You know you're getting old when your body doesn't work the way it used to. It doesn't take as much abuse as it has before and still function properly. I've never been hospitalized my entire life and I've never had to go see a doctor. Not until very recently.

Ok, so it started a week ago when I couldn't go to school because my back, neck and head hurt like hell from what I assumed was high blood pressure. Its the smoking probably. Or the excessive caffeine intake. Or the late nights having sex with my newfound boyfriend. Or the lack of any other form of exercise since I quit going to the gym last year after my father died. Probably a combination of all of the above.

And then I go and contract urinary tract infection. I thought maybe it was the condoms. Horror of horrors I thought my boyfriend gave me an STD. Although it was quite impossible, the thought crossed my mind. But there it was. After texting a couple of med student friends, I self-diagnosed UTI.

It burns when you pee. And you go rush to the bathroom every hour or so. Its incredibly annoying at best and painful at worst. When you're in the throes of love, you don't really think about how unhygienic it is sharing your body with another person. And a man at that. And well, you know how unfinicky men are about their bodies.

"The mouth is the dirtiest part of the human body." So said the OB-gyne I saw yesterday. Don't get me wrong, I love oral sex. But how come nobody told me it can give me an infection? :-/

I watch too much MTV. Saw them on the MTV Movie Awards. Damn...that was an electric performance of "Maps." They sound like an improved, less-boring White Stripes...plus...the chick vocalist drips hott sex....hehehheeh :D

Their lyrics don't make too much sense tho....stoned ramblings perhaps? Hehehe..no matter...its all about the music bebeh!

2 freebie mp3s at their website. Check it out!

Plea to A Boy

Stop your legs from running so fast. They’ve carried you nowhere quick. Escape is all that you want it seems. Dreaming faraway lands, fighting invisible battles, wielding swords in your books, in your computer games, in your mind. You fight. You fight useless battles over and over and over. You wage battles in your head where you constantly lose. Who are you fighting I’ve wondered. What monsters must be slain? You’re far too old to fear ghouls and goblins under your bed. Far too old to hide underneath your sheets.

Let me see your eyes. Stand tall, stand up straight. Face the world without fear. Should you fear, do not show them. Should you fear, steel yourself. Should you fear, just say “Fuck it. Fuck you.” Look at people’s eyes when you speak. You have nothing to be ashamed of. You’ve killed no one, hurt no one. You’ve no malice, no ill intentions, no meanness. A kind soul you are most times. Forgiving. Maybe too forgiving, most of all, of your faults.

Time is not finite. Hours, days, years gone by will never come back for you to reclaim. You must hurry, it will not wait. Feel the urgency in your mother’s creased forehead, in her sometimes panicked eyes. She is steel but she will not be young forever. And I? Well, I will not be your baby-sitter. I have my own demons to slay. Feel the urgency of now. Stop running away.

How does a woman teach a boy to be a man? I don’t know. Let me wear the pants then and speak to you the way he never spoke to us. In our father’s stead I implore you. You must wake up now. You’re no longer a boy.

A Woman I Love

You looked beautiful in your yellow blouse, showing off your tan lines, your curves. Your teeth seemed to glint each time you opened your mouth to laugh. It had been quite a while since I last saw you so carefree, so unconditionally happy. It was the best birthday gift you've ever given me, seeing a side of you you've kept under wraps for so long a time. I'd missed you. And I remember.

I remember you as a girl so full of spunk and balls you ignited. High school kids we were. Stupid and naive I was. I'd had my wallet stolen in a bookstore and you gamely suggested we run after the snatchers, all four of us fourteen year-olds in our blue and white uniforms. It was futile, but made me feel better. That day I decided I wanted to hang around you and be your friend. The details are hazy and I don't remember everything, but that was a landmark day in my head and I look back to it with fondness. I'd discovered something wondrous, now I know. You were beautiful then.

