Sunday, July 20, 2008

Two centavos on writing, twenty nothings for twenty people

Writing is not for cowards. There is nothing cowardly about wanting to express your thoughts in a medium that places a lot of, if not the most, importance in choosing what elements (word? phrase? sentence? other?) and how to place these elements in order to bring forth the clearest-as-possible emotions and messages. And yes, even obscurity counts as a medium and as a message.

Those two centavos given, the following are the twenty nothings. For twenty different people with twenty different names and twenty different faces and twenty different minds. In order not to jostle the emotions of any potential reader, I managed to place all the not-so-good (I'm not one to judge your idea of 'bad' after all) ones first and all the not-so-bad (I'm not one to judge your idea of 'good' after all) ones last (they are in no particular order, though). As Dante once wrote somewhere, you have to pass through Hell and climb up to Heaven, not the other way around.

(Funny, though, that a tag such as this comes out just a few weeks after I did this, though in poem form.)

1. Stop living in your worlds. The real world is also a fun place to be in, if you stop leaving it and if you stop comparing it to the ones in your mind. You should know, one aspect of your major thrives on comparing things.

2. Wow, you're way more than psychic. You're probably even meta-psychic, considering your ability to talk and blackmail people about thoughts that they never thought of in the first place. On second thought, you're not psychic and certainly not meta-psychic. Just a dumbass. Shut the fuck up already, dumbass.

3. Let's face it: what you did was stupid. Let's face it: my thinking you couldn't possibly do what you did, that was also stupid, if not stupider. So let's just not talk about it. Honestly, I'm so tempted by the idea of personally coercing you into a vow of eternal silence, but I guess I trust your sober self enough not to do so. Now, what to do with your drunken self?

4. You have no right to tell me what I'm going to be in the future, be it near or distant. To tell you the truth, I wouldn't care what happens to you in the future. After all, you have no idea what I busy my life with anyway. And I prefer to keep the illusion up. Someday, though, you'll regret ever telling me anything of the sort. That's a promise.

5. I know we started this for fun and because of its truths, but you've gone too far. Face it, your credentials are unimpressive at best, you flaunting them the mark of a pompous ass at worst. So stop it. There's a huge difference between practicing something and criticizing it, especially on the receiving end. You never caught on.

6. You either don't trust us, or are hungry for more attention than can realistically be given you. That's why you're always trying to make yourself look more intriguing than what you really seem to be. But as you can see, people are already getting sick of all your faux intrigue. So either start changing, or just shut up. In the end, after all, everybody only cares for their selves.

7. We haven't seen each other in years. Heck, even back then we hardly saw each other. We've grown up and lived and loved our separate lives. Despite these said years, you still hate me when you see me. Don't worry, I also still hate you when I see you. Touche.

8. All those years, and you're still trying to one-up everybody around you? That is not what I expected of you, but I guess the fact that I expected at all was kind of stupid in itself. So I will leave you to your devices. You see to be happy enough with them anyway.

9. Come on, admit it. Nobody's going to love you less for it. You probably feel it yourself, but I'm not one to talk about what you really feel. You're the only one who can do that. I hope you know you know that, and you probably do.

10. Do I literally have to whip you into shape to convince you that you can do much better than what you're doing at the moment? I hope not. But you know that I do what I have to do. You, after all, are partly my responsibility, at least for now.

11. I want to be able to talk to you more openly, to know you better, but you seem to have this aloofness, almost as if you thought my eyes displayed an ulterior motive, or something of the sort. Trust me, malice is the last thing on my mind when I'm talking to you. Don't take him seriously either. He's just like that. I think.

12. I miss the geekiness. All of it. I wish we just never grew out of it, at least in that aspect. For the escapism of our geekiness was an otherworldy bliss that a non-geek will never be able to relate to. And this probably applies to all our other geek-friends too.

13. Ideas are just that. They don't do anything for you, unless you enjoy the romance of struggling for transcendent causes. Might as well conform with everything until you can see yourself with enough power to do something about it. At the very least, chances are that it will put you in a much better position than what you are in now.

14. So I've heard you're literally an alien back there. One of those green things with eye stalks and dripping with gunk. I guess your heart never found its way there, after all. I hope it's already in the right place, though.

15. I haven't seen you in some time. I've heard rumors, and they don't say anything good about you, but I guess that's what rumors inevitably end up as: blackmailing bad news. I just hope that you know what you're doing, whatever that means to you. You're too nice a person to get messed up the way some of us are now.

16. Time after time, your life has been undeniable and inexplicable proof that people still listen to the select few Renaissance men of this day and age. I'm happy to be doing in-your-face level insane things with you as your friend. And I hope everybody else who also does is as happy as I am.

