Wistful

Where did they go, those sunrises two years ago, when everything was easy to write and my emotions weren't so complex and unreachable at the same time? Here I go again at a frightening crossroad, with so much uncertainty and pressure, and nearly not enough sleep (often because of the workload; at times of my own volition).

It's yet another rollercoaster year of fun, excitement, fear, self-doubt, sadness, and utter, inexplicable happiness and contentment. In other words, it's life, or a particularly heightened phase of it. But among the many emotions, in this moment--and in many others, when I happen to catch myself--I am wistful.

Contradictory as it is, I've found myself most wistful at the happiest, calmest times. I yearn for things as they happen to me, because every time I can't help but remind myself: in a minute, or an hour, or the blink of an eye--this moment, this experience, and this unexpected swell of emotions will pass and I will never be able to have it again.

Around seven years ago, I was fascinated with cherry blossoms, blooming and falling in a matter of days. Until now this fearful fascination with change and ephemerality has stayed with me. Everything ends; everything passes.

So, often I shy away from any form of trying to capture the moment. Unwritten posts, pictures not taken, words left unsaid. Best left that way, for fear of not being able to do it justice. Instead I opt to keep them in my head, much like series episodes to be replayed when I feel the need.

Other times though, I think I ought to tell those stories--even just to myself--because the time will surely come when I will forget. Perhaps I'll start. While words and pictures may not suffice, they'll help, at least.

Perhaps, things aren't so easily lost after all.

Damien Rice - Cannonball

Bad Decisions

A week or two ago I watched this one episode of How I Met Your Mother, where Ted, one of the lead characters, has to tear down an architectural landmark (The Arcadian) to make way for a new building he was designing. He was pretty reluctant; at first he thought it was about the building. But then he realized it was really all about a girl who was protesting against his project. His friends then recalled the silliest things he'd done, all for the sake of dating particular girls.

I just love that show (you should watch it, it's awesome). And—not for the first time—I found myself being able to relate to Ted. Embarrassing as it is, I have to admit I may have, on occasion, gone totally out of my way for a girl I liked.

There's this incident from almost ten years ago that I remember vividly. I was in fifth grade, and I had developed a crush on this girl, who upon meeting me, apparently decided that she hated my guts. She teased me relentlessly, until one day she decided to stop; at that moment I realized that I liked her. Now, I don't know what that says about me, but (*cough* masochist *cough*) I guess I was pretty much a hopeless (and clueless) romantic at the age of ten.

So anyway, we were friends already, and there was a fair of sorts in school—with mini-rides, inflatable houses, and all that. I was with a couple of friends when she and a couple of her friends went up to us, joking around and asking to be treated.

And, before I knew it, I had my wallet in my hand. I wasn't a rich kid, so I handed her the remaining 50 pesos in my wallet. I got a sweet smile and a peck on the cheek, and I guess that made my day back then, despite the fact that I had no money left for the rest of the day. Later on she went on to be the first girl to officially break my heart, when she started dating a close friend of mine. Tss, kids those days.

Here I am, ten years later: about five inches taller, with a better haircut and better fitting clothes, but almost exactly the same attitude when it comes to my love life. I may not be tripping over myself in the haste of doing irrational things for every single girl I happen to like, but I can't say I've quit the habit entirely.

Over the years, in the name of dating, or simply liking someone, I have:

• embarrassed myself multiple times by trying to pull off something I normally wouldn't even want to try;
• been dragged into awkward events and situations wherein I knew practically nobody else;
• taken impractically diverted routes home for the sake of being able to commute with aforementioned someone;
• stayed up amazingly late, or woken up amazingly early to talk to said someone (depending on whether she's a midnight or morning person);
• regularly attended classes which I wasn't enrolled in;
• waited for hours, hoping to casually bump into said someone during her free time;
• gotten lost multiple times, trying to find/buy things as gifts;
• learned to play the guitar to impress aforementioned someone;
• totally overhauled my wardrobe (yippee for me);
• played nice (actually, I really am nice), even when it felt like torture;
• tried/am trying to change my attitude toward things (yeah, that's mostly for the better though);
• and some other things which are too specific and/or dramatic to disclose here.

They might sound like totally normal things to do. I guess that's because at some point, we've all done irrational—or, at the very least, uncharacteristic—things for the sake of love, or the faintest illusion of it. If you haven't...well, hang on, you'll find your match.

Does loving or liking make us foolish, or does it make us brave?

Hands down, I'd have to agree that it drives us to make some really awful decisions sometimes. But still, unless you'll end up getting seriously hurt physically or psychologically (or something horrible like that), I'd say go for it.

After all, bad decisions make for good stories. Or so they tell me, anyway.

Chiaroscuro

Let me tell you about my clothing choices. Oh, no, I'm not going to pretend to be fashion-savvy. Trust me, I couldn't put a fashionable outfit together, even if my life depended on it.

It's just that the other day, I was wearing black, which I almost never do. As of my last tally, my closet contains exactly one black and two dark blue shirts, and about one shirt for each other color. The rest of my tops are white. I don't know when this started, but after four years in college, the white shirts have slowly piled up.

I really prefer white shirts, mostly because the weather is baking like an oven most of the time, and I, unfortunately, tend to sweat profusely and easily.So white clothes keep me cool and comfortable, while also keeping me from perpetually looking like I just came from a jog.

