Twenty-six

Thought I woke up on the wrong side of the bed today when I realized am already 26....and not yet married! Haha. Mah men, 26 and still a bachelor?

Really, who said I can't marry at 30 or even beyond that--when the time is right, when I'm ready to take full responsibility, when I am matured and sane enough to take love on its highest level? Was it so bad staying single and wait on love to take it's own course and find you instead of pursuing it at the cost of being lost? I say no. And I say wait.

At twenty-six, waiting can lose its appeal, and patience becomes an absurd virtue. At twenty-six, the thought of spending your life alone is a horrible dream that haunts you. At twenty-six--when almost all your friends and batch-mates are marrying young and are already settled--being single is almost impossible to take in. Haha. Paranoid ba?

On the other hand, being single at twenty-six is an opportunity. At twenty-six, the season of waiting no matter how long is a chance to have a positive outlook on love and of life in general. At twenty-six, the patience to learn so many things slowly but surely is a wonderful and irreplaceable journey. And it is always possible to take it all in when one learns how to appreciate the value of life and love...that this two are not exclusive of each other but a harmony, a unity, a single substance that holds existence in place.

It took me 26 years of knowing, losing, finding, and losing again to know this wonderful truth. I may have forced some few things in my life, and I may have been hard-hearted, but I'd like to keep breaking my heart until it opens.

And until then, I know love will work it's own way. And when I find it, it will be in the right time. It will be for the right reason. It will be with the right person. Medyo maarte, haha.

Oh yes, I'm twenty-six; and I'm lovin it! :)

(I posted this as a Facebook status on my 26th birthday last January 27. And in intentionally forgetting the reality of my age, I forgot to post it here, too :)

4G: Stardance

(This piece of poetry is dedicated to my once-stargazing buddy, who have taught me to contemplate the grand mysteries hidden behind the stars. Wherever you are, I remember :)

it's the moon that hangs tonight under a canopy
of dark clouds hovering in the sky
stars sparkling in the great distance
millions of miles away
while we're here sitting side by side like star-crossed lovers
bound to dominate the night time panorama


but it's the sparkle in your beaming eyes that illuminates
the dark shadows of existence
and if the moon has light because of the sun
then I have you as source of enlightened reason


we're here in this cosmic drama called life and reality
our paths have crossed like the moon eclipsing the sun
was it randomly or was it destiny?
but tonight we're one celebrating life's greatest mystery


the night will end, the stars will lose their sparkle in the glaring reality
the clouds will be swept away by the wind to clear the sky and paint a new scene
as I took your hands and lead them into my chest
to hear my heartbeat, a melody that's playing for you
you hold my hands and we're carried by the rhythm of endless joy

tonight it was You and Me and we're one with the skyline
come hold my hands and step with me to conquer the universe
tonight when the moon and the stars are grand
I hold you near to my heart as we dance with the stars.

Confession No. 2: Terminating the Procrastinator

I am a chronic procrastinator.

I always feel like I've been gifted with the ability to let things accumulate and neglect the most urgent and most necessary. When, at the end of the day, I find myself trying to make sense of what had just happened, I naturally deny that the blame is on me (of course). So it has become now a habit that I blame every little thing around me: my cup of coffee for not being strong enough to keep me awake, the radio station for all the great and wonderful songs it is NOT playing, the weather for not keeping up with me, etc. (I hate it when I use the term 'etc' because I don't know how put the next words).

I learned that there's a price you pay for ignoring things. There's always a relative consequence for anything you've taken for granted, say a chore you missed doing, a paperwork left untouched, a motorcycle you forgot to refuel, or whatever. You may be able to make one last attempt to rescue the situation and sure you might succeed, but the fact is that the time you wasted doing otherwise can never be taken back. Especially if you don't have the luxury of time, which is also true. And when time is all you have, you might as well spend it in the most maximal, in the most appropriate, in the most remarkable, and in the most passionate ways. Yeah I know, easier said than done.

So what else do I tend to procrastinate and ignore? Right words in the right place, right motives, right actions, encouraging thoughts, good conversations, true friendships, real love and feelings? I dunno. Perhaps.

But then, I sure don't want to regret all the right things in this world just because I've taken them for granted, or because I failed to settle in my life what is most necessary. I don't want to look back to my life and say at the end of the day, "ay sayang! I should've done that!".

Confession No. 1: Rainsanity

I love the rain.

I don't know why but there's that strange and irrepressible feeling deep inside every time the sky gets dark and the clouds burst with water. It makes the world a little less dangerous for someone perpetually inflicted with chronic sentimentality like me.

I always like to consider rain as my element. It is during this time that I get to infuse sanity in a world gone mad and so confusing you need a break from the 'routinary'. I'm at my prime (or becomes incurably cheesy) every time I hear the rain battering the roof or the ground, or step outside and open my mouth for a few drops as I relish the cold enveloping the atmosphere.

As the rain conquers everything around and suspends the normal, I get to stuck myself with the realization that there is something more real to this ephemeral existence. That the world as we know it is not really "it". That you can not come to terms with your life until you close your eyes and quiet the confusion around you and within you. Ah, to make sense of the world!

And yeah, who knows, that as the rain fills and cements the cracks in the dry ground, it would also fill the human heart with hope and heal its brokenness. Do you get that? Or is that too cheesy? LOL.

When Pain is Beautiful

I was in UP Diliman the other day when I saw this thought-provoking, gut-wrenching graffiti on a wall at the side of the CSSP building. I really thought it was meant for me at that moment, otherwise, I wouldn't care.

And though I like to think that it wasn't really so much of a question but a piercing statement, this begs for an answer. Can someone please explain this to me?

Melancholy strikes again!