I remember you as a girl who cared nothing of what people say. Sashaying down corridors unmindful of what the other girls thought of you. A snob, they told me. A show-off, they told me. You simply shrugged it off and went your merry way choreographing dances, directing stage-plays and plotting pranks in your head. You were beautiful then, and worthy of admiration.

I remember you on our first day in college. Giddy we were, wide-eyed, on the threshold of higher learning. The doors of the university were open, cavernous, overwhelming. But afraid I was not, because I had you by my side. Together we dared the world to come get us. So eager to taste, smell, hear and see all that we could. We tested waters previously unknown, even forbidden. Fearless we seemed. Indestructible.

Then the months go by, and people have come around, beside and between us. We’d found life-long friends along the way. And found loves. HE came. Your first love, your first agony. He broke you, this I know now. And in pieces you were for a long time. Young and inexperienced, I couldn’t share your pain. You were hurting, but I couldn’t fix it. I didn’t know how. But as they say, time heals all wounds. You glued the pieces back together somehow, but you were never quite the same. Still beautiful you were then, so fragile yet unwavering. But the light you once had around you didn’t shine the way it used to.

Looking back I wonder now if I could’ve done something to change how the chips have fallen. Have I failed you, I wonder. Last Saturday, on my birthday, I glimpsed that light that once shone from you so brightly, inviting me to come near. Perhaps, bit by bit, it will come back. And so, I am hopeful. A decade it’s been, you’re still beautiful now. And I love you.

I Heart Manila

"Aren't you glad we're from Manila?" On a night bus from Barcelona to Madrid, a strange thing to say indeed. But I looked over to my friend and said this with a wide smile and not a little bit of smugness.

It was in the middle of the night when we woke from the commotion. The bus had stopped on the side of the road and two armed officers were on board, speaking in rapid Spanish with two young American women, roughly our age, from right across our seats. I was clueless to what was going on. I tugged my friend's sleeve asking her to translate. She shushed me and listened intently to the exchange. One American woman spoke in relatively fluent Spanish, calmly but with urgency, seemingly explaining something. Her friend looked distraught. The Spanish officer asked a few questions while casting sweeping looks over the passengers. We could've been an ad for United Colors of Benetton. A bus full of people of different creeds, tongues, smells and melanin content.

The tension inside the bus was mounting as the American's voice seemed to ring more with urgency. The whole bus was quiet, save for an occasional cough and murmur. From my six units of Spanish I surmised the two young women lost something. Some 15 minutes passed and the officers got off the bus. They spoke with the driver on the side of the road, beams from their flashlights moving to and fro.

I turned to my friend with expectant eyes. The distraught young woman apparently lost her wallet. Cash, traveler's cheques, credit cards. She had left it in her backpack on our last stopover and upon climbing back on the bus, found that it was gone. "How stupid can anyone get?" I thought. What a couple of dumb Americans. I looked reassuringly at my orange Benetton backpack with all my important belongings in it, squashed between my legs, with the straps wrapped around my ankles. My friend patted her money belt, safely tucked underneath her sweater. Nothing prepares you for "roughing it up" in a foreign land like growing up in Manila.

Innate distrust of strangers, paranoia, and "It’s a jungle out there" are lessons taught us Manileños. Sometimes these are hard lessons learned, but most times, we’ve been taught these common-sense facts from cradle to kindergarten, to grade school until we have it completely drilled in our heads that "It’s a dog-eat-dog world." Trust no one, rely on no one and always question a seemingly freely-given helping hand. There’s all sorts of scams, modus operandi and criminals (petty or hardened) out there to get your money or do you bodily harm. You know this and I know this.



You don’t leave your backpack, let alone your wallet in a bus-load full of strangers. Not for a quick cup of coffee from the vending machine not quite ten meters away, not for a minute, not for a nanosecond. But for two young women from God knows which quiet little American suburb, the thought wouldn’t occur that someone might rifle through their belongings and steal their valuables while on a stop over on a bus-trip in Spain. They probably wouldn’t think twice about handing their bag to a stranger on the side walk while tying their shoe strings (as one Spaniard did me). Growing up in this city hardens you and prepares you for the simple fact that people are not to be trusted and they will dupe you given any chance they get.