Click for source.

However, I've been thinking about how there's a lot more to my clothing choice than just comfort. I realized that I actually suit my shirt colors to my mood—and based on that, I'm pretty bipolar, I guess.

Most of the time I'm white; I'm bright. I catch the light, reflecting it, reaching out. This is me in my happiest, most hyper moods. I go out on impromptu drinking sessions, I dance around, and act like a kid with ADHD. This is me in my most sociable, most engaged moments. I laugh at anything and try everything, just for the heck of it. I breathe the air and sunshine in, like a silly sunflower in bloom (and mind you, the concept of me as a sunflower is silly in itself).

But other times, I'm black; I'm dark. I absorb the light, curling up, cowering in corners, shutting out. I refuse to talk to people, spending whole days shut up in my room, watching movies and reading.This is me in my most detached, apathetic moments. I watch anything—to distract me, because I think about everything—especially the unnecessary stressors. The air feels trapped and I feel too tired, too heavy to move. 

Lately I've been alternating between dark and light shirt colors; dark and light perspectives. Too many things going on, and I'm losing focus. As colors signify moods and emotions, I'm pretty much overloading on the whole spectrum every day.

Most days I come home tired and drained, and fall asleep feeling defeated. I wake up the next day hoping for the best; for the nearest I can get to a clean slate. Then the day comes at me again and before I notice, I'm stuck in the cycle.

But it's fine, I guess. I'll find a way around it, I always do.

We are all are light and dark, in our own ways. We all have the potential for goodness and positivity, yet we are at the same time inevitably flawed.

The thing about black and white is that they both are overloaded with the whole spectrum. One simply chooses to reflect it, seeing it as an opportunity to exude brightness, while the other keeps everything in, trapping the light.

Having choices is freaking difficult. And as we've all heard at some point, our life depends on what we choose make of our circumstances. No wonder life is such a pain in the ass. We'll just have to deal with it, then. If we make enough good choices, maybe we'll even turn into prisms and achieve states of rainbow-shitting happiness (very similar to Maslow's concept of self-actualization, except this has hints of substance abuse).

[Okay, I think I just pushed the analogy off the cliff. Don't mind that last bit. Just stay happy, folks.]

FAIL Better

I've been gone for another while. My apologies, life kind of got in the way. Academic life, I mean. The last week of my sem was a seemingly endless downpour of papers, papers, and some more papers. Luckily, I got through it, and now I have more or less a week and a half before I have to go back to the toxic, mind bending UPM life.

I miss it already, actually. I'm not exactly a workaholic, but I could manage a week of staring at a computer screen, reading, shit-talking my way through papers, and gulping down bottle after bottle of Lipovitan. But I can't quite deal with hours and hours of nothing to do, no one to go out with, and everything to think about. Movies, every TV series I could think of, endless games—I'm just so tired of it. I've been meaning to write, but I've been putting it off, since my brain felt literally exhausted. I felt like I ran out of words for a while.

And then there's this other thing. I've been thinking about me, my relationships. Well, one in particular. Lately, I've been putting such a strain on the person I value most, and it's because of this irrationally insecure side of me that I can't ditch. I've been so busy comparing myself to others—and thinking about how I don't even come close—that I've quit trying.

That's part of the reason why I haven't blogged for so long too. I felt like I didn't have anything good enough to say, so I didn't even start. I don't know why I'm like this with the people—and things—that I love most. I want so much to be the best that it feels like an all or nothing deal. I keep on waiting for the right time, for when it's all perfect and proceeding according to plan.

Who am I kidding? That's never going to happen.

Let's face it. Life is unfair. I'm never going to get that edge. I'm going to have to earn it. I'll just have to keep trying—and die trying if I need to. So, I'm still a failure. I'm not great; hell I'm not even good.

But I think, that nobody is perfect, really. And the few people who seem have it all good are bastards who managed to grab all the luck. Haha. But really,  I don't take it against them. For us normal people, failure is a fact of life. So if you're not failing, you're probably not even trying enough. Live a little. Try and fail some more.

  Just keep swimming. Or something like it.

And besides, there are just some things (and, say, a certain person who happens to be YOU), that I love too much to quit on. So I'm back. Yeah, you know what I mean.

It's Complicated

This topic is so complex that it deserves a lengthier post, I guess. But as I don't have enough time or sense for that right now, this will have to do.

Relationships are weird. The dynamics of a normal relationship (between parents and children, or between friends) are unique to each and every person in this planet. So that's a lot of different dynamics. Freakin' complicated.

Relationships (except maybe family ones) can also vary from one state to the next. Strangers can become friends; friends can become enemies or lovers; lovers can become just friends, enemies, or strangers again. Sometimes it's confusing to tell where the definite limits are in these cases. Freakin' vague.

I don't know. It just popped into my head. It's something we deal with every day, and whether we notice it or not, our relationships with the people around us have a very significant effect on us.

On a more personal note, my life is filled with those complicated, vague relationships. I don't know why, but I tend to bond with people who make for not-so-stereotypical relationship dynamics. It's a real headache when I try to figure them out. But I guess with most of them, I don't really need to. I never really liked norms anyway. It's better to color outside the lines sometimes.