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.

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.

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.

The First Wedding I Ever Attended

NP: Charlie Simpson, Haunted

I want to talk about the first wedding i ever attended. It's a lie, actually - this isn't the first one. But it feels more like the first, simply because I want it to have this distinction. 

It was for my friend, Pok (or Pola, take your pick). Just last December 2013, she was showing us her ring, inviting us for her wedding sometime in 2014. Understandably, we were shocked and nervous at the same time. We barely even met the guy, but you see, to me, Pok was just one of the people who.. kind of had it together, yknow? She was kind of a bitch sometimes, but her most significant quality was her togetherness. Puzzles didn't faze her simply because she was above it - she could look at som many things and see the puzzle that was forming. So even though we barely even met the guy, i guess there was a degree of confidence. "Si Pola na yun eh."

Aliases

NP: Up Dharma Down - Tadhana

Heyy. I've updated the banner. I know nothing about dimensions and sizes, so I ended up taking a lot of time guessing the measurements. Hihi.

Updating the banner means i'm going to update my old blog, Gotta Knock A Little Harder , an end post soon.

Small confession: this new blog, still a stutterer, probably went through hundreds of revisions by now. I had a bit of trouble choosing the URL. Initially, it was Awanggan, the Filipino equivalent of "infinity". Then it became stillastutterer - a term loosely borrowed from an account name I saw at SoulPancake. Today though, right after I made that blue dot of a banner, i'm changing it again, this time to my name without the vowels.

Missing Places

NP: Sam Smith, Make It To Me

I'm currently missing a lot of places right now. Usually i miss a place because i've attributed value to it, or because of other reasons.

Missing a place is weird. It's not like, say, missing a person. People can be tricky to contact, and oftentimes when you meet with one it's hard to predict what would happen.

Places, on the other hand, are more predictable by the simple value of they don't really move. They're pretty solid and consistent, and it's hard to move a place. Well, relatively consistent until the next condo or mall comes along. Right now, this is a list of places that i miss and might go to more in the future, because well, i just fucking miss them. I'm missing a lot of things lately, it seems.

This Is New

NP: Priscilla Ahn - I'll Be Here

Right. I've moved to a new blog! I was debating, actually, whether or not to create a new profile for this new one. I mean, it was a figurative kick in the guts, reading this:

Hello from circa 2009? 2008?

I mean, JFC. Just what is that interest. HNGH.