OF THE SHINING STARS

As the days passed by, the older I get, all the while as I see dreams coming true... the more I am convinced that I was not born to spend my life contained in what others call "normal."

I was born to go places-- to see the world. I was born to dance under the light of a thousand stars. I was born to take bath in rivers, in falls and under the rain. I was born to know people. People who live their lives completely different from mine and from what I knew of how life can be live. People who see things. People close to nature, those that can hear the earth whisper. People who really lives. I was born to climb mountains and shout at the clouds. I was born to take part, not in politics, not in the society, not in my profession, but of the universe. I have always believe I am a child of the stars.

At the same time, I am getting more convinced that I was born to spend my life in solitude. Solitude lets me hear myself. Solitude allows me to write.

Dreams are scary and cruel, aren't they? And yes, they are always worth fighting for.

MAD WORLD

Because of the tragedies that's happening everywhere this past few months, someone had asked me if I do believe in justice.

Justice. According to Miriam-Webster Dictionary installed in my android, justice is the process of using laws to fairly judge and punish crimes and criminals. Fairly. Fair. Treating people in a way that does not favor some over others. I like to think justice is similar to the phrase getting what we deserve.

I can answer him without second thought. No. I don't.

I like to think myself as an observer. I see things, more than what is visible. I hear things. I notice them. I watch and analyze people, and for me, justice is an illusion created by humans to cope with all the cruelty we experience. For all I care,there are only two kinds of people in this world: those who gets what they don't deserve and those who don't get what they deserve. The powerful and wealthy are the ones who create laws that favors them. There are those who never gets punish for all the crimes they committed and there are those who suffer for the sins they never made. There's no justice. Not at least in this world.

I don't believe in equality. We don't always get the same things as others did. I don't believe in peace. There is no peace in this world. Not in this lifetime. As long as there is love, there will be hate. As long as we continue to hurt each other there will be war and injustice. As long as classifications exist, we would never achieve true peace. Muslims and Christians. Idealist and realist. The wealthy and the savages. The deprived and those who cannot ask for more.

This is a cruel world we live in. But don't you think it's funny? That the world is still a beautiful place despite everything?

QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS

I remember this one girl who asked Pope Francis, during his visit and mass in Luneta, a very thought provoking question: Why do bad things happen to little children like her? I remember her pushing back tears and trying her best to untie that tight knot in her throat. I remember how she embraced the highest official of the catholic church, as if doing so will answer all her questions. I can almost hear her asked with all earnest the follow-up questions: Why does God allow worst things to happen to them? Why do some of them get rape, abuse and murdered? They're children. They're defenseless. They do nothing wrong. They are only victims of society. Why? Why? Why?

And I remember myself asking the same question when my sister died.

She was adorable. She was kind. She can't even hurt an insect (except kill a flying cockroach). There's a lot of things she hadn't witness yet. There are a lot of great things for her ahead. She's yet to experience first love, first dance and first heartache. She's supposed to graduate, to go to college, to spend many nights making researches.

And I can't help but feel guilty.

Since she was born, I tried my best to protect her from all kinds of pain as I can and I came to hate many things. I hated myself for not noticing the symptoms even if I'm in my second year studying nursing. I hated myself for watching her suffer for almost two weeks. I hated myself when the nurses brought her lifeless body for us to see---the fact that I didn't dare whispered goodbye twenty minutes after she died. She could have heard me if I did. I hated myself for still breathing months after the funeral. It should have been me. It should have been me who died because I'm the stronger one. I'm the eldest and it's my responsibility to protect my siblings. I'm the one who can tolerate pain and sadness and loneliness. I'm the one who did many wrong. I should have been the one who lied on that deathbed. It's supposed to be me.

But it isn't.

The sudden sickness took her away and I was left in the darkness, despising my own existence. I'm the one left walking alone in that path of self-destruction. I'm the one filled with unanswered questions. And you know what's worst? I'm the one left to live. I came to realize that we all have our own tragedies. That little girl I mentioned earlier is that she lost her parents. Some have to endure different kinds of sickness and human cruelty. My parent's tragedy is that they lost one of their child. Mine is that... I have to live.

Why does God allowed it all? We didn't kill anyone. We're not the ones sitting in corrupted government chairs stealing millions from starving people. Why? Why does God allow bad things to happen to us?


After almost three years of trying to understand it all, I am still offered no definite answer. I read many stories, christians and self-help books. I listened to sermons and true to life sharesBut nothing ever made sense. I found myself digging for more questions. But I came to arrive on a conclusion. I became focused on asking that I failed to see that because God is God... He has no obligation to explain Himself to me. His ways are not my ways and His thoughts are not my thoughts. He's everlasting and flawless and powerful.  I am but a mere fragile creature in His story.