One wonders what it might be like to have grown up somewhere else. Perhaps, being less in shock when you find your wallet, with all your money and credit card in it, at the lost and found, intact. A few weeks before this bus-trip I had accidentally left my wallet in the school washroom in Paris. It was but a few minutes after when I remembered I’d forgot it in the cubicle. There was queue after me. I knew I was fucked, but I went to check anyway. No wallet. I then went to the administration office in panic and asked, but with little hope, whether anyone had given them a brown wallet left in one of the toilets. And lo and behold! Someone found what I’d lost and returned it promptly to authorities. And no, no one was hanging around waiting for her reward for having been a Good Samaritan. I think it was the snotty Swede who came after me. I hated her guts, but at least she was honest.

If I’d grown up in Stockholm, like she did, I’d know I should wait for the green man on intersections before crossing because the minute I step on the road every frickin’ motorist within a five meter radius will stop to a screeching halt for me, the mighty pedestrian. If I’d grown up in Vancouver, I’d know “beggars” on the streets strumming their guitars and drawing crowds are doing honest “work,” not a diversion for pickpockets to pilfer unsuspecting folks' wallets. If I’d grown up in Tokyo, I’d know someone offering to help me change a flat tire doesn’t expect a service charge.

That is why it always, always shocks me when I receive random acts of kindness in this city. In a span of a few days I believe I’ve set a record of sorts. My car’s radiator needs repairing and has been overheating but I hadn’t known this of course til after a few times I’ve stalled. The first time a cab driver stopped and offered me his expert diagnosis. He popped open his trunk and poured water in my radiator while at the same time mildly berating me on the importance of car up-keep. It was an ungodly soggy day. I wasn’t overly concerned for my safety since I was on a major thorough-fare and I wasn’t alone in case the driver got any funny ideas, but I was guarded nonetheless. After my car maintenance lecture and a couple of gallons of water later, the cabbie and I were both on our separate ways with only a smile and a heart-felt thanks exchanged.

The second time my engine sputtered to a halt in Philcoa on my way to UP for my first class. Two traffic policemen on motorbikes went to my rescue. Like the cabbie, I only got a lecture on being a wiser motorist but forgiven for my ignorance since I was a young woman with nary a clue on car trouble-shooting. One astutely poured water for me while the other directed traffic build-up. Two tow-trucks cruised by but Pour Water Officer told them off. Tense I was since these are policemen and in our sick-sad world of course, cannot be trusted. But apart from an occasional glance on exposed cleavage, they sent me on my way without hassle. No rewards, no nothing. Just two civil servants doing their job. Incredible? There’s more.

Last night a tall young man came up to us in Glorietta 4. “Are you watching Dawn of the Dead?” he asked. We nodded yes. “You want tickets? We can’t use these and they’re not refundable. We have to be somewhere in a few minutes.” My boyfriend took the tickets and inspected them. Yep, same date, right time, legit tix they were. He reached into his pocket to pay the young man, “You have change? I don’t have smaller bills.” Tall Young Man beamed a toothy smile and said ”OK lang sige sa inyo na,” then quickly hurried back to his waiting girlfriend. We couldn’t believe our luck. Who gives away freebies these days? Mistrustful we were all through dinner and coffee. Come screening time we were half-expecting the tickets to be declared unacceptable by the movie ushers. But we were motioned in without trouble. Yep, someone had honestly given away movie tickets.

Moments like these one marvels at little signs of goodness in people. Yup, even here in our dirty-ugly city of Manila. Moments like these one realizes there’s hope yet.

Confessions

I crave your smell, your taste, your skin. I crave hearing your voice, our talks, our meetings. I crave seeing you walk, your earrings, your jeans, your big toe. I crave touching your thighs, your shoulders and arms, your chest, your mouth, your tattoo. I crave listening to you speak in 3 different languages, the way you woo me in Ilocano. I crave your gaze, your smile, your laughter, your breath. Does that make me love you? As each day passes and each time I see you, I crave you more.

