Posts Tagged ‘Musings’

The moon, a big round pale yellow, is rising from behind the coconut trees in the horizon, just above and past the neighbor’s roof as I take a break from the day’s work. In a minute, I will take a shower, second today but this time shorter and quicker as showers are the only simple pleasures I take and can get out of this unrelenting heat. The past days can basically be characterized by flitting thoughts and nagging migraines. I have resorted to permanently wearing my eyeglasses in the credence that it is caused by my 20-100 myopic astigmatic vision and have developed an addiction to paracetamol. Though it may also be due to this blinding heat, the insufficiency of caffeine in my arteries, stress from the accumulated housework load or a combination of any two or what the heck, I will just stop speculating and admit that it is due to ALL of the aforementioned reasons.

As I was washing Lia’s laundry in the garage, I distinctly heard from the neighbor’s television set that all citizens of this country must conserve water and one of the suggested ways is taking less, or shorter, showers due to the El Nino phenomenon affecting the country today. I will pretend that I am not aware of such an advisory. Two pails of bath water everyday is not such a crime after all.

What is a crime is not having your pipes fixed when it is obvious that there is more than just one or two underground leaks as evidenced by monthly water meter readings ranging from 40 to 143 cu. m. for a household of two and a half people. Yes, landlady, you are committing a crime. Will someone tell me why I have to pay no less than P1,000 every month for water I supposedly consume when we do not even use the toilet’s water closet, I reuse the washing machine water for flushing and cleaning the bathroom and I use Lia’s used bath water for cleaning the garage? Must I state month after month that the average water consumption worldwide (whether first world or third world country citizen at that) is 3 cubic meters per month? Even if I bathe all day every day there is no way I will consume 40 cubic meters of water. Why is it that the landlady refuses to have the pipes fixed or exposed? Because exposed pipes look unpretty. (I miss you TLC). Damn, some people are just unbelievably petty.

In a month or two or preferably less, we will be moving out. My only hope is the Manila Water Company will do something about the filed complaint and pressure the landlady into doing something about these leaks. Forty (lowest so far in all of the past 13 months and we were even out of the city for half of that month) cubic meters is just a lot of water to waste. Dare I even make a comment about the 143? Shame on people like this.

The past days have been nothing but housework, housework, housework and keeping up with backlogs. I believe I even have “baby fatigue”, a.k.a. fatigue from taking care of a precocious nearly-eleven month old baby day in and day out. I love my daughter but these days, I am just. simply. overly. tired.

Maybe its really not the amount of housework left undone, maybe its this relentless heat. These days every time I have to go out into the garage, I have to wear my sunglasses. Is the sun really that bright or am I living in a cave? (Flashback to when the baby was a few weeks old and we were told she had jaundice – from not being exposed to enough sunlight.)

I do appreciate the quiet early evenings, when the baby has gone to sleep and the husband has not come home from work. It is my time for myself. It is the time to appreciate the simple pleasures of sitting on a chair, sipping a glass of ice cold dalandan juice and looking up at a humongous ball of yellow that is the sun of the night. Just another day in the life of a plain housewife, each day as boring as the next, each day more exciting as the one before.

This past week has been very, physically and emotionally, exhausting for me. A lot of things happened this week. For some of the important occurrences, one could say, “I saw it coming.”

Ryan going out on a business trip is not something new. He has been going for years. What is different is now we have a baby. I used to not mind his going away. It meant I was going away too. If he was going on 20th for example, I’d book a flight somewhere for 19th and make him drive me to the airport. If he was coming back on the 29th, I’d book mine for 30th and make him pick me up at the airport. Now I can’t go anywhere because I can’t bring the baby to other places just like that, especially by myself. So I stay home.

Staying home in an apartment by yourself, to take care of your seven-month old baby all on your own, without any help from any other family member on any or both sides, and with an insensitive and inconsiderate maid who sleeps earlier and wakes up later than you do is not easy.

Friday I finally snapped my thinning patience and yelled at the maid who instantly packed her things. When it comes to maids (even if I have only had one of my own in my entire life.. the ones my parents had over at our house through all the years of course do not count) I am never one to say or ask, “No, don’t go.” In fact, so enraged was I that  I even had the urge to throw her bags out my gate. An urge quelled by other things of course.

