CHRISSY WAKE UP I DONT LIKE THIS CHRISSY WAKE UP

Himlay

Long time.

It's a few weeks into 2020, and I'm writing now to clear off a few things from my mind. This has always been a repository of things inside my head, after all.

On 2019.

Man, this was a tough year. I quit my job of four years and took a leap of faith. I started up my internship again. It was a rough year, guys. I can't tell you how many times I woke up with a massive pit in my stomach, thinking of how the day was going to be like. It was hard, you know? I had never felt so much self-hate, so much doubt and anxiety, so much worry.  I felt like a lot of my experiences weighed on me and reduced me to nothing. It felt like I was breathing through a tube.

I won't deny that most of it was all in my head. A lot of my worries and insecurities spilled over certain aspects of my life and it just pooled into a huge wave. Imagine lying at the deep end of  the pool, not being able to feel the tiles on your feet. I felt like a drifter, unsure of which side was up or down.

There were days when I found myself sitting at the little prayer room just a few floors beneath the floor I was doing my internship in. I usually finished my duties at around 5 in the afternoon, so I usually stopped at prayer room before going home. During this time, the whole place was suffused in a warm orange  glow, the setting of the sun.

Sometimes, I felt peace. I won't deny that there were days when peace didn't come. I could sit there, aimlessly for hours on end. I didn't want to go home. To go home was to admit that I wasted another day, I was a day less and not an inch further. 

Writing this is still hard for me. Honestly. I keep on switching tabs. I keep on opening new things. The thing is, I think i've developed the habit of not being fully in the moment? Like I'm not fully paying attention to things going on, especially if I feel that it's hard, or not going too well. I think this is a form of task avoidance - evading accountabilities and what not. It's something that I feel I need to change this year. Or at  least to take steps to address it. 

======================================================

I'm revisiting this a few weeks halfway before 2022. 

2 years of pandemic anxiety and quarantine. I don't feel the same. I dont think I ever will. 

YWQN

XV
Nanginginig na kalamnan, nagsisibagsakang looban -
Ramdam ang laman sa putik, putik sa laman
Pabulong na tapang sa pagkapa sa dilim
Kasinungaliang minsan nang inalagaan
Pinakain, pinagyaman - pinagyabong sa kaalamang
Sa yakap ng dilim lahat ay magsingmukha na lamang

Nanatiling buhay sa kahapon ngunit bihag sa bukas
Sa loob ng rehas ginawa sa simula, paikot at palabas
Sa hudyat ng simula, mag sisipagkalasan pa kaya?
Tinanim na gusaling mistulang baluktot na kublihan
Sa aking naliligaw na daanan

A Couple of Things

XI. 

I feel helpless. 

It seems to me at this point that for the longest time, I was chasing goals. For the most part, I was meeting them - graduating, getting my license, getting into a career I liked, albeit with a few hiccups here and there. 

I feel like I really need to talk about what I am feeling. I'm studying right now, and part of that training is to be able to notice the distorted thinking of others, and how this thinking gets to affect how they behave. I know that one's experiences growing up can predispose them towards certain things, I do. For the most part in my training as a counselor, I felt that I was meeting them, you know? My goals, my work. I had a feeling that I was pretty okay doing this, that I was good and helping people out, you know? 

It's just hard. 

Golden

Ben and Ben, Maybe the Night 

It's been two years since I last logged in here. Truth be told, posting a blog post feels alien, unknown to me right now. I feel like I always say this, in all of my posts but it is what it is.

Then again, it has been a while. Two years, gddmt. I think there's a lot of things to catch up on, and I feel like I have a lot of things to tell as well.

Let's get started, shall we?

catching sunsets at zambales city

It Has Been a Year

Ang Bandang Shirley - Siberia

and what a year it has been.

2016 was a time of change and growth. Around January or February last year, I wrote in my planner the things that I wanted to do. I'm pretty stoked to see that I've managed to at least tick off all of them - join an eco-group, enroll in a japanese class, travel and enroll myself in further studies.

It's been a challenging and rewarding year, guys.

Catching Up

Whoa, it has been a little over a year since I've last written in here.

Blogging has always been at the back of my mind, to be honest. Life has been getting in the way though, and letting it has been my choice. A lot of things have happened which I'd like to share, but I'd like to go into detail some other time. I want some things to have that distinction.

At ay nako juicecolored. I don't think I'll ever be able to complete a 30D challenge :))

Anyway, here are a few things: 

Rant

IV

Your door is closed.

It is wooden, but hollow
Even if it opens, and you walk outside
Nobody feels welcome
But everybody shivers, scared

I knock for the door to fall
but only the skin on my knuckles do

I watch the skin fall, and the blood follow after
Raw wounds that need time to heal
A perfect circle-shaped break in my skin
A fitting ring for my soul to feel
The hollow beat of my heart
  - of jagged stone against cold tin

V

I am trying.

Sometimes I just want to take it all away. To uproot myself from the world, tearing out the roots.

I am my own adhesive - I can take away everything, wipe it away. Clean. Empty. Start all over again.

I want to jettison myself away. Jetsam. Debris from a larger whole. I often wondered how it feels to escape, and now I wonder when.

