one shares that inner alcohol-induced misery.

And now, you struggle with your hangover, on your bed, typing away badly-written paragraphs of non-sense, preparing to be late for work, keeping yourself from crying over the thought that has wildly bothered you from last night. Never again, you told yourself. Not a single drop of alcohol again. Yet another terrible lie.

This is a part of my commitment to my daily morning writing exercises. Well, apparently, it hasn’t become that daily.

Which brings me to the question: how can one write anything worth reading, when you are on a mad rush, and with the thoughts in your head still in disarray, still needing to be organized? How do you make time for leisurely writing, when you are at the mercy of real-life deadlines, of Bundy clocks, rush-hour traffic and responsibilities that you need to keep in order to stay alive?

Then there’s another question that popped in my head just now: how do you keep yourself from becoming an automaton, if most of your adult life has become about working?

Finally: how do you make yourself relevant?