I'm 21

I'm 21-years-old starting today and until another year from now.  Big deal!

Have I made a difference?  Maybe in the past, I have, but I don't think being 20 was that great for me.  I need to start fixing messes, reconciling animosities, and working for the greater good.  I don't enjoy being just another disposable come-and-go person whose life didn't mean anything.

And why the heck am I here in Cebu?  My family misses me and I can hear my grandmother callinge me in my head.

My dad greeted me a couple of hours ago.  I responded.  This is a good sign.  After over a year, a sign.

Like the way I inspired myself two days ago, I'm going to create a trend of inspiration emanating from within me.  This way, what comes from outside will be supplementary to what's already coming out of me.  And this is not just for me alone, whoever catches the good bug is blessed.

I love life.  I've loved it for 20 years and now my 21st will be the best so far--I'll make sure of that!

Last Day of Being 20

Today is my last day as a 20-year-old.

Being 20, I've done a lot of regretful things, but I don't regret any of them.  There's no use regretting.  Crying over spilled milk won't pour it back to your glass like it was--you know, without all the dirt and what not.

For example, I tried to befriend dad but I didn't muster enough courage to actually do it, so I failed.  No, I didn't fail 'cause I didn't actually try.  Nevertheless, I don't regret it.  The right time will come and it'll go smoothly.

Again, being 20, I've done a lot of things I'm happy about.  Go figure.  I love life.  It'll get better.  It always does.

Oh my!  I'm still in Cebu.  What am I doing here?  I don't want to be here tomorrow.

The Day I Begin to Tone Down

Let's see how this goes.

I'm going to start spending less time blogging.  No more than 5 minutes per post until I decide I need to post something long.

Julianne, I'm deeply sorry about this.  I know you're a bit used to my long, inspiring posts and what not, but please allow me to do this.  This won't last all year, I promise.  I call this my word fast.  Not the speedy kind of fast; I mean fast as iin fasting.  You know the kind of fasting Christians do during lent to repent on their sins and sacrifice pleasures to thank God the father for the death of Christ Jesus?  Yep, that's the kind of fasting I'm referring to.

So, anyway... Today, did a self-examination session again.  That was my last for this series.  I centered my thoughts on the elaborate concept of "love."  I asked myself a lot of questions and got a lot of answers.  Some answers were very certain-sounding and very antagonozing of today's present circumstances that I wasn't really happy about them.  Nevertheless, they came from me--and intuitively at that.

I love.  It's a general statement.  This is the only way we're all ever going to attain peace.  We should love.  We should love selflessly even if we love ourselves, too.  Self love that involves hate is not real love, I'm sorry to say.  There is nothing negative that can be derived out of pure love.

Normal Hours?

I woke up early today and I was able to start my self-examination very early.  Well, not THAT early.  I started point-blank on the hour a normal person usually has to start a full day of sitting on his/her desk only then to resume the previous day's whines about how miserable life is for him/her.  Shallow much?

Yeah, you got that correctly.  I started at 8:00AM on the dot and finished at 5:00PM.  Of course, I had to take a couple of water breaks and pee breaks.  Actually, more than a couple.  I did not, however, take any meal during the course.  My only meals are the one I'm about to eat after finishing this entry and the one I ate before beginning.  I skipped lunch since I figured it would have caused me short breaths during the afternoon part.  I was dedicated to making this stress-solution a success--meaning no external stress involved.

I'm not going to make this very long.  The results are for me to keep and for you to discover.  If you're wondering, yes, I feel really good right now and I feel like I have a full day ahead of me.  And, no, I didn't fall asleep.

Well, since I need to get some shut-eye sooner than later, I might as well just do astral projection tonight.  No ointment here, but it's all good.

Be a Sensible Sympathizer

I did some self-examination this morning up to about 11AM.  I had lunch and went back at it at 1PM ‘till 5PM.  My theme was “unfulfilled personal aspirations and what to do about them.”  Again, I’m not going to divulge my plans to the World Wide Web.  It’s not nice to be frustrated.  I know a great deal about frustration, and let me tell you it doesn’t feel good—especially if a lot of people know about it.  In addition to the gratuitous sympathy text messages and mobile phone calls in the middle of my lunch, what else?  Yes, who can forget about the red dialog box Facebook notification I receive from time to time?