Separate, then blur out the lines.

Nakakapagod na.

Sorry!

Hwoops.

It has been a while since I last wrote in here, since I last logged in. Sorry about that. I want to say that a lot of things happened, that there were a lot of things that I had to take care of, but... nope. I'd rather not. To say these things at this point would be just excuses, and I'd much rather not offer up any.

So. Here we are, at the break between the 2nd day and the 3rd day of writing. Here is something a little bit more... personal.

I want to tell you a few things.

30DC Day 2: How Have You Changed in The Past Two Years?

Be the Song, Foy Vance

This picture taken two years ago probably sums up what I had been like back then: awkward and inappropriate. Sinong pumikiiiiit?!

F tells me I've changed. She says I've adopted a new kind of voice, one which I use regularly in my work. This is probably true. It takes a certain kind of pitch to talk the unassuming, and this pitch is as low as hell.

30DC: Weird Things You Do When You're Alone

Mightiest of Guns, A.A. Bondy

I found myself alone inside my alma mater one hot Saturday afternoon. I came from Dapitan to have a couple of things printed, and I couldn't resist taking out my trusty camera with just over a bar of juice remaining. I was home, but I was all alone.

Revisiting a Challenge

Be the Song, Foy Vance

In my previous blog, I once tried a 30 Day Writing Challenge. I wasn't able to complete it though, because of... reasons. 

Anyway, here is me, completing what my self wasn't able to do. Naks. 

1. Weird things you do when you’re alonge.
2. How have you changed in the past 2 years?
3. What kind of person attracts you.
4. What you wear to bed.
5. 5 things that irritate you about the opposite sex/same sex.
6. The person you like and why you like them.
7. Your opinion on cheating on people.
8. Something you’re currently worrying about.
9. Your last kiss.
10. Your views on drugs and alcohol.
11. Your currently relationship, if single discuss how single life is.
12. Things you want to say to an ex.
13. A date you would love to go on.
14. Something disgusting you do.
15. The best things to happen to you this week.
16. 3 things you are proud of about your personality.
17. Things that make you scared.
18. Disrespecting parents.
19. Something that never fails to make you feel better.
20. The last argument you had.
21. Something you can’t seem to get over.
22. 10 things about you people don’t really expect.
23. Something you always think “what if…” about
24. Things you want to say to 5 different people.
25. 10 ways to win your heart.
26. Your religious beliefs.
27. Talk about your siblings.
28. The month you were happiest this year why.
29. A picture of yourself.
30. What changed this month and what you hope will happen next month.

*whew.

Stutter

Autotelic - Dahilan

I feel my chest tighten - my lips slam shut and I feel something bottled up inside my throat. I struggle to take a breath and try to open my mouth again, but a gasp only escapes me. I think of fish and the endless way their mouth opens and closes; I feel myself getting red in the face. I see you furrow your eyes in worry, and I try to communicate by my eyes that this is okay, that this happens. I know I fail.

This is how it feels. This is how it feels to be stopped by your own body, to feel yourself powerless to explain.

This.

Points On A Plane

It has been a while. Work has kept me busy lately, so I haven't had enough time to write. 

Whoa. This is a truth, but it still feels weird to hear it. It has been a busy couple of months, and since my last post in January, a lot of things have changed, the least of which is my career. Work has been crazy. I'm still new, and I'm still getting used to a lot of things, but it's been alright. Frankly, it has been one crazy adjustment one after another, but at the end of the day, I'm still glad about it. 

On the other side of things... 

I think I'm a bit lonely. I'm missing a lot of people. We see each other every so often, but a few days after, I'm missing them again. It's a bit different from wanting - I find myself yearning for more simpler days. for far more simpler times. 

I know it's days I won't be able to get back. And I know, that when my friends feel like this, I can spit back all the good things, all the positive thoughts to cheer them up. 

But it doesn't seem to stick. 

I think we're all terrified of the future. Nay - I know that we are. Each and everyone of us are leading more and more separate lives - like we're all diverging lines from a single point of origin on a single plane. And that, quite frankly, is terrifying. I sincerely am scared that one day I'll wake up and realize it's been twenty years since college, and it's been months since I last talked to my friends. It scares me to think that in a few years' time, we'll all be with different sets of people. 

I see the kids here at my job, and I can't help thinking how many of these relationships will last until college. I see them walk, arms linked across each other, with the boys with their awkward voices, their awkward height and the girls with their giggles and spring-loaded steps. I can't help but be cynical. 

But this is a fallacy. My experiences should not color their own. 

I don't know where I'm going with this rant. Suffice it to say that this post is for all the times I have missed the past. Suffice it to say that this post is a tribute to our fears, to our joys, to our future. Suffice it to say that I miss all of you, and I wish we could go someplace soon. 

Numbers II

NP: Vivir, Mowat

7. June has been a strange month, and it's still a cliche to say this, but it needs to be said. It has been a month of definite downs and absolute highs, with almost nothing in between to stabilize myself in. A part of me wants to deny it, but in the interest of mental health, I find myself denying the need to deny.