So harassed and exhausted was I that I made a distraught call to the husband who was in the middle of a crazy “Black Friday” sale to tell him that if I had wanted to become nothing more than a housewife, I wouldn’t have taken up graduate studies. That if I had wanted to be a single mother, I would have just gone home to my parents or back to El Nido where I could have a real job and I would be surrounded by a lot of people all the time that I never have to spend a single day taking care of a baby all on my own and nary a person to practice my social and communication skills with.

A hysterical me found myself asking when is it exactly that I would be able to rest? When was the last time I could say I have had a good night’s sleep? I haven’t had a real straight sleep in seven months. I haven’t had a real ME-time in seven months. I keep saying I need to go to the spa for a good massage perhaps but I don’t ever make it. Taking care of a baby, though tremendously rewarding, is also exceptionally tiring. My back used to hurt because I breastfed all through the day and all through the night even as I slept. Now my back hurts because I have to carry around a 20-pound baby. I keep saying one day I’m gonna make it out of the city by myself and have some me-time in some beach in some island somewhere even for a day or two. Just like old times. But I never make it. I cannot be away from my daughter for long periods of time. Not because she demands it, but because I just can’t. I keep wishing I could but I just can’t.

A lot of things is going on right now and I post happy stuff in this site because after all, I want to project that I am living high and taking it easy. One would think my life does not have any privacy at all since I seem to blog all the time, but you would never know what really goes on in my life and I will not tell you either.

Today I was rewarded for all my efforts and hard work with a lot of things I have so wanted. Yes, things. I finally got a Sanuk sandals and a Bamboo tablet. I even got a Nine West sunglasses (which is going to be handy this weekend when we go to Bohol). Ryan finally got himself a point and shoot camera he has been wanting to have for months since he finds it tedious to keep lugging his heavy Nikon D80 around on business trips. That being said, the Nikon D80 is officially mine. Well, it has been mine for some time. The 50mm f.18 lens is mine. I keep thinking of selling my Olmpus E-500 since we hardly use it but I looked at it online to see how much it sells these days and it’s still at about $1000 with used selling from $400 and above. It has not lowered its price that much. I especially love the 40-150mm lens on it and I have a hard time parting with it. Maybe  I won’t.. but what is it gonna be there for?

Ryan even got me a balloon animals book and kit! A few months ago I saw an episode of MOMents where they featured a mom who made balloon decorations as a business on the side and I was sort of envious. No I did not want to put a balloon business but I wanted to be able to make balloon decorations too. We saw a kit at Shopwise once when we were shopping for book shelves but I did not really buy the kit. Ryan said when we were chatting on YM when he was there, “I got you something you at some time expressed a passing interest in,” and I wondered what that was. It seems to me I express passing interest in almost everything and anything, even the most mundane.

I am excited about making little balloon dogs and gators with Lia one of these days.

I am still tired. I am still in need of a good massage. I look at what I have now and I can’t say I’m not happy though. I have to be. These are good things. Some days we get the things we want but not the things we need. Still, is that not something to be thankful for? We know money can’t buy happiness but at least it makes up for some real hard time you have had to and will endure. I deserve these things too I guess. To mask the pain I have in my heart and soothe the pain on my back.

Nothing to look forward to in the evenings.

Suddenly the nights are too long and too quiet.

I miss the sounds of basketball TV and UFC… and History Channel.. and Discovery Channel. Already.

Nothing now but me with my noisy thoughts. There is not enough in Facebook to click at.

It’s cold out and I find myself just sighing one after the other. I am preoccupied these days. Not just with things to do but with thoughts. I am overwhelmed with thoughts. If I have been nothing but giddy the last week, this week I am definitely anything but giddy. The more serious part of this is that I am not sure I will be feeling giddy any time soon. Not this coming week most definitely.

The baby scrapbook I have zealously started on two weeks ago with an impromptu shopping spree – if not all shopping sprees are, that left me two thousand pesos poorer as I walked out of this little scrapbooking store in Sta. Lucia is sitting undisturbed on the second floor hallway, after half-finishing the first pages that documented the arrival of the baby almost seven months ago. The idea is to make at least a page for every month for the first year. Just like what my sister Jasmin did for my nephew Sean. That being said, I am [almost] seven months behind.

Speaking of the baby, sometimes I find it hard to believe she is just six months, with all the things she does and can do. I am finally beginning to accept she will be bigger than I will ever be. Literally and hopefully, figuratively. She looks so big. Sometimes I ask out loud, “Is it just me or am I not seeing enough babies to be able to tell whether mine is smaller, or bigger or just the average size for her age?”

