Wedding your friends

18 February 2022

This is strange for me. I've spent a lot of time with my dad more than my mom. And I thought there would be a lot of love lost. It makes my heart ache how much effort he took to reach out. He looked so tired, bloodshot eyes, drooped shoulders, slowed breathing. He looks drained. I feel like I'm not justified to say I'm tired. Tiredness is not written on my father. He is tiredness and he still keeps on tugging at the rope and creating knots. Must come from getting your livelihood as a mariner. It seems he does it and perseveres merely by muscle memory. I want to weep. I want to do right by him. This man gave up his life to sustain me. My mom too. And selfish me insists I am deprived. I want to give my life away in pursuit of the happiness and comfort of other people.

5:51pm Riceland II hotel
After my 1st INC wedding.

The groom danced with his mom, evoking thoughts that the mother is saying goodbye to having his son as he will be the head of his new family.

It is quite easy to see how this rite of passage event pronounces strongly that Ate Aprille embarks a new stage in her life. It feels heavy. Like an armor. Having your own family.

This is so pretty. This wedding. It is my favorite so far. They've worked so hard for this. It reminds me that Ate Aprille now has a new title: wife. And that all the splendor we experience now is a product people worked for.

7:02pm, same venue post-prandial blood glucose relatively well-nourished

Seeing your friend who you've remained in contact with since after HS graduation gain the title of wife is a new experience. It made me realize what stage I could be ready for.

Yesterday was my 1st time inside an Iglesia ni Cristo church. I was staring intently at the interiors. They have 2 high chandeliers and the facade continues to the inside, with a formal arrangement like a courtroom and wooden benches with spaced slats as pews. And today, after the ceremony was completed as forecasted complete with signing the copies of the marriage contract within 30minutes, I would say INC ceremonies strike me as a no-fuss business-like approach to prayer. I am awed by the part where the community, exemplified by the church people as one with the "prime minister" all rise in prayer for guidance and well-wishes for the couple in unified petition.

I feel stuffy in my secondary sponsor clothes. But I am having fun. Seeing how other people's hard work come together, particularly the people hired for this wedding, is a wake-up call. From the kapilya floor manager, the video and photo team, the makeup artists and hair stylists, the tailor, the MC, coordinators, the Zoom team, the drivers, the recep servers. How could we take this for granted, the love and kindness of other people?

This event is not mine. It is foremost Yton and Aprille's. Their wedding. They are exemplary for portraying what a couple should be in real life.

Time surplus

16 February 2022

It's still a vision. An unbroken expanse of sunny blue sky. It strikes differently in a cool car than when I'm catching my breath because my legs have to power pedals.

3:20 pm, SLEX
Maybe it's because of our nomadic tendencies, traveling most of the time for sustenance. Seeing this much sky lulls me into embracing latent awe. Awe for what I could have no control over, but could admire while it keeps me safe.

3:47 pm, beyond Sto. Tomas exit
Something about travelling familiar roads to the tune of songs majority of the public has heard (Adele) seems to reiterate the pathways where my blood flows. It reminds me of who I am——me that's always been there.

3:55 pm exit leading to a SuySing store, Batangas
The view reminds me that the world is vast. Brimming with possibilities. The world is my oyster mentality alights. But I have fellow humans to live the other possibilities in my place.

6:24 pm Starlite Ferries booth queue, Batangas port
I was pissed off. I felt I was being mooched off and tricked. I had to pay 100 for tricycle fees. Accrued expenses for travel are lousy. I can't help but think how much more I can save if I found an alternate route.
I talked myself into enjoying that ride. I won't get to feel the roads as closely as I did if I were on a bus. And the waning afternoon sky was pretty above a bit of the sea surrounded by dark green islands. I like it. Maybe it looked prettier cause I paid for it. How lucky I am that I am not charged for everything I glean beauty from.

8:39 pm Starlite Pacific, tired of seeing the same side of Batangas for 2 hours
The sea breeze sends me chills. It looks like we're not moving at all. But we are. Maybe that's how my progress looks like. I keep bemoaning being in the same place because I still get to see the same markers.

Moonlight on the ocean looks lovely because it sends light reflections back to me from the curve of each individual wave. We're turning to the portside a bit. The winds buffeting my hair cessates, lessening no matter how little. This I totally appreciate.

8:51 pm at a sea somewhere, the faintest lights of Batangas City are almost invisible
Blue Period still affects me strongly.
Valentines Day: Before 6am, I am already in a queue for the commute back to Alabang. The sky is blue that barely makes itself known through the black. And that wall on my far left of the adjacent buiding to the complex looks very imposing in its shadows. I know the building stands straight, a typical man-made wall that's flat and as basic as can be with an even but non-glazed smooth finish. It barely has windows. Whatever windows there are, their tinyness is amplified by the darkness from within. But at that time, the right wall that faces me is quite imposing. More so than the protrusion of landmass I look at now which roughly could support 1000 people and I am being stingy at that. The island before me did not appeal intimidating. That wall that morning was. It filled my field of vision, with barely one inch border on each side to frame the structure. It occupied 80% of my view.
As I came nearer to the pay point, it distorts and appears curved, not as exaggerated as a fisheye lens does but it curves. It is not only imposing then, but sinister too. As if its eyes, if it had any, peers at me atop its nose in condescension; a revolted sneer on its lips. I did not take a picture. I cannot make one either. I wish I could. It denies me. Its denial of me makes me realize I am more real than it is, that I am alive. Its curved reality directs my attention to assert that I am more real than it is.

9:29 pm, still at sea after a phonecall from my mother where I said we haven't passed Verde Island when looking back I thought we just did.
The vessel I am in encountered lots of small fishing boats. First was green and blinking. A string of orange. A flash of red. An assortment of colored blinks from a single bulb. Mom said they would have a poor catch; the moon is bright and out. When all I thought is that the moon is out-it'd recharge my gem bracelet which Sam touched. It's hard to be a fisherman.
And I am claiming again that we are just now traversing parallel to Verde Island. I see both ends of this shadowed mass. The other which I assumed it was stretches to the point where  I fail to detect the end that points to more land.

Luck

14 February 2022

It came to me last Thursday as I was slaving my legs to pedal me to work that all the crickets are gone because of human intervention. They must have sprayed an insecticide. It saddens me that the sweet trill of birds I cannot name are no longer accompanied by the male cricket's mating call. They must be unaware that crickets are thought to bring good luck.

And I read today that it was devastating for one's luck to kill a cricket —— definitely a crisis to commit cricket genocide. As I was looking at more luck symbols related to my further reading of the Tumi ceremonial knife borne of my Inca empire preoccupation, I saw that the blue bird in Kayangan was a swallow. It was supposed to be lucky.

We ascribe them to animals or their body parts/implements (the horseshoe, rabbit's paw, monkey's hand, elephant, pig) natural or manufactured (dala horses, three-legged/golden toads, three-legged pigs, waving cats) or designated mythical (komainu, fu dogs, pi yao, pi xiu, kiritmukha).

All those symbols of luck. We ascribe objects with meaning to remind us and make us believe things would go our way. Felix felicis.