Emotional Unloading

03 February 2013

Because no one would hear me out, I will write on. The ground floor guard said I was blooming, even at night time. Am I not supposed to be happy? I rarely receive compliments, much more from males. He must’ve told me that out of respect or for the sake of small talk or because he was simply friendly and kind, shouldn’t that cheer me up?

My emotions validate the fallibility of my logic. I feel bad. I don’t know how I was going to tell Sam she didn’t pass the UPCAT exams. She is having a great time; she just called, telling me she was happy because all her grades for the third grading period increased. She was developing her self-esteem, seeing how her efforts were paying off and I am not selfish to deny her credit that was due. She’s just starting to see her value and how if she worked for what she wanted that would bring her somewhere closer to what she desired. I cannot break her heart. I don’t want to be the one to tell her. Her resilience when it comes to failure is questionable. She’s just starting to find importance in herself by what she can do and what she can create. She even said she would really take it hard if she didn’t pass.

 Luneta wasn’t enough to cheer me up nor my trying to distract myself with what I see. How the wriggling shrimps in the restaurant aquarium were actually swimming, how the people by the sidewalk had expectant faces, how the moon and her cohorts were seeing I was miserable through their veil of orange clouds, how the mall cleaner affected the aura of an executive, how dark Orosa was at past six, how the dude at the front end of the entrance line waxed his hair artfully I was amazed and thought him cool – all that didn’t matter. I was not able to savor the present.

I no longer know what I should be doing. I was wishing for a time I was Wesley So, and I was great when it came to mind games.  Or that I was House and I didn’t mind how I acted because I have faithful people who would always stand by me no matter how shitty I got. I wanted to dream that my dad is a haciendero, and I was his heir and that we would ride to the borders of our land in horseback at times, galloping through the dust or creating a trail of dirt road dust with our four by four or race through mud puddles in our big motor bikes. Sam and I will both be gray with dust and we would be writing off on each other’s faces, wiping through that layer with our forefingers to form words. As far as the East was from the West, so would the borders of our land be. Shiela would be under the shade of a leafy tree and soon we would be taking turns swinging on the makeshift swing she was on. We will make beds out of boughs, sleeping as if birds without nests. We would laugh as we harvest pineapples or throw rocks at ripe cocoa pods. The three of us would be running and rolling on grass to rid ourselves of large red ants, the sentinels and verifiers of the sweetness foretold by the redness of rambutan growing in clusters. In our mischief, we would mix up seedlings in the flower beds, making sure the profusion when it blossoms no longer has order. We would practice walking through narrow sugarcane hedges, balancing through those hardened mounds of clay. We would pretend we were Edward Scissorhands, cutting shapes out of bushes. We would frolic better than waves do as they come back to the shore over and over again throughout our fields and our parents would hand us cups of hot chocolate and malagkit cooked in coconut milk, paired with succulent yellow mangoes. My dad would be there watching as the three of us fly each one’s kite and how the breeze was also a tolerant father indulging those whims to rise up but remain attached to the ground. Together, we would watch the sun set and see on each other’s faces the hue of a setting sun that promises another day of joy when it comes back tomorrow. Its pinks mix in with orange, yellow and red. We will saunter and look at it until it becomes a dreamy blue, reverence and gratefulness pouring from our hearts.