I have also been documenting the collection of accessories I have acquired through the years. I plan on disassembling them to fashion them into new and hopefully more exciting pieces. If I fail at exciting at least I will succeed in the new part. I have started putting together a few pieces here and there a few days ago, after a valiant trip to the city of Manila. I say valiant because I had merely wanted to take my mind off things… sad ones specifically. I remember sitting in one jeepney to the next, a blank and sometimes grim expression on my face, not minding the hours. If it was possible to cry, I would have; but I do not want to indulge these tears. I need my strength. I do not want my tears to fall just yet. So far, the city of Manila is the farthest I can go to, given that I cannot be away from the baby for long periods of time. If circumstances were different, I would have been miles and miles away out of the city. The trip to the city of Manila rendered me four thousand pesos poorer, but at least richer by a few points in experience and little tidbits of rather useful information… like where Hidalgo Street is relative to the church of Quiapo. Then again, another little project sitting in one corner of the living room, waiting for me to pick up some inspiration that will drive me to picking them up from their suspended indolence. Yes, their suspended indolence, by virtue of transference.

Like I always do when bothered, or perhaps what most people do, I have been going through my Facebook games in the hopes that mindless clicking will help. No, most people do not go through Facebook games to take their mind off things; just the performance of inconsequential things for the purposes of passing time.

“Most days of the year are unremarkable. They begin, and they end, with no lasting memories made in between.” – Narrator, (500) Days of Summer

I am mostly quiet these days. While sitting at a party a few nights ago, I began to wonder whether I still deserve my name. I am more content to sit in the back, observe everyone, just smile, make polite conversations and be more of a wallflower – blending more and more in the background. I have also began to wonder whether I like this change or not. Or was I ever? I am giddiest the most when I am with my high school friends. Or maybe when I am with my theater friends, they are always just giddier than I am.

There is this sadness.. deep within me. These days I am at a loss for words. Unable to communicate or perhaps, unwilling. What is there to say? What can be said that will not be misunderstood?

Did I not tell someone a few nights ago that the past does not bother me anymore? That I do not care anymore, only to be thought of as someone who is apathetic instead of someone who has finally accepted? Is it not enough that I spent most of my twenty seven years asking why and even going through hours paying someone in an attempt to understand? Last month I have come to the realization that some things are just the way they are. A month ago may be pretty recent but that realization is deep down to the core of my heart.

“All over the world, people are losing their futures and yet there are people who are hung up over the past…”- 8th October 2009

If my tears refuse to fall, it is not because my heart is cold and unforgiving. It is because I am trying to be strong.

My parents are coming over this week. I hope they would find some time to come over to see the baby. My husband’s work requires him to fly out of the country more often than is convenient for anyone. He will be gone almost all of this week and the last weeks of this month. He will be gone for half the month and I am surely not looking forward to that. If circumstances were different, I would be occupying myself with travel plans, booking plane tickets and getting reservations to various little resorts; but right now I am preparing myself for what difficulties it will pose to the baby, she being used to having her father around, and for me who will be helping her cope with that absence. I just know it will be trying and tiring and most certainly, un-looking-forwardable.

There is this sadness at the core of my being. There is this sadness gnawing at the edges of my heart. And this is a sadness I am not familiar with. This too is a sadness I will have to bear for months to come. If you find me smiling and laughing on the moments of forgetfulness, consider it a gift to myself and not indifference. If you find me silent, indulge me in a conversation on any subject regardless of significance. If you find me in tears, love me by not asking why.

All over the world, people are losing their futures and yet there are people who are hung up over the past…

Today is a bleak day, with gray skies hanging above and just like the day that is today, I am feeling bleak with a cloud hanging above me.

Today I think about my past, my present and my future. I think about the places I have been, the people I have met, the different men that have touched my life and the various situations I found myself in in the short life that I have had.

On some days like this, I think about all the other lives in this world and realize how much, even though try as hard as we do, we really have no control over our lives.

I wrote the above paragraphs one Friday morning. It was the morning of September 25. The day before so many futures were lost just like that.