Here’s the deal:  Being a friend is good, but sensitivity is very important in that regard.  From time-to-time, one must examine himself/herself by asking:  “Am I being a good friend by doing the things I’m doing?”  Of course, logically, it’s the thought that counts, but it’s selfish to have to make the miserable party be the one to understand your behavior.  We all have our oops-I-think-I-did-something-inappropriate moments, but don’t console yourself by saying, “it’s okay, he/she will understand that I was just trying to be a good friend.”  Next time, think before doing.  This goes to people who like being sympathetic.  Try choosing the right words next time.  Also, when you do find the right words, please not on my Facebook wall.  I like inspirational things there, and if there has to be a lamentation, it should come from me, not from another person who feels sorry for me.

Robbed by the ATM Machine

Alright, it’s 11:02PM of the 20th of October and I’m in seclusion. I started yesterday since the DSL went down due to the strong typhoon that hit our country. I didn’t really want that to happen. I mean, I could have gone on with seclusion and still maintained my blog habit, but it happened so I took it as some sort of sign. I told myself, “This broadband ban for me is a good opportunity to harness my inner being in meditation.” Janette isn’t very happy with the situation, though. She isn’t particularly ecstatic about the fact that liberation from this no-internet-fiasco (as she termed it) would come no later than the first week of November, so she bought a Globe Tattoo unit for mobile internet so she could continue her stint as a virtual desk operator, but I don’t see the need to do the same. I’m comfortable being detached from the world of cyber brouhahas—just temporarily, of course... Just until I get home to Bohol.

So, today has not been a very good day for me. Payoneer Inc. and Metrobank stole $23 from my bank account and I was pissed. A day’s worth of food supplies went down the drain just because of some avoidable invalid transactions and balance inquiries. You see, here in the Philippines, if you use US Dollars as your currency, everyone will try to steal from you—including ATM machines. It isn’t uncommon for American tourists to be ripped off by desperate prostitutes in Cebu City’s prime whoring destination, Mango Avenue, but that ATM incident I got seized up in was just ridiculous. I was unaware that invalid transactions and simple balance inquiries had charges, too. I’m never going to fuck that machine with my MasterCard ever again! I don’t enjoy getting fucked up—no one does. Of course, except for drug addicts, which I’m not. And even that’s a different kind of fucked-up-ness.

Anyway, that’s enough profanity. I’m in seclusion so I should be peaceful. I got a haircut. I’m back to my schoolboy look with my semi-airborne do. I like it this way ‘cause my head looks normal. This look works for me, as my mom would say. You see, my head tends to look disproportionately huge if I wear my hair jetty. My strands are thick so my head looks thick, too.

What else did I do? Oh, yeah, I bought some cream for the allergies on my face so my mom wouldn’t freak out when she sees me. It’s not that bad; it’s just that our family has this thing about taking care of ourselves and looking good all the time. And after all that, I went to my close friend/ex-roommate Josete’s house with John for a movie marathon. John and I met up at the mall after his date with some girl, and then there we met Josete’s brother, Justin. He had to walk us to their place ‘cause they moved to a new apartment and we had no idea where it was. It was just coincidental that he was out buying DVDs. Would you call watching two movies a movie marathon? Well, no arguments there! It was a movie marathon as far as we were concerned.

Justin wanted to grab a couple of beers, but I declined. I haven’t had dinner yet even until now. The chicken stew is boiling away as I speak. I left it to work on its own flavors. That’s the great thing about stews. Even if they’re done, you can just pour in another cup of water and leave them for an hour without having to worry about the sauce drying up. It even develops a more enhanced flavor when you return. It’s about done now. I also marinated some prawns in beer and I’m going to start working on sautéing it right after this entry.

Anyway, that was basically my day. I'm not going to talk about what happened before 5PM except that I was meditating in the peaceful darkness of my room then.

Nasty-Ass Commercial

There’s nothing I want to write about.  Nothing really happened today.  I slept at 3AM and woke up at 5:30PM.  It’s a -ber month so it was already dark when I jumped out of bed.  I never got to see today’s daylight.  It doesn’t matter, though.  I’m very well rested.  I feel like a million bucks now!  I must say, it’s better to remain in bed than to walk around on a hot sunny day.  Hurts the eyes.  You’ll just be inclined to get back to the hay after 4 hours or so.

So, yeah, I’ll leave you with a video I found last night on YouTube.  It’s a banned commercial about the necessity to learn English.  It advertises a foreign language institute that has quite a way of giving itself an image.  Quite a way, I really must stress.  You’ve got to see for yourself to find out what I mean, so I’m not going to elaborate any more.