I never had any intention of forgetting what happen to my sister but I came to accept everything. I accepted that I will not be given any answers. Not at least in this lifetime. Nor will I hear some divine explanation from Him. No. He doesn't have to explain Himself to me. And that's how I started forgiving myself. That's how I regain my courage to still go on, to move, to dream dreams for the both of us. I think that because it should have been me who died, I owe my sister a life. If I cannot live for myself, I have to live for her. I have to find a reason to live because I'm the one left in here. I'm the stronger one, am I? I have to live no matter what. I end up looking forward to meeting her again with all the wonderful stories I experienced. I decided to fill my life with stories because one day, we will sit across each other and talk for eternity.



I'm not claiming I undestand everything. If that little girl will read this and accepted that God really allow bad things to happen to us the way I did... I don't know. I'm offering her nothing. I do hope she realize that God is God. And I do hope she lives. May she lives a good life.

THE WRITER IN ME

Mark Twain once said that the two most important day in our lives are the day when we're born and the day we found out why. I guess I already arrived on the day that I found out why.

I was born to write stories.

I was born with an insatiable appetite to understand the world because I'm going to write it down.

Please don't think that I'm deluding myself or anything, but I recently made up two short stories and two novellas. I just tried it out to know if I can really come up with ideas, characters and words and who would have believed that I actually did. As of now I'm also drilling myself in self-taught grammar and style course, alternating with creative writing and reading The Girl Who Played With Fire by Stieg Larsson (the second installment of Millennium Trilogy). I joined NaNoWriMo last November 2014 and submitted a novel with 50,000 words---self-edited.

I know my achievements couldn't yet be compared to those who already made a debut with their first novel in the industry, but for someone like me, with a degree in Nursing, with no formal education in English and creative writing and a non-native English speaker, finishing stories made me feel as if I'm... there. Walking on the road that I never even dare set foot years ago for fear that it will be a pointless thing to do. I was just that book geek with an old soul who admires Mary Shelley and Sidney Sheldon, pressing her nose between the pages of that dusty book and daydreaming that one day, I will be holding a book like that with my name on the cover.

I'm not over confident or having symptoms of schizophrenia but who knows, maybe one day, I will be able to come up with a novel worthy to be printed and send to entertain thousands of people.

Okay, enough of the lucid dreams. Allow me to dig deeper my thoughts about this topic.

The first question is: Why do I want to write?

Yeah, because I want fame and fortune blah-blah-blah. Who would not anyway? But I think those reasons are shallow and lame. No one in their right minds would sit on a chair, grab a pen and fill an blank notebook with words only Zeus knows where to pick up. I think writers are writers because there's a story inside them that's aching to come out. There are scenes inside their heads that wakes them up at three in the morning begging to be given appropriate words. There's a group of people fighting in their minds whispering "Hey dude, I know you want to know me, oh suck the denial, I know you do!." I think maybe writers are writers not because money or pile of books that needs signature or sex or the promise of immortality that compels them to write in the first place but because they really do have something to say and if they don't say it on paper, they'll die.

Yes that goes with me too. I want to write because even if its difficult, even if its a craft that needs commitment, even if its only possible that blood would literally flows from my eyes like tears because hunting for the right words is that hard... writing is who I am and I have found myself because of it. I feel free, admitting this truth to myself as well.

I always know that I'm different. People says that I've changed because I become a loner and isolate myself these past few years but I don't think I do. I just become myself. I just woke up one day and took off all the clothes I'm wearing so I will fit in the society and accepted the dress that I've been ignoring for too long. I slipped it on and saw someone smiling back at me when I looked in the mirror. "Oh! Who would have known you're that gorgeous!"

I guess no one really decides to be a writer. Not even me. I decided to become a nurse and work in a hospital. You decide to be an engineer or a soldier or scavenger but you cannot decide to be a writer. Writing is like being in love. You stop telling yourself that you're not falling for someone, that it takes more than just a pretty face to make your heart beat like crazy and you step out into the light and admits that you're in love. And when you do, you start to see the world from a different point of view and without knowing it; you're already letting yourself live.

For the first time in my twenty two years of life, I can finally say tht I'm alive. Half of me died together with my sister three years ago but I realize that even before that I'm not really living. Writing gives me a sense of purpose that I never thought I will be allowed to have. It's like I'm only starting to take my first breath ever since I was born. I am living at last instead of mere existing.

