When do you say goodbye?

I've been reflecting on the dark areas of my life recently, but from the perspective of someone who's exiting the dark tunnel.

A lot of people don't like me. I don't mind that part. I know I'm not exactly miss sunshine, it works for me to put my guards up. It's what insects say when they wear bright colors: I'm poison. Stay away. Instead of bright colors, I wore the mark they stamp on toxic liquids: a skull. 

I was the goth girl screaming "I'm no poser!" directing all thoughts towards death with the sincerity that only children following their parents have. With the intensity that good students are praised for. (funny that when my thoughts finally go to death one day, I have no space in my despair to think about how romantic the situation is. No detachment whatsoever this time, just a jackhammer of self abuse. The self imposed censorship that was nothing but fear-based.

What are you afraid of? Being rejected?

What I do mind is when the person who doesn't like me is the person I let my guards down for.

Wow, I must be really sensitive?

But what's wrong with sensitivity? Why are we expected to be sensitive only with art and beauty, hard when it comes to the harsh? Nobody is THAT inconsistent.

Why is it a shameful thing to wear your heart on your sleeve? When is innocence synonymous to stupidity?

I guess it is. They're just a singko pesos nga gibalibali (two sides of the same coin ba).

Some of the things they tell the innocent is that you should "forgive your enemies"; "be the bigger person."; "don't go to sleep angry"... why is angry not allowed?

Angry is proud. Walls are proud. Dicks are proud.

Proud is an ironic word. Why is there so much shame in pride?

Why can't I stay mad? Why am I not allowed to judge that I am not at peace with something? Because I might act on it? Is there no trust in me to regulate my emotions in my own time?

Instead, we invalidate people's emotions by dehumanizing the other. I guess this is where tv is damaging, the most experience we have dealing with problems are from memories. If all memories you have are manufactured (in this case, by television), you start reacting to things the same way your favorite cartoon characters/heroes do.

But people are more complex than the standees we put in front of the camera. Not everyone acts deliberately ever single moment of their lives, unlike the heroes, who in your memorybank, never had downtime. Sometimes we say things because we're tired. Sometimes we scratch our noses because while you were talking to your teacher, she let out a fart and you wished you could quell the chuckle bubbling from your lips. Sometimes we say one thing because you don't want the drama that would likely follow if you say the truth. It's unfair that when a slight change in climate occurs, you can't be honest about it and trust the person to ride the wave with you. Then again, maybe not all relationships are meant to be like that. Maybe we ride a wave with someone, and then the next wave is a different sort - one you haven't learned to weather or have no interest in navigating together.

If I met every single human being on earth, I bet a quarter would be made up of people I don't like and don't like me back. Touch and go. Some people just don't mesh. 

And some people have come and affected you, and then left. Their contribution to your life is over. You've satisfied your exchange's purpose. That's why some of the people who hate me now were people I liked a lot when I first met them. That's why It hurt so much. Because the rejection was meant to change me profoundly.

Even if there's no such thing as previous lives it's still a beautiful shape of a story you can't tell by dumbing it down.

You have to experience it.

I had a friend I really cared for and still do, but not with the same intensity that I used to. The space helped.

I want to maintain this space. It's better than second guessing, with tears blinding your vision. With drama blocking your better judgment. As Chris put it, maybe I can't let go because I was the one who got rejected. My fears were satisfied.

Maybe I'm expecting the satisfier to make things right? I notice this is what baby does when he's angry with me - he clings to me like I'm going to leave him. How can you expect someone to both be angry and in love with someone and not go mad? That's an explosive combination.

I'm letting their power over me go. I'm the only person who can make things right. And not everything has to be right. They can be left too. Hehe.

Whatever Happened to the 25 List?

I turn 25 this year. Some years ago, my bestfriend Sam pointed out this thing her friend did to commemorate her turning twenty - a bucket list ala "A Walk to Remember", and proposed we make our own, which naturally should include a backpacking trip all over Eurasia. Of course.

And then twenty came around and we were swamped with stuff and nowhere near realizing the Eurasian trip, or even completing the list whatsoever, that I turned it into a 25 things to do before 25 list.