17. You are a person who's drawn to people who have what you think you don't have (which I have), and I'm a person who's drawn to people who have what I know I don't have. And you're right: this, among other things, is probably why we've been friends until now.

18. Thanks for the books. Thanks for the time. Thanks for putting me down. Thanks for keeping me up. Thanks for listening. Thanks for talking. Thanks for everything else my memory and paranoia do not permit me to mention at the moment. You help keep me sane.

19. I don't know what it is that makes me feel like I can tell you everything. Maybe it's because of the things we have in common. Maybe it's because I feel you won't get offended by all the shit that comes from my mouth for some reason. Maybe it's because you somehow remind me of an old friend of mine who swore that she'd personally beat me up if ever I ever even considered turning gay, even though you said nothing of the sort.

20. You're really hot. You're so hot, in fact, that I don't believe you deserve to be with just anybody, just because you crave more than what every day can give you. I'm saying this because I think you deserve much more than the pile of shit that was handed to you last time. Because what happens to shit when it gets too close to something hot? It explodes.

posted by Ocnarf @ 8:02 PM   0 have spoken

An oldie, but one helluva goodie

Note: not for those who are easily offended, religion-wise. Taken from here.

Close-to-complete Ideology and Religion Shit List

  • Taoism: Shit happens.
  • Confucianism: Confucius say, "Shit happens."
  • Buddhism: If shit happens, it isn't really shit.
  • Zen Buddhism: Shit is, and is not.
  • Zen Buddhism #2: What is the sound of shit happening?
  • Hinduism: This shit has happened before.
  • Islam: If shit happens, it is the will of Allah.
  • Islam #2: If shit happens, kill the person responsible.
  • Islam #3: If shit happens, blame Israel.
  • Catholicism: If shit happens, you deserve it.
  • Protestantism: Let shit happen to someone else.
  • Presbyterian: This shit was bound to happen.
  • Episcopalian: It's not so bad if shit happens, as long as you serve the right wine with it.
  • Methodist: It's not so bad if shit happens, as long as you serve grape juice with it.
  • Congregationalist: Shit that happens to one person is just as good as shit that happens to another.
  • Unitarian: Shit that happens to one person is just as bad as shit that happens to another.
  • Lutheran: If shit happens, don't talk about it.
  • Fundamentalism: If shit happens, you will go to hell, unless you are born again. (Amen!)
  • Fundamentalism #2: If shit happens to a televangelist, it's okay.
  • Fundamentalism #3: Shit must be born again.
  • Judaism: Why does this shit always happen to us?
  • Calvinism: Shit happens because you don't work.
  • Seventh Day Adventism: No shit shall happen on Saturday.
  • Creationism: God made all shit.
  • Secular Humanism: Shit evolves.
  • Christian Science: When shit happens, don't call a doctor - pray!
  • Christian Science #2: Shit happening is all in your mind.
  • Unitarianism: Come let us reason together about this shit.
  • Quakers: Let us not fight over this shit.
  • Utopianism: This shit does not stink.
  • Darwinism: This shit was once food.
  • Capitalism: That's MY shit.
  • Communism: It's everybody's shit.
  • Feminism: Men are shit.
  • Chauvinism: We may be shit, but you can't live without us...
  • Commercialism: Let's package this shit.
  • Impressionism: From a distance, shit looks like a garden.
  • Idolism: Let's bronze this shit.
  • Existentialism: Shit doesn't happen; shit IS.
  • Existentialism #2: What is shit, anyway?
  • Stoicism: This shit is good for me.
  • Hedonism: There is nothing like a good shit happening!
  • Mormonism: God sent us this shit.
  • Mormonism #2: This shit is going to happen again.
  • Wiccan: An it harm none, let shit happen.
  • Scientology: If shit happens, see "Dianetics", p.157.
  • Jehovah's Witnesses: >Knock< >Knock< Shit happens.
  • Jehovah's Witnesses #2: May we have a moment of your time to show you some of our shit?
  • Jehovah's Witnesses #3: Shit has been prophesied and is imminent; only the righteous shall survive its happening.
  • Moonies: Only really happy shit happens.
  • Hare Krishna: Shit happens, rama rama.
  • Rastafarianism: Let's smoke this shit!
  • Zoroastrianism: Shit happens half on the time.
  • Church of SubGenius: BoB shits.
  • Practical: Deal with shit one day at a time.
  • Agnostic: Shit might have happened; then again, maybe not.
  • Agnostic #2: Did someone shit?
  • Agnostic #3: What is this shit?
  • Satanism: SNEPPAH TIHS.
  • Atheism: What shit?
  • Atheism #2: I can't believe this shit!
  • Nihilism: No shit.

posted by Ocnarf @ 1:14 PM   0 have spoken

Just a Saturday

Woke up around 5:00am, because I wanted to reach Diliman by 8am so that I could spend as much time as possible in the library. Catch a near-empty HM bus at around 5:30. Will make good time, since the morning rush hasn't arrived yet.