The follow up question is: What is my goal in writing?
I know the answer by heart. I want to inspire people. Isn't that the goal of everything we do? God has given us talents in hope that we will use it in the best ways. Don't interrupt me by saying that writing is a way to escape oblivion because I believe that no matter what we do, no one can ever escape such fate. It's more like I want to be someone everyone around me didn't dare imagine. I want to prove to those pessimist and yes, even to myself, that we can always rise above ourselves and be someone we always want to be. If we really want it that badly.

The second question will go like: Am I really sure about taking this endeavor?
I know you can relate to me if I say that I'm aware of having only one lifetime to live and if we invest ourselves to something that doesn't have seventy percent success rate...

I am also aware that it's easier to dream of having a mansion, three luxury cars, nine zeros in bank account, handsome and stunning husband and three lovely children added up with the world's most expensive dog out there but, I don't know. Maybe there are these kinds of things that you wanted so much you'll be willing to see yourself risking everything just to see it come true. I don't care if I'm the only one who believes that tomorrow, I will walk inside my favorite bookstore and stop on that beautiful work, I, myself had written. I have arrived to the point where I no longer care if my family or friends will be please and approve what I'm doing and of what I'm going to do. As long as I can see it as vividly as it can be, I don't care if it's lame or pointless in anyone's eyes.

I made this entry during my break before starting the third chapter of my new story. My goal for this month is to come up with 70,000 words and I'm willing to sprinkle salt in my open wound to reach it (suck the metaphor). I'm not saying it's a story worth a million dollar contract now. I'm still working it out and I know there's still a mile to go before I can produce a marketable work. All I know now is that I'm willing to go as far as my dreams can take me. There's no turning back, the only choice left is going ahead.

I pray that this endeavor will be a good one and if I stumble I'll make sure to read this entry and remind myself of the happiness I have in writing. Like I said, I'm not there yet, but I'm closer to it than I was yesterday. I'm not sure if I'm going to win though but I know I'll never lose. As Paulo Coelho said, only those who give up are defeated. If that's the case then, I'll die trying.

A PATH LEADING SOMEWHERE

I think she was four during the nights when she laid in bed together with her mother and sister. She will put her left over her right leg only to be imitate by her sister while their mother holds high an illustrated fairy tale for both of them to see.

It was a warm, cozy summer night and children should sleep early but her mother starts telling them the story of a princess from that far away castle. She can't fully understand the words her mother utters, though its in the native tongue, but the colorful drawings she saw makes her wonder if the illustrated princess her mother talks about is real.

One year from then, she will start to go to school so her mother starts teaching her how to read little by little while her father is teach her how to write her own name. Maybe it was her father to be blame that years later her handwriting is mistakenly took as from a man.

Then came the time that she had to go to school. The thought of her mother leaving her alone in that strange place with other children scares her, yet she can't help but feel excited on what that brand new world will reveal to her. She become fascinated of that small thin woods the length of her arms with different colors, that piece of rubber that can erase everything she writes on a blank piece of paper, those binded papers they call books and the group of words that when she read, is telling her a story just like what her mother did during those warm, cozy summer night.

Never did she thought that knowing how to read is the beginning of everything.

Years pass, she had gone to the nearby grade school and able to finished her secondary education after. She made a lot of friends and experience things. She realize the beauty of knowledge and the advantage of being a well read girl and for once, she actually believe that life is just like that, you make friends, please your parents, get a high grade on every subject, read good books, put on some lipbalm so the guys can notice you and try to do what everyone else is doing.

When she goes to college she discover a larger world. There is more to learn but little time to accomplish all. She gets the chance to meet people bigger than life, whose aspiration is not limited to wanting a big house, a handsome spouse, a faster car and more zeros in bank accounts. She experience things and enjoy her own skin. She read many good books, fiction, fantasy, adventure, romance and her all time favorite thrillers, in between the academic ones. When she look up at the sky she thinks of how maybe, just maybe, she was born to do great things. That maybe one day she can do something that will of worth and be able to leave a legacy behind. One night, as she smile to herself slipping slowly in a dreamless sleep, she decided that she will find that very thing that she is destined to do so she can do it with all her heart.

But life is not always with bright and blue sky. She learned that there are people whom she cannot please, that her parents, no matter how high grades she show cannot be satisfied, that her teachers and professors pretends to be all knowing when in fact they just learn the topics ahead and that not everyone can be trusted. So she turns to books to satisfy a part of her that others cannot. She turn to books during those empty nights when she wants to speak her mind but no one bothers to listen.