Let's take a list at the list and see what happened:

1. Learn how to drive a car - I did. I learned how to drive a stick shift owner-type jeep that rattled and clanked all around town. But it's one thing to spend a summer taking turns with cousins on a dinosaur, and another to drive everyday, and practice driving for more than a few hours on a weekend.

2. Earn $1000 - Yes. Turns out, 40,000 pesos isn't much when you're paying bills and stuff. It's 3 months' pay for starters. I suppose that it is a lot if you don't pay bills. But I didn't know anything about striving for financial sustainability back then.

3. Cook a full course meal - I'm actually competent in the kitchen now! People actually gulp my food down within seconds! The full course meal hasn't happened yet, but I still have time.

4. Sew an outfit myself - No. The farthest I got to this was T-Shirt surgery and pattern-making classes. I have a sewing machine in a box somewhere in the Pacific. If it arrives before my birthday, I might still be able to accomplish this.

5. Write a book - No. My prose has taken a beating ever since I started writing scripts. It's so much easier to say "the girl looks at the guy" than "she fluttered frosty eyelashes towards him and wondered if he saw her or was staring right through her".

6. Climb a mountain - No. :(

I still want to. Maybe when Malaya's old enough.

7. Film an indie flick - Yes, and it's been one hell of a ride.

8. Sell a print on DA - No. I stopped caring about DA and online communities shortly after coming up with this list. I think this was more of me wanting to be on top of the game in a community I was active with at the time rather than wanting to make a living making prints.

9. Go to Bohol - I received my first kiss on that trip. We did the adventure trip thing and went spelunking. Easily one of the best summers of my life. Probably why it was so hard to recover from that boy. I wonder what happened to him.

10. Pose nude - Yes, and this is now one of my sources of income. Young Ara, so cute and green for thinking this was a big deal.

11. Organize a surprise party - YES! My cousin Deanne's debut. My cousins and I were plotting, our parents got wind and took over at some point, leaving some of the details to us. She walked into the dark ballroom womdering why there was a pile of glow sticks on the floor. She cried when they turned the lights on. Best prank ever.

12. Contribute to Reader's Digest - No. I stopped reading them. I did work for a newspaper for a while, realized the "glory" of getting your byline published wasn't all it was cracked up to be. "Glory" has lost its glimmer over the years.

13. Make the Dean's List - I don't know? Teacher said my total was 1.25 one sem, But I didn't see my name on the list. It doesn't matter much to me now. I didn't take college very seriously. I thought my majors were fun, but I didn't really see school as a place to build skills to earn a living. I just chased stories and muses. I still do I guess, but I'd like to believe I've become more pragmatic with what school is and what it's not.

14. LARP - Yes. But it all seems silly now. Young Ara, such an exhibitionist. I miss my guts. I don't miss whatever I used to be gutsy over.

15. Learn how to speak another language - Yes. Mon petit garçon est jolie et mon francais uhmm... sucks?

16. Visit another country - No. Not since Hong Kong.

17. See someone die - A cat. I saw a cat cross the street, get hit by a bike, shiver, and then breathe its last on the pavement. Death is not a joke.

18. Watch a birthing - My own! But before that, a buttload of waterbirth videos for research. Giving birth to my baby beats everything I'd seen on video though.

19. Perform for theater - Yes. Once. I miss the craft, but not the stage.

20. Get a Dama de Noche album launched - No. Very bad breakup, with irrepairable friendships as a consequence. It's all good though, you simply learn that some people are not meant to be in your life, and some people are just really big assholes.

21. Find out about my dad - He died November 7, 2008. The half brother who told us and I email sporadically. We've agreed to meet someday, but never got around to it (he lives in Singapore).

22. Name a baby - Uhmm, duh?

23. Talk to one of my fave musicians/authors - In 2009, The director for a short film I'd auditioned for met up with me to talk about the project. The meeting ended in the wee hours of the morning, with him giving me a copy of his now defunct band's music. I gave it a listen and was blown away. I'd just found my favorite Cebu band and they didn't even play live anymore. What a bummer.