The Mango Mafia

Peacefully you sip your overpriced but yummy coffee in a quiet little corner, minding your business, absorbed in a book, or juicy gossip with a friend. She sneaks up to you, little woman that she is, lugging her huge backpack, and slips you a little tiny gift card.

You open the card with a cute bunny design and read in straight block letters:

DEAR SIR/MA'AM,

I AM A SELF-SUPPORTING COLLEGE STUDENT IN NEED OF A LITTLE HELP TO FINANCE MY STUDIES. I AM FINDING IT DIFFICULT TO MAKE ENDS MEET HERE IN MANILA AND MY FAMILY BACK HOME CANNOT PROVIDE FOR ALL MY EXPENSES. SO TO MAKE A LITTLE BIT OF MONEY, I AM SELLING MANGO PRESERVES, 3 FOR P100 AND 1 FOR P50. YOUR KINDESS IS MUCH APPRECIATED, THANK YOU.

Upon closing the little bunny card your heart is touched. What an ingenious way of earning a little bit of extra cash to go to college. What an industrious young woman, persevering despite the odds. She must really want to finish school and help her starving family in the province. So you shell out a little bit of money and buy her 7D Dried Mango Chips. And you figure out she must be from Cebu, because thats a staple brand from that city. You don't mind that she's selling it for twice its actual price, because what the heck, its for a good cause.

Smug in your good-hearted generosity, you hand her your money and congratulate the hard-working young woman for her efforts. You ask her what her course is and she quickly replies, "Theology at Trinity College." Wow, and its all for the greater glory of God Almighty. You feel a bit guilty because by accident of birth, you don't need to do what she does in order to go to school. With a nod of thanks and a hesistant, shy smile, she goes on to the next table. On to the next set of unsuspecting victims.

You see, this happened to me thrice in a span of a week. Twice in an uppity cafe and once in a gas station. Little innocuous women, young and fresh-looking, wide-eyed innocent. Just trying to make ends meet. Strange that its the same little card, same block letters, same 7D dried mangoes, same bunny design, same sob story. And to think, I felt so good doing a little bit of charity.

I've lost track of the days. I don't know what the date is today. The days seem to melt into one another. Sunrises, sunsets, all melding into a confused fray of colors, tones, moods. Light or dark, dusk or dawn, don't seem to matter when time stands still. And for the last two weeks, the seconds tick aimlessly meandering where they may.

I've lost track of the days. And I worry not. Moments when the focal point of everything revolves around one thought, one song, one feel, come so rarely, come once in every while. Cherish them when they come I say. Hold on to the seconds fleeting, scrambling where they may, heedless of plans, of caution, of inhibition. Hold on to the seconds for as long as
they permit to be held. I say, fuck tomorrow. So incredibly alive we are, only in the now.

This is an edited excerpt of a paper I wrote on Democratization. In the spirit of futile, useless elections, read on.

WHAT DEMOCRACY IS NOT IN THE PHILIPPINES
Democracy, the kind that is peddled today, was a unique phenomenon that underpinned the political and economic evolution of only a handful of nation-states (Britain, Former British settler colonies; US, Canada, Australia to name a few). While Democracy as a political system has developed organically in Western Europe through a long a period of social conflict, class struggle and compromises, it has not in the Philippines.

Notions of Democracy, the “rule of, for and by the people,” as are conceptions of “state” and “government,” as defined in the Western sense, are entirely alien to the Philippine experience up until the arrival of colonizing Europeans. Indeed, the four century-long colonial experience may be said to have been completely antithetical to this idea of majority rule. It is implicit in the imposition of external administrative control and “civilizing missions” that the “people,” here indios, are not the ones meant to be in charge.

Furthermore, the kind of colonial rule placed in the colonies engendered a highly centralized way of administering colonial endeavors which then translated into the “absolutist” and “arbitrary” post-colonial state.