And one day, without realizing it, she grab a piece of pen and put a single word at the blank sheet of a notebook. Then she write another word that becomes a phrase which becomes a sentence. She felt good so she continue adding sentences until it became a paragraph and the paragraphs becomes, what the english books called, an essay. She read what she wrote from the beginning and she gasp in amazement, not believing that she did wrote it. But an essay is never complete without a title, so shethink of one, and after a day she pick up a pen again together with the notebook containing her essay and above it she wrote "My Favorite Book Qoute and How It Changes My Life."

She laugh at how ridiculously happy she become.

There is happiness in reading.

There is happiness in writing.

But is there happiness in being read?

After a year she manage to keep a journal and many unfinished short stories. But she did not let anyone take a look on them for fear that they find her outrageous, weird, neurotic and ambitious.

But what is wrong in thinking that one day someone will tell her that she writes good enough to make worthy stories, like the ones she reads at night, like the ones she cannot put down easily. What is wrong in wanting to be a person everyone around her did not even dare of becoming even in their wildest dream. What is wrong in being different from the rest.

I want to be a published author someday, she whispers.

And just like the stories she read, there comes the stormy seas proving that when it rains it pours. She lost a loved one, devastated she goes on isolation. The people who called her friend, nowhere to be found, those who promise that they will always be by her side are busy. Her grades failed many times until she loss all interest in everything. That night, she curled herself at the corner of her room, crying, gripping a pen, reaching for a blank sheet of paper. She writes. She writes the paralyzing pain, the coldness within and the absence of anyone. She gave word for what she feels even if its all empty. She construct the paragraph that will make her remember what she thinks at the very moment she wrote it. And she felt free.

There is beauty in suffering.

There is beauty in emptiness.

There is beauty in words.

There is beauty in writing.

Its not long before she longs for adventure. She finds herself sitting in a coffeeshop just to observe the people around her. She will go her way buying books far from her town just to watch sunset on the nearby shore. She open herself to stories told by any kinds of individuals. And at the end of the day, she develop a sight of seeing things some refuse to look at and the ability to wrote down the memories that time will not be able to snatch away.

She wants to live and she wants others too.

She wants to feel and she wants others too.

She wants comfort and she wants to comfort others too.

Each, possible through her chosen craft.

Her body craves for fortune, her mind wants fame, her soul longs for immortality but her heart desires nothing but to help others with the gift she have.

But above all she wants to write.

And write she did.

She realize that everything that happen, everything she absorb, everything she learned and will learn outside and inside the school premises, everything she witness and taken part of, everything, let her become what she is now.

Im not there yet, she thought, but Im closer than I am yesterday.

Yes, my dear.

Yes, you are.

Hold on then.

Be patient.

Love and live.

Embrace it because it is the path you decide to take.

She wrote this piece. Not sure if its good, really.

INTROVERSION

Y: Everything is possible love, if you really want to.

B: I couldn't agree more.

Silence. A deafening silence.

Y: What is it the you want anyway??

It was a simple question that requires a great, thoughtful answer.

What do I want?

B: I want to be a published author and reach the world.

Y: Not what you want for tomorrow.
What is it, that you want. Today. At this very moment.

Silence, again. I smile.

My brain tries to analyze that simple question. My mind wanders, seeking the very thing I want. Now, at this point in time, as  I breathe in and I breathe out.

*chaching*

Yes. That was right.

That's what I want.

The very thing that I need.

The air that will keep me from mere existence.

B: I want to live.

*chaching*

I want to lie under the sky, staring at the stars, knowing that I wouldn't be able to count them.

I want to be there, when the sun rises and lightens the dark corners of that face of the Earth.

I want to stand at the top of a mountain, with arms wide open, against the wind, against the limits of the society.

I want to float above the water, with the currents lashing on my skin, trusting that the waves will bring me to the shore, to where it is safe.

I want to sit together with men, of great minds, of big hearts, of souls as old as the ancient ones, listening to their stories, laughing my heart out, because some dreams will be beyond comprehension, but is not impossible.

I am longing for a world far greater than I am now.

I am wishing to be with people I couldn't get a chance to meet. They are secluded as me. Kept hidden, thinking that they are as rare as fossils, feeling empty and sometimes strange.

How ironic it is to long for a person that is you but at the same time afraid to open and know them.

tIt will burn every fiber of my being. It will set me on fire. It will leave nothing of me, but ashes.

I want to live.

I want to live.

I want to live.

Y: Then go.

You grasp that small thread that will give you capacity to do as your heart desire, grab it, burn with it, never ever let it go.