Did I mention director/musician is now my partner, artistic collaborator and baby-daddy? (I swear, the baby isn't an art project)

24. Paint a mural - Yes. Don't ask me if they were legal.

25. Get a moondance - I do every now and then from the partner. It's pleasant. It's even better that we both can't dance for shit. So it's like we're just hugging and moving around, trying not to step on each other's toes.

That's 16 out of 25, with 2 things I could still do, 1 unsure thing, and a buttload of undoables.

Hello hiatus, goodbye hiatus

Hi.  it's been a while. I haven't written anything here since the time of primordial goop. Actually, so much shit got down that there simply was no time for vanity posts. I had a baby, got "married" (more on that later) and settled down kuno. That's right, I'm mutating into what I used to call a "doormat". I've done nothing this past year except raise a human being. If I sound like I'm downplaying the amazingness of motherhood (and my baby), let me reiterate: everyday for the last year, I've been killing the urge to go out into the world chasing muses. The because is important, but killing the urge has taken its toll.

An article another new mother-friend posted sometime ago on fb stated that the first year of a child's life is the most hostile in a couple's couplehood. No wonder they say three's a crowd. And even if you prepare to have a kid, your relationship changes forever. My partner and I've been secretly involved ever since we got involved, because we didn't want to stop becoming individuals to other people. And then baby arrived and now we call each other "mommy" and "daddy", and everyone refers to us as the parents.

My kid is awesome. I blog about him. Not as frequently as I want to, but I won't here. Because this is my space. And I need alone time too. Which is why I write this while he's asleep.

The great big positive is that I want to better myself because of them. If we're going to be stuck with each other for a long time, I want them to be stuck with the best version of me. The version that is healthy, that makes great food, that knows how to make things better when they're not, that knows how to get shit done and does so without breaking the bank.

And then. i think about who I already am, and who I already was and wonder why I can't continue being good at the things I already was. What happened to my neverending quest to be a better writer/blogger/journalist/filmmaker/artist? What happened to my scripts? My storylines? My imaginary worlds? How's the grass over in Inverness? How are Marie and the Thousand? Has it stopped raining red yet? When did I stop keeping a dream journal?

Nobody tells you you're going to stop dreaming for a while when you're pregnant. It's an automatic shift the moment you announce a pregnancy. You disappear for a while. And while you revel in gratitude at the overwhelming love for your child, you wish friends were willing to hold the baby for a while while you gather your lost dreams. Because those were your first children and you can't afford to neglect them either, and yet you are.

So this is what I've been doing when I can't take it anymore : I write in secret, while he sleeps. The essays have been piling up in the ipad notes section, so I'll just slowly transfer them to this blog.

do you have an idealized self? And if so, what does she look/act like?

do you have an idealized self? And if so, what does she look/act like?

Answer here

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Byebye '09

Today is the last day of 2009. This statement, is of course for the sake of my future self when I read back and wonder what this is all about. Im forgetful that way. This is also for you people who bother to read my musings. You're 40% of the people I want to extend this to. This week last year, I'd been reflecting on what a horrible year 2008 was, full of ill-gotten victories and misdirections. 2009, on the other hand, was straitforward and radical. 2009 saw the best and worst days of my life to date. I lost close family members, through death and estrangement. I found and lost love. I found and lost hope. I've had severe bouts of depression where I couldn't leave my room to even eat for days. I've had days where I felt like I was on top of the world and that nothing could get to me. This is the year I officially stopped being a teenager, when the pressure of adult life and independence actually sunk in. I'd been able to fulfill dreams, I'd had some questions answered, self identity crises resolved, new worlds had been revealed to me (yay WOD and accent movehz!), old things came back to haunt me. I became part of Hastang, to whom I am thankful for the opportunity to be able to perform and write my songs. I'd done things I never thought I would do, or get around to. This year also saw me getting rid of masochism and procrastination (I'm almost there!). I went back to building skills for things I'd dropped long ago, and I earned and learned new skills through exploring interests. My life philosophies found names, and I'm still deciding whether I'm happy that I'm not alone, or pissed that I'm not the one who came up with this shit. I made a lot of mistakes in the process but the mistakes only made the little victories sweeter. There were more downs than ups. But that only made the ups more special by contrast. For all of you who were part of it, for those of you who helped make this year crazy and memorable, I wouldn't have had it any other way. Thanks. Bring on the new year. :)

Beauty Bar Bitches

What was supposedly an adventure by two bored girls turned into a reality check into how unprofessional some people in the service industry can be.