***

Some weeks back, I was really bothered about someone, someone close to my heart, who I have found to have taken me off her contacts list on Facebook and have not written back to the many messages I have sent. I kept thinking about what I have possibly done for her to, perhaps, write me off like that. Was there a time when, perhaps she sent me a text message and I have not texted back? I always reply to text messages. More so if from someone like her whom I dearly love and respect. Perhaps I had not received it? Perhaps I was out of town and did not have coverage? Did I fail her in some way? Did I make her feel like I used her? I kept thinking, “What did I do? What did I do?!” Then a common friend said to me when I told her about it, if I think I have not done anything wrong, then perhaps it is not me and that I should just let it go.

Some things you just have to let go.

There are friends you don’t get to see for years, friends you have lost communication with for years, but when you tell them you are in town or they tell you they are in town and you tell them you want to see them and get together, you suddenly find them standing in your balcony or outside your gate or you find yourselves at some cafe or bar or resto or diner somewhere close by. You start talking like the last time you saw each other was only yesterday. Those are your simply, truly, your friends.

I used to have a best friend in high school. The first true best friend I ever had. One day she wrote me a letter saying, “I’m sorry I can’t be your best friend anymore,” and I found myself thinking, “What did I do? What did I do?!” It’s been more than a decade now and when people ask me about her and what happened to our friendship, I still do not have an answer. It’s not that I have not tried to be her friend in the years that followed after she wrote me that fateful letter or tried to be her friend in even the simplest meaning of friendship but she has just let me go. Some friends just let you go like that and you have no choice but to let them go too.

There was a man in college. He was one man I believed I truly loved and when he refused to see me just like that, I found myself thinking, “What did I do? What did I do?!” He was one man that truly changed my life. He simply disappeared from my life. I went on the best way I could. A few months back, he suddenly reappeared – as the boyfriend of one of my close friends. When I learned about it, I found myself lost for a day or two. I did not know what to do. I have not seen him nor talked to him in years. Our closest friends, upon disclosure, failed to tell me things I would have liked to hear. Distraught, I came to someone who was the most unlikely person to tell my thoughts and feelings about . Someone who in the past must have at one point truly believed he loved me and that I refused to see just like that. In the most honest way, he told me what I may necessarily not have liked to hear, but something I badly needed to hear. Some people are like that, they are truly, simply, your friends.

One evening, after a night at the theatre, I found myself having dinner at some place with my husband. On the way home, he told me that the man from college was there, sitting at a table right behind me. I did not see. It could have been the first time I would have seen him in years. It was then that I realized I didn’t care.

I have not told my girl friend about this new man in her life, someone whom I believe makes her happy. I figure it’s not my place to tell her and if I did, what would I say? There is nothing to say. I have stopped caring. If in the following months, or years, they find themselves at their wedding, I will not be there, not out of spite but out of respect. Even if pasts needed and sometimes must be forgotten, it still deserves respect.

My life has not been easy. Some friends come and go. I am not perfect. I make mistakes, a lot of mistakes. But mistakes are past and like pasts, they need and sometimes must be forgotten. Just like pasts, mistakes deserve respect. I will respect my mistakes in the greatest way possible and that is to strive never to do them again.

My life will never be easy as lives never are but I try my best to be happy and be the best of who I am to people around me.

***

I try to take little walks around the village every now and then. It helps me clear my mind and make some sense of little thoughts. When I was living in El Nido, these little walks were in the form of little sit-downs on the sand in little, secluded parts of the beach. Where I live now, there is no beach, but there are some almost empty streets.

Overheard while walking down the streets:

Man to woman on the other side of the street: “Kamusta yung baha sa inyo?”
Woman: “Wala kami nung baha. Nasa Sta. Lucia kami. Pagbalik namin dito, wala nang baha. Wala na rin kaming gamit.”
Lesson: Trips to the malls must not be taken in the early morning hours.

Woman chatting to man in front of a car: “Kamusta yung kotse mo?”
Man: “Sa dalawang kotse ko, naayos na yung isa.”
Woman: “Insured ba mga sasakyan mo?”
Man: “Putsa, hindi nga covered nung insurance ko yung baha eh. Hinayang na hinayang ako, isang libo lang per year ang difference nung coverage!”
Lesson: Ang isang libo kung isang taon ang pag-uusapan ay napakaliit lang.

Overheard after I went inside the house after my little walk:

House help to hitherto screaming baby: “Nakita mo na naman ang happiness mo!”
Lesson: To some person, I am the whole world.