I. Blowing the bubbles
I have never found such a cluster of words to be rather negative yet charming. Hmm.

There was this phrase that J kept repeating to me months ago when I insist on some theories she claims to be wrong: assuming can be dooming. On the other hand, Ger says it’s not. Go ahead and assume, it’s good for the ego. Just don’t tell the other person the context of what you assumed, else, lipad ang ego mo sa backdoor papunta sa compost kung naging mali ka. At least, no one can claim you assumed such, while your pride silently inflates faster than your vcr’s fast forward. No room for push pins to blow your bubble.

Then there was this story about someone who thought the girl he wanted has been writing about him in her blog, it’s just that he couldn’t figure which entries were about him. It’s just that it fits, you know? he sobs in between regret. I thought it was about me, I thought we were building something together. Then I find out it was about someone else. I mean, just how many people can fit the same descriptions that best fit me?

(chuckles)

If I say I know it was me, would you also think I am pertaining to you? If I say that no, now my thoughts have somewhat become hushed, less attacking, and less passionate but with still the same redundance, would you know that it’s a reply to your queries?

Would you also wonder if this is about you, because just how many people can fit the same descriptions that best fit you?
I don’t know. I kind of thought about it that way too. But I’d rather not tell you I know that you know that it was me and that it was you. Because we’ve grown tired of picking up pins to burst each other’s bubble.
 

II. Sentiments from the Brokeback Mountain.
I yet again came across an old black box while looking for some certain notebooks in my book cabinet in my parent’s house last Sunday. I know I shouldn’t be bringing in more trash in to the unit, but I couldn’t help but hope that I could reread some paragraphs that I penned back in high school when Message in a Bottle has just hit the market as a paperback and still hasn’t garnered critical acclaim after being brought to life by Kevin Costner’s Garrett and Robin Wright Penn’s Theresa.

I fell in love with Garrett, and I fell in love with him hard. It was due to his inspiration that I trailed after the well known tradition of love letter writing, and I did so with I believe to be an exemplary craft for a public high school student. I wrote love letters for my friends for valentine’s day of 1999, where when they asked for letters containing infatuation, I wrote about arduous desire and passion. Puppy crush is so 1980’s.

Most of those notes were written on a spine-sewn notebook which I covered with a gray carton-like cover. It should have been there somwhere in my book shelf, one of those few mementos I was adamant to keep. But Sundays are always great with turning around things–I failed to find it, but found a different memento; in fact, those of which were real correspondences to a once dear co-lover of life. These were no longer inspirations out of a book, but inspirations out of life.

The black box was simply a matte silky carton for a wallet which I lost years ago on a bus (which sadly, also contained maybe two or three long letters from a heart twin). I kept that carton on purpose as I needed a no-fuss treasure box: it was sleek, it had ample space, and it stayed true to its purpose. Years now and yet it somehow remained a little crisp, although there are signs of dust around.

I opened the box slightly just to take a peek, then after much thought, slowly closed the box and placed it back. I had only a few minutes left and my dad was going to bring me back to my unit; I still haven’t found my book.

She has always been alive. I had the biggest remorse, bitterness and much regret whenever I was around her memories, but she has always been alive. I, on the other hand, was killed and deliberately shoved to where rotten memories lie 6 feet under. Somehow it’s understandable, as it has been I who pushed myself into her. When she relented, it has been a whirlwind of an affair, to be broken only by my fear of my assumptions being affirmed. Years later, I turned into what I fear my assumptions were, and she was gone.

We couldn’t have made it together, maybe. Or maybe we would have, it just wasn’t such a great idea then. We were friends. And she was the world. And those letters in the box would have overtrumped all of Garrett’s emotional stir-ups at any given time.

Anybody asks, of course I have moved on. Everybody does that. It’s just that there has always been this lingering hope of maybe, just maybe, we could be nice to each other again. Because just how many people can fit the same descriptions that best fit her?

I just only wish I knew how to quit her.
 

III. Purest form of trash.
Once, I was told I was artless. I was doing poetry then and I was told I was artless. For someone who’s rather disappointed with her lack of poetic lyricism, that was a rather harsh comment to hear. 

“You dork. It meant you’re raw. You’re still waiting to be formed.”

Pretty much means a noob, yeah, but that term kind of lingered on.

Some years after, I still can’t look at poetries without much prejudice. It may be partly because of the whole artless thingamajig, or maybe because I just never got beyond the point of take-off. Artless is as artless can get.

Sometimes, I look back and wonder where all those friendships and drive and art and passion has gone to. One time, the simple act of scoffing at someone else’s ideals has made me ashamed of who I have become over the years. To someone’s eyes, I was a clump of clay ready to be formed. Years after, I am nothing but still that lump of clay, except I have given up on my self, and lost all the passion of a youngster ready to take on the world.

When I read those cluster of words which I found to be rather negative yet charming, there was an unavoidable tinge of familiarity that has given me a flashback down the memory lane. The person being described was reminiscent of me, and I couldn’t help but compare how many changes has been added to the personality I now carry. And suddenly, I felt there has been a thousand and one differences that has separated me from the past.

Not that I don’t want change. Far from it. I’m just not sure whether it has indeed been for the better sometimes. Because just how many people can fit the same descriptions that best fit me, but right now, won’t or doesn’t?