Go far away as your feet can carry you.

Climb that mountain and inhale the freedom that will be set forth before you.

Swim against the current.

Burn bright until your light can so set others into ashes. Until they turn blind just by a mere blink at you.

Don't ever come back.

Don't dare to glance behind.

The past is there. It will call you. But it never wants you back.

B: I will.

Before death comes knocking at my door, I will.

I want to live.

I will live.

I will live.

I will live.

Listen.

Feel.

Breathe.

I am here.

I am like you.

We are the same.

I will wait.

NOTHING BUT DREAMS

I just woke up from a strange dream where I saw myself in a room full of people I don't know, girls giggling and a handsome man lying sick in bed surrounded by people with grave looking faces. There are also black cats around me, which took turn biting my arm, creating little bloodless holes in them. Because of the floating feeling the dream gave me, I immediately reach for the pen and paper on my side and with eyes half open I make sure that I wrote it down before they slip away. You know, I don't sleep without those things on my side nowadays.

Later, through some reliable dream interpretation website I found out the meaning of each things I've dreamed of. I was taken aback to notice that each of them tends to tell me that there is some part of me I don't recognize yet. Either feminine, potential and weakness part, they suggest that I face that part of me that needs to be face. I was advice to let go of the things and people that slows me down and to examine my guard because some of the symbols in my dream says that Im letting my guard down. Too horrible.

Yes, I daydream but I am not a type of person who dreams a lot during sleep. Maybe because Im a shallow sleeper. I can get really sleepy anywhere, difficult to wake, but is used to wake up every now and then. I don't sleep without lights on, that explains why I cannot have a good night sleep other than on my bedroom. One of my weird growing up habits I guess.

Back to that dream.. as I ponder about it, I can't help but wonder what is it that I never accepted for myself yet. Im aware of my weakness and limitations that's why it bothers me that my subconscious is trying to tell me things in contrast. Then, I remember that I had a "small" arguement with my mother last night. Its plainly about me always in front of my laptop, typing or with my notebook, writing. I say that Im writing something sure (my manuscript). She thinks Im weird because people on my age should go outside, date, gossips, shop and do everything "normal". She reminded me that Im the weirdest person she ever knew and that reason alone is enough to conclude that if I stay being this way I can never have a boyfriend or lots of friends and that I wouldn't get anywhere. I never tell her that I want to be a published author someday, I know without doubt she'll laugh. Sucks. I know Im weird, Im proud of it, but my mother's utterance of weird sounds like I have an incurable disease or Im too disgusting and pathetic.

One thing I am certain about my relationship with her is that she doesn't know me at all. We may be having the same blood flowing on our veins but that doesn't mean I am going to be like her or that people can continue judging me through her. We are but different people.

Well, what Im trying to convey is that, yes, I know what she thinks of me and that I know she wouldn't approve my dream of becoming a published author (who cares) and yes, I accepted that long ago but that doesn't necessarily mean Im a stone Im not getting hurt anymore. I think it hurts me, the way my own blood sees me in that way, but its nothing more like a pinch now, it amazes me to realize I acquire an invisible armor built hard that no remarks can hurt me now, to the point of crying, from all the insults I've endured before. *laughs*

I guess it makes me realize that dreams should be worth fighting for. That if you want to make your dream come true you must be really brave to stand against all who will try to bring you down. It makes sense anyway, no one can fly without letting go of the things and people that's weighing them down. In the end, it will just fall on to you. You will be the only one who can make those dreams come true, some can help you but it will always depends on how determine you are along the way. If your dreams become a reality, great, when it doesn't, then you can never blame anyone for it. I owe Dumbledore for teaching me that "It's our choices that make us who we are far more than our abilities.."

This is my choice, my folks.

I WANT TO BE A PUBLISHED AUTHOR AND BE READ.

Its the only thing that burns inside of me that everytime I go to a bookstore and pick up a book I imagine Im holding my story instead, with my name under. Its the first thing that pops out of my mind when someone asks me how do I see myself ten years from now. Its the sentence I used on my goal setting stuff. Its a dream that makes my heart beat fast, my mind race and my whole body tense with excitement.

And Im going to stand by it no matter what. No insults will ever bring me down. Nothing from my family, friends or anyone can make me waver.

If I win, then I'll be happy the ground can swallow me whole.

If I do not then at least I try, I will have some stories to share to my grandchildren (if Im going to have grandchildrens, haha!). I said "If I do not" and not "If I lose" because I don't think I'll ever lose on this. "Only those who give up are defeated, everyone else os victorious." (Paulo Coelho)