Just before independence, transfer of control and power to indigenous actors was made hastily. What followed was the wholesale copying of the colonizers’ political systems onto the former colonies. From the organizational structure to the political processes and even the constitution, these were faithfully made in the image of the former metropolitan power. More importantly, the underlying principle of liberal democracy, the product of Western European and American histories, was supposed to have been imbibed and internalized by the newly-independent peoples and governments. Filipinos were then expected to occupy roles and perform functions they had no previous experience in. And they were supposed to do these functions within the institution that is the State.

THE “STATE” OF THE PHILIPPINES
A State, according to orthodox political science, is one with; a.) a territory, b.) a population, c.) a government and d.) sovereignty. This construct, and its definition, is uniquely reflective and the product of Western historical experiences. On all fronts the Philippine state is already problematic. The territory has been arbitrarily drawn cutting across natural ethnic (cultural-religious), political and economic groupings, which explains the ethnic conflicts still present to date. Many “supposed” Filipinos in many regions in this country would not usually call themselves Filipinos.

Most contentious of all is the question of sovereignty. If we go by its orthodox definition; the complete and autonomous exercise of authority within the given territory, then the Philippine state is evidently not sovereign.

Here it might be instructive to use instead Jackson and Rosberg’s (1986) definition. In the Philippines, what is practiced is “juridical statehood” as opposed to “empirical statehood.” The Philippine state exists in writing, in law, in official international parlance and imagination. The authors maintain that they exist precisely because of their international legitimacy. This is what they call “negative sovereignty,” the avowed principle of non-interference among equally sovereign states. As opposed to “positive sovereignty,” which is the capacity for self-government or the legitimacy coming from the inhabitants within.

Magnanimous in their creation project, former colonial powers were confident that they have done their part in the civilizing mission. They have done their best in imparting their superior values and institutions that would surely lead the way to modernity and development. The future was then in the hands of Filipinos themselves. Or so we have been led to believe.

It probably came as a surprise then, when immediately after multi-party democratic elections were held, many states throughout the world fell into authoritarian regimes (i.e. Ferdinand Marcos and Martial Law).

It is curious how the preference for liberal democracy as an uncomplicated “good” is often implicit in the discourse of authors as opposed to “bad” authoritarianism. Democracy, throughout the decades, has acquired a sacred status of sorts. Almost like a cross being brandished to ward off “evil.” Comparable to the search for the Holy Grail, countries throughout the world have come to perceive it as an uncomplicated good, a universally valued “state of being” much like World Peace and Prosperity. Democracy is also being made into an all-purpose cure for the “fundamentalist” ailment in the Middle East.

How this has come to pass is largely through the work of dominant forces in the world today. It is in their interest that the kind of democracy we speak of is one that has been defined by them. The discourse on democracy at present is one that is hardly contested. Although debate and dissident opinions may be alive and well in the academia and non-governmental sectors, the de facto Democracy being fashioned in much of the world today is reflective of the will of international financial institutions (IFI’s; IMF-World Bank) and donor countries, the powers that be.

In directly observable ways, and less bloody but just as appalling as the example mentioned above, economic liberalization enforced in this country directly contradicts the very essence of what Democracy is supposed to be; the rule of, for and by the people. How so? Economic policies are formulated by IFIs without so much as the scrutiny or consent of the populace. Assuming that the populace would make heads or tails of the highly technical language used in these policies. What the IMF says goes. No debate, no question. Read the business section of your newspapers. They make "recommendations" every week or so. What is worse, the ideology behind these policies have already been cemented in neoliberal dogma, they are presented as absolute truths. And besides, there is no alternative. Present conditions are such that would not allow for alternatives to be conceived of as possible.

The Herculean task of resolving these contradictory processes is foisted on the Philippine State, which, as we have shown here, is itself problematic. Unfortunately, the powers that be are either blind to this fundamental problem, choose not to recognize it, or are too smug in their own proclamations of what Democracy and Economic Development look like.