Papa texts that he wants to bring be to Diliman and asks what time I'll be in Cubao, so I say 7:30. Around 7:15, I ask him where he is already, he answers he's still in Antipolo, a good 45 minutes away. Wondered why he bothered to waste his load to ask me what time I'd arrive if he'd disregard it anyway. Read a few chapters of Banana Heart Summer while waiting in front of the Araneta Center parking lot.

Reach Diliman at around 9am. Papa and I get lost while looking for the CAL. Ask a lot of people for directions. Try to hide the UP seal on the UP shirt (note: not UPLB shirt) I realized I as wearing as I asked. Quietly hate myself for getting lost in Diliman every time I visit, without fail.

Finally find the CAL. Since Papa's battery is low, he asks me for a time when he can pick me up. I play it safe, so I say 12 noon, just so that I have a lot of time. Papa leaves me in front of the walkway to the CAL.

Enter the CAL and wander around for a bit, the way I always do when I visit a place for the first time. After a few more questions, a lot more wandering about and repeatedly flashing the ID I just had made last Monday (the security in the library always asked for a closer look, because they obviously aren't used to UPLB students flashing their IDs at them), I learn that the material I need is in the Graduate Studies Office, which is closed on weekends. Wander around the Faculty Center for a long while before I find out there really is no way to get what I need on a Saturday. Wander around even more before I found out that there is really nothing else to do, so I sit down and eat cheap palabok and read more Banana Heart Summer and take down notes and realize that this book is really quotable at times:

"Every story has its own taste, Every storyteller has her own taste; so does every listener. So when I speak in a particular flavor, I know my words taste differently on your tongue. While it is the ear that receives a story, the main event happens in the tongue repeating it..."

-Chapter twenty-one: The Flavoured Tale

Go back outside before it turns 12. Text my angst about libraries and the UPLB main library (which is often only useful for Biology and Agriculture students at best) to several friends. Run into Ai while waiting. Chitchat about Lola Mad's awarding speech (which I wasn't able to attend because it was a weekday) and a short debate about the culinary and etymological roots of Adobo (which she threatened to ask Michael Tan about). Feel funny talking about literature and cultural history on a graduate student level, for some reason. It's raining by the time Ai leaves.

Get rained on while waiting for Papa, so I am wet and shivering and wanting to go home when he arrives. He wants lunch in Sta. Lucia first, though, so I oblige, the two pieces of penoy I ate that morning already reduced to nothing.

On the way to the mall, two words suddenly resonate in my mind: DARK KNIGHT. I ask Papa if he has time to go watch a movie. We see if the new Yoshinoya branch in Sta. Lucia is any good (which it is, and besides, Papa loves Yoshinoya), we check for the prices of laptops and buy a new mouse before watching. Watch the movie, almost go gay over Heath Ledger's acting (note: almost, and besides the guy's dead already). Epicfailed to predict the length of the movie, which meant that we would be late for Tito Arcus' birthday dinner at Rockwell. Have a quiet angst episode when Papa and Mama are both too flustered over each other's personality quirks to coordinate on how to get everybody to Makati.

After much humming and heaving and calling and texting about, finally reach Le Souffle only thirty minutes late. Proceed to dig into talking with cousins and into a supposedly medium rare ostrich steak which was still kind of tough for what it was. Feel they are redeemed by the dessert of cheesecake, sorbet, souffles and mousse though. Fall in love with my sweet tooth for the nth time.

Everybody votes to pass by Lola Tess in the Loyola Memorial Crematorium before going home. Remember that Mama texted about Lola Tess' death some time in the week. Hate receiving news late as a consequence of staying in LB.

Arrive at Loyola Memorial. Visit relatives. Share a few tears and a few prayers. Fall asleep on the ride home.

posted by Ocnarf @ 1:06 PM   0 have spoken

Saturday, July 05, 2008

I am analytical

My personality type: the analytical thinker

Or at least this test says.

Dammit, I wish I read more of Carl Jung's work a long time ago. But Freud's "Interpretation of Dreams" kind of distracted me along the way. Now all I think of is that people just want to eat, sleep and get laid.

posted by Ocnarf @ 6:44 PM   0 have spoken