8. The first fight of the day begins the moment I open my eyes: I am tied down by the warmth of my bed, by the coziness of my pillows. To close my eyes is to surrender my body to the warm, enveloping wave of my bed, and the gentle drone of the fan. To get up is to admit prisoner to the cold, hard floor, but it is still the cold floor I seek, so I can start my day fully.

9. I consider you one of my constants. You are not only the anchor that ties me down, but also the wind that blows and refreshes. You are not only the ocean that I steer in, but also the stars that guide and direct. You are the ship, the people and the energy, the quiet lull in the morning, the gentle breeze of the sea. I miss you, and I miss being with you, in its simplest and truest sense.

To The Tito I've Never Known: Musings and Stories on the National Day of Mourning

Today, over sandwiches and coffee, I talked with my Nanay for a bit about what it was like back then, and why she had so much fear towards Muslims. 

It started a few hours ago, when we watched a live broadcast of the necrological services on TV. Nanay, (actually my aunt, but she practically raised me, so I call her so) a frail-looking but still surprisingly strong woman of 60 years of age, had such strong reactions against the encounter but I couldn't help but ask myself why. She told me herself a few hours later over merienda that when she was a child, her brother was ambushed and kidnapped by Muslim raiders in the mountains. My Tito bebot, the Tito i had never known, never came back down since.

Saying Goodbyes

Break the Cycle, You + Me

A few weeks into 2015, I said goodbye to a friend.

To those of you who've come into my room, you might notice several things. You might notice the black and red marker writings on the inside and outside of the closets, a thing i started one late night into my junior year, when a scene from an anime series kind of inspired me to do so. You might also notice the large pile of books stacked haphazardly in one corner. Maybe you'd look at the shelves above the mirror and notice the rows of Goosebumps books. Or maybe you might notice the assorted things i've crammed into this wall over here. It's kind of a medley of all the things i've found throughout more or less 9 years, to be honest. There's countless CDs (broken, mind you) of movies and music, some notices and meetings i've had a hand in officiating, some k-zone posters from my elementary days, an old map of UP from when I took the UPCAT and even a calendar of Our Lady of Buensuceso - the patron saint of my old high school alma mater.

Numbers I

NP: Signal Fire, Johnoy Danao's Cover

Numbers I

1. My phone has ran out of juice. A part of me wants to charge it, but a  part of me doesn't. Knowing the phone can't ring is better than hearing the phone unringing. Unringing - is that a real word? I mean it like the absence of a ring, this word unringing. But somehow, it does not feel like the absence of a ring, but rather the undoing of it, or the not doing. The reverse.

2. I told myself these shoes can cross distances - seven-year leagues, depths of nineteen fathoms, walls of fifteen feet. What I failed to realize though was the soles, the strings and the cloth that binds them all together, are at the mercy of all the things inside.

3. Sobrang gulo. Masyadong maraming linya ang umiikot ikot. Mga takot masaktan, mga takot manakit. Sa isang perpektong mundo marahil, nabubuhay ang mga masasayang katha ng ating isipan, hindi dahil sa kanilang paraan ng pamumuhay, kung hindi sa paraan ng kanilang pakikitungo.

4. The other day, I was at the university, getting my tickets for an ceremony I neither wish to attend or discuss. I sat at one of the benches overlooking the main building and thought about how fragile everything is. I could've sat underneath one of those trees inside the lane - i could never tell which one was ours - but it felt wrong, somehow. Like if i did that, it would only be a perverse imitation of what had happened. I didn't stay to catch the sunrise, nor the lighting of the trees. For now, it was enough that I was near that place, not within it.

5. I have a brother who is so disorganized, he always forgets to flush the toilet. One day, as i come home early from a day outside, I peer inside the bowl and see the edges of a book, the silhouette of a cloth, and a castle made of popsickle sticks - his project for the last grading. I see all these things and possibly more - all of the things he wants to flush away.

6. Zippers. It's funny how they work, and it's strange how people haven't found a way to incorporate it into the human body.

Harrumph

NP: Tom Misch & Carmody - So Close

Right. It's been a few weeks since the end of the exam, and i passed. Can't say i'm pleased, can't say i'm not. It just is. Right now i'm looking at jobs, or the smattering of ones i find, and it feels like nothing has changed, but at the same time a lot has.[Proofread. HAHA ano ba, past daryl :))] I had this interview recently where this interviewer was asking me to develop a test so casually, like i do it all the time. Hnggh. There was this other one who asked me (as i applied for an L&D post) why i went and grabbed a license. Jeez I don't know lady, i don't know.

I don't know what i was expecting, really. I feel like i'm in limbo again, but this time the pressure is more real, yknow? I can feel a lot of people breathing heavily on my neck looking forward to what i'll do next - most heavily a person i don't even relatively see - so it's quite a lot to take in. The additional letters tacked to the end of my name feels more like a paddle in a sea of heavy, heavy liquid. I can't use it to row, so i might as well whack myself on the head with it.

Close To The Dawn

NP: Up Dharma Down, Tadhana

Top (n) on my library. I've formatted the hard drive earlier this year, and i haven't had the time to update my playlist yet, so the play count isn't all that high - but this seems to be pretty accurate.