Multi-party elections have been held in this country and yet has there really been change in leadership? Has there really been any change? It is a myth peddled by the United States, that democracy; meaning elections, is the cure for everything.

Democracy, made in the image of Western Democracies, seems virtually impossible to replicate in an entirely different historical entity. Nonetheless, the hegemony of Capitalist-Democratic States compels that this be done regardless of all the contradictions in order for the status quo (capitalism) to continue working.

Of Deaths and Wakes

In Six Feet Under, that incredibly well-made show on cable, grief, loss and closure are regular staples. Story arcs are made revolving around the themes of not only death but also life. There are usually incredibly tense moments of bereavement, anger, frustration. The writers know their stuff, these scenes definitely make for good drama.

What the show usually doesn't portray are the looong and draaagging moments in between hot spurts of emotions on the boil. Yes, when someone in the family dies there are unresolved family squabbles come to fore, there are long-kept secrets revealed, there are potentially destructive, litigious money matters. All these make for good drama, and yes, confrontations, dramatic do-or-die lupasay scenes do happen in real life. But they are few and far between.

Let me tell what it's like when somebody in your family dies. I've become somewhat well-versed in these unfortunate occasions, losing my father and maternal grandmother in less than a year. In films, when monumental things happen, background music stops and you see the actors move in vacuum-like settings. No sound. In real life, when you learn of family's death, everything becomes eerily silent. Its as though a plug has been inserted in your ears and all ambient noise is muted. You walk around like a zombie for a while, your mind groggily trying to comprehend what has been said over the phone, or you rub your eyes looking twice, three times on your mobile reading and re-reading the text message delivering the bad news.

Then you start to cry. Tentative burst of tears. Depending on where you are, you usually want to go to the hospital and see the body. So this moment of grief is brief. A sense of urgency takes over and you rush over to the scene of the accident or hospital.

When one is my age, 23, young but not too young or too old, one is expected to be strong and brave for younger
and older folks. One cannot cry too much or too long. One must get her act together relatively quick to attend to the mundane details. At this moment, your mind is forced to become crystal clear. Settle hospital bills, sign death certificate, call the Six Feet Under people (your funeral service), choose the casket, choose the place for the wake, attend to police matters (should your father drive himself and his wife into a building driving his expensive car), cancel credit cards (should MMDA folks steal your parents' belongings while they lay helpless broken and bleeding), find certificates for your burial lot, notify the cemetery of the burial, buy flowers and of course, who can forget... the wake.

You see, wakes are a funny thing. It is only probably in this country where one may expect people to come visit your dead any time of day. So like a convenience store, you're open almost 24 hours, ready to cater to all and sundry who happen to come in through the door.

Then, it is also probably only here, that mourners are fed. Acquaintances stay for 20-30 minutes, friends, an hour max, and relatives usually stay longer. These people are offered refreshments and some snacks. You talk to them, and tell the story of how your loved one expired over and over and over again. Details may be added or subtracted depending on the sensibilities of the mourner. Immediate family of course cannot leave the wake. So we cook, eat, drink and sleep within the premises, occasionally leaving to go home to shower and do the groceries. And the cycle repeats again and again for however long your family decides to hold the viewing.

Wakes make ripe occasions for intrigue, scandal and high drama. Where there is a maximum number of mourners, usually around 6:00-10:00 pm, there is this electric atmosphere, highly charged, ready to explode should somebody do or say something to ignite it. Rarely though, does this explosion occur, usually out of respect for the departed. Or fear of being haunted. Or both.

So wakes are a noisy business. It is perhaps Filipino tradition to make it so. Like a fiesta, people eat, drink, chit-chat and play. It is a whirlwind of activities and never-ending chores and tasks, all of which must be accomplished within an incredibly short amount of time. What makes it doubly tricky is lack of sleep. Everything is more difficult when one has only had a few hours of shut-eye and long hours of moving about like a tornado.