I was window shopping with Nica, looking at sparkly things (she's the shine fetishist, not me), where our whimsy brought us to the makeup department of Rustan's. One thing I like about Testers, is that although the product is expensive as hell, you at least know what you're missing out on. This way, if you really think it's worth it, you come back when sudden windfalls happen. Welcome ladies and gents, to the mind of the Philippine college girl shopper.

After finding the most byutiful lipcolor in the world (Hotwired, NARS, P1300+ T_T), Nica suggested we go to Beauty bars.

Ara: Do they have makeup brushes?
Nica: For testing? I'm not sure, but yeah, probably

This is where the adventure turned funny. I remember how Nica was saying that she loved how the salespeople at Rustan's don't bother you when you're at the make up counter. I was curious to find out how service was like at the other cosmetic shops.

At the beauty bar, we were hovering over random brand sections where they had the testers lined up in front. The difference between some of the testers and sold products were how they were sealed. Some of the testers didn't even have marks on them. We were taking our time, laughing at the weird products (green concealer is apparently for pimples, not aliens. I learned something new today!), when I was having a particularly hard time finding the tester for one of the products (dark eyeshadow), I figured the unsealed box was the tester.

I was taking time trying to open the box, and at one point, I almost asked the girl for help, but it came free. I noticed though, that the salesladies had started hovering over me when I tried to apply the eyeshadow on my lid. I was seriously wondering if I was allowed to put heavy make up with testers or something.

When I was done, one of the (braver?) salesladies came up to me and said that I had touched a sold product. Demmet. I knew I was at fault, problem was, I didn't bring moolah, and I wasn't going to have any til my allowance arrived (which would be tomorrow).

The saleslady left me to talk to the other salesladies, although I knew I was supposed to have to pay for it. I was thinking of leaving something, but I didn't even have an ID on me. All I had was a cellphone, my wallet (with change), a book and a small sketchpad. I'm not a proficient 'artiste', so none of my drawings could've amounted to the damaged product. The saleslady came back several times to tell us she couldn't let us just go, and there was no way they could make it appear as if the product hadn't been touched, and I would have to pay for it.

I don't know why she kept on insisting on this point when I'd never once denied paying for it, I just didn't have the cash atm. I figured I needed to talk to the sales manager to make her understand the situation, so I asked the saleslady to contact the manager for me. She again told me I had to pay for the product and said the manager wouldn't come. I put on a firmer tone, which seemed to change the manager's mind about facing me.

So she did, and pretty much reiterated what the saleslady said, even after I apologized and told her I understood that I'd have to pay for the product. I repeated that I was willing to pay for the product but would only be able to tomorrow when my allowance arrives. I also assured her that I could leave something of mine behind to guarantee that I'd be back. She asked me for my phone, and I hesitated because I was thinking of whether I'd need it for anything between now and when I get my allowance. She then asked me if there was anyone I could call to borrow from. It seems I wasn't being allowed to leave until that damn thing got paid. I told her there was noone I could bother for that sort of thing (I was already humiliated enough), and just handed my cellphone over. Madame manager told me there was no way they could be convinced that I'd return. I was pissed. I was humiliated. I was being treated like a common thief, and the manager was worried I wouldn't return for my P1,500 worth cellphone that I used to communicate with my mother for a P670 eyeshadow pot.

If this is how they treat potential customers, they have no business being in business. Nica mentioned later, that this had happened to her before at Metro Gaisano, but the attending saleslady just shrugged it off, saying they'd just use the opened product as a tester. It was like the Beauty Bar salesladies were bitter about me randomly trying on the products, being my dorky, scruffy self.

Their body language totally said, "You keep trying stuff on, are you even buying? You don't look like a customer.", and later, while the whole drama was playing out, it was almost spitefully, "Oh! Guess what! You're suddenly a customer!"

Well Ayala Beauty Bar, too bad it had to turn out this way, I would've wanted to become a recurring customer. But now, I don't even see why you deserve any when you're suspicious of anyone who browses through your stuff.