After the dead has been buried, after the hustle and bustle of the wake, comes the quiet once more. Spent, one goes home to a house with one more less body and contemplates the events of the past few days, the present and the future. It is only at this time where one truly starts to grieve. Where the finality of death truly sinks in. Where one, sobbing and heaving in tears, finally realizes that the loved one is truly gone. That is a door firmly shut, never to be opened again, at least not in this lifetime.

In Six Feet Under, they usually end the show on a high note, because although the dead will never come back,
life must go on. So one must patch up that gaping hole in one's life pretty quick. Because lingering in pain is useless and denial is stupid.

Une petite histoire de compréhension

J’ai grandi dans une école où des filles embrassaient des filles. Si ce n’était pas permis, c’était certainement commun. On ne parlait pas d’anomalie. On ne parlait pas de perversité. On l’appelait l’amitié ou une attraction inexplicable, quelque fois l’amour. Il n’était jamais l’homosexualité. Dans notre petit monde, le mot n’existait pas. C’était une idée abstraite, loin de notre conscience, loin de nous, loin de moi. J’étais jeune et je ne comprenais pas.

Le Noël avec ma famille. Pourquoi chuchotent-ils ? Ah. C’est Charlotte. Elle a amené sa petite amie. Des bouches couvertes et Des visages écœurés se cachaient prudemment. J’avais honte pour ma cousine, mais je ne savais pas pourquoi. J’étais jeune et je ne comprenais pas.

À partir de ce jour-là j’ai observé et j’ai appris. J’ai commencé à voir les petits gestes comme tabou. A l’école. Pourquoi elle m’a regarde comme ça ? Pourquoi veut-elle se lier d’amitié avec moi ? Mes méfiances, ma peur, mon incompréhension.
Ces images jouent dans mon esprit. Des petites vignettes, des petites histoires. Des petits événements qui ont petit à petit formé mes pensées au sujet d’homosexualité. C’est vrai. On est socialisé et instruit d’avoir peur des choses qui sont différentes, qui ne sont pas compréhensibles. Le préjugé, la crainte et l’intolérance sont crées et propagés par la société. Ce que je vois, c’est qu’on s’enchaÎne. Nous faisons notre prison où nous mettons nos idées en cage. Est-ce que c’est l’esprit humain ?

L’homosexualité est un choix. C’est une décision qui est faite par une personne sensée. On doit respecter ces choix. Ce n’est pas la possession par les mauvais démons et ce n’est pas une maladie. C’est une question de préférence sexuelle. La liberté de choisir, c’est ce qui nous sépare des bêtes.

Mais mes petites réflexions sont loin de l’actualité. Aujourd’hui, le monde choisit de fermer ses oreilles au fait indéniable : on aime avec l’esprit et l’esprit ne choisit pas toujours le corps « correct». Quand va-t-on se rendre compte que c’est inutile de résister le changement? C’est notre nature de nous libérer. Des chaînes, de l’emprisonnement que nos avons façonné nous-mêmes. Je suis jeune et maintenant, je comprends.

Ma cousine, Charlotte, est mariée. Avec un homme. Elle a deux fils mignons, ils s’appellent Jay et Brian. Elle habite dans une maison blanche avec une palissade blanche. La vie parfaite ? Elle a enterré sa petite amie. Dans l’oubli. Je pense qu’elle s’appelle Joey ou un nom mignon comme ça. Je ne me rappelle pas. Je me demande si ma cousine se souvient d’elle. Je me demande si elle se rappelle beaucoup de choses et si elle les regrette. Mais quand je la vois, elle a toujours un sourire. Mais le contentement ne semble pas toucher ses yeux.

we have different poisons of choice you and i. we choose different means to kill ourselves. some slowly, some fast. but all of us have a deathwish of some sort. some choose to wash down self-loathing with alcohol. they bathe in it to wash their sins. some light cigarettes to forget. some pop pills to cure imaginary ills.

at times the yearning for oblivion is so strong. being close to the precipice tempts us to finally let go but killing oneself is difficult. and so we kill ourselves tortuously slow.