Ang Ballpen Bow

Ang buhay, para lang ballpen yan..

Iba-iba ang kulay
Iba-iba ang bigat
Iba-iba ang itinatagal


Ang bawat titik na isinulat ng ballpen mo ay simbolo ng bawat pangyayaring tumatatak sa papel ng ating pagkatao. Madalas, nag-iiwan din ng marka ang ating ballpen sa kanvas ng iba. At minsan, ng mundo.


Iba-iba rin ang paraan ng pagkasulat ng ating ballpen. Merong pahaba, patayo, pabilog, at sa maraming pagkakataon, parang kinahig ng manok. Pero ang lahat ay isang pahayag kung saan tayo ang magsisimula, kung saan natin gagamitin at kung saan ang maabot ng ating ballpen.


Wala ito sa halaga o presyo ng ating ballpen. Hindi ito kinakailangang Staedtler o Gtech, hindi rin mahalaga kung Pilot o Panda o Lotus. Hindi sukatan ang pangharap na hitsura para masabi ang kahalagahan ng ating ballpen. Mas mahalaga ang bawat katagang nahabi sa isang makabuluhang salaysay. Mas mahalaga ang bawat daloy ng pagkakataon na huhubog sa ating katauhan.

Paminsan-minsan, nagbo-blot din ang ballpen. Nagiging malabo ang daloy ng mga pagkakataon, nagiging mahirap, at minsan nakakaperwisyo pa nga. Lalo na kung nakaupo ka sa pinakamahalagang pagsusulit ng iyong buhay at nagbo-blot ang ballpen mo.

Merong mga taong pipiliing itapon na ang ballpeng ito. Sa maling paniniwalang wala na itong halaga. Marahil dahil sa galit at kawalan ng pag-asa.

Pero mayroon pa ring hindi susuko. Gagawa at gagawa ng paraan.
Pinapainitan ang ballpen para mas madaling dumaloy ang tinta. Inaalog alog, pinipitik pitik.
Ito ay sa paniniwalang bukas susulat muli ng maganda ang ballpeng ito.
At madalas, nasa lakas lang yan ng paniniwala.

Parang ang buhay natin. Minsan, naiipit tayo at hindi makalabas. Merong mga desisyon na ayaw nating harapin. Mga desisyong susukat sa ating estado at sa paniniwala natin sa ating pagkatao.
Nagtatago tayo at nagsusumiksik sa maliit na tubong iyon at ayaw sumulat.
Sa maraming pagkakataon, kailangan lang nating maalog-alog.

Meron ding pangyayari na magtatae ang ballpen. At magkakalat ito. Sa kamay, sa sangkaterbang papel, sa sahig, sa kamay ng iba, sa papel ng iba. At hindi katulad ng pagbo-blot, hindi ito pwedeng pitik-pitikin dahil siguradong magkakalat ka lalo.

Minsan, mas mabuti pa na hayaan na lang munang maubos ang sobrang tinta. Wala ng dahilan pa para iyakan ang nasayang na. Hindi na ito maibabalik pa. Siguruhin lang natin na lilinisin natin ang ating kalat.

Dumadating sa ating buhay na gumagawa tayo ng mga bagay na kahit alam nating wala sa tamang landas ay patuloy nating ginagawa. Maraming nasasaktan. Marami ang nadadamay.
Magsisi man tayo hindi na maibabalik ang mga nasayang na panahon. Hindi na maibabalik ang mga luha at sakit. Kailangan na lang nating linisin ang ating kalat. At magsimula ulit.

Meron mang kaunting dungis ang ating malaking kanbas, nasa kagandahan pa rin ng bagong mga kataga, salaysay at larawan tayo huhusgahan.

Dilemma

Sometimes late at night I fear, there's more hate in me than the love I feel.
Lurking behind the emotions of anger.
I could not see why but I despise myself for feeding on the thought that this is all a lie.
A betrayal of my own words.
I am both surprised and frightened of the amount of hatred that sleeps within my dreams.
And it is eating me whole.
Consumes me.
I cannot accept in me that I am loving you less than I should. Should? Now it even sounds obligatory to me.
I cannot place it.
My yearning for freedom is burning. Almost suffocating.
No, not from the commitment, but from the hate and the anger.
There is so much pain in my eyes I cannot see pass the shield of enraged coldness.
There is so much bitterness in my heart I cannot penetrate the walls of selfish pride.
I love you and I hate you in its most ironic way.
Like it keeps me alive and kills me at the same time.
Their symphony befriends me in my waking hours.
Embraces me in my slumber.

It is in me.

Let it happen.

I surrender.

Stranded

The semicon business is now in its downturn.
There is very, very low man-power requirement and most of us here are in a state of dreadful doubt of losing our jobs.

Some already chose to leave the company to look for better opportunities abroad.

And some who already spent the last twenty years running the rat race decided to retire and spend their remaining limbs resting on some old wooden rocking chair near the beach.

I can do neither.

First, I have a binding contract to work for this company for the next 3-4 years. This is because of the scholarship program they have given me when I was in college. Resigning would mean I need to pay for all they have spent for my education. Sadly, I dont have that kind of money.

Second, I am sending my kids to school. My hubby always wanted me to stay home to be the loving housewife he dreams about. I would gladly take the challenge. But that means he has to support us, food, shelter education, all the like. BUT, he doesn't earn enough for that. He earns well, but not enough for growing children.

I need this job. I know I do. What I do not know is if the JOB needs me. The last few weeks have been very dull. Our work load is low as well and I've been spending most of my office hours doing nothing but reading blogs, surfing the net and waiting for my email to update its folders. (Not that I am against it.)

But not being productive may mean that I have no worth in the company, which, in this time of crisis, would mean I could be laid off. And no, I cannot accept that.

I am afraid of what is to come. I've been trying to convince myself that the company cannot take this job away from me because of the contract. That they could not waste all those money they spent for me. That they need the intellectual property I have.

But the horrifying truth is that THEY ACTUALLY CAN, THEY ACTUALLY COULD, and THEY ACTUALLY DONT.

What's worse with this is that I dont know where to go from here. This was not part of the long-term plan I made. I cannot leave on my own but if they DO lay me off I will come face-to-face with the real world unprepared. And I cannot accept that either.

I know I have to do something. But what is there to do?

I love flowers

Oooohhh.. I love flowers.. Especially orchids..
But I like tulips as well. I started liking them the first time
when hubby gave it to me on our first month together back in college.
These are in my grandmother's garden.

Miranda Residence. Palauig, Zambales

This is our home in Palauig, Zambales. My children are staying here while I work in Laguna. I only see them once a month.





At least they have a very wide play ground.

Lets talk about that Dull work

I like my job.

I dont necessarily love it but we're friends.

I am currently working in a semiconductor company as a Test Hardware Engineer. (whoooh)
And I would gladly trade it to be a full-time housewife and mother. (And I could do some cross-stitching on my free time). Since I cant be neither in the next 3 years, lets talk about that obsession some other time.

So work.

This is work.

This is engineering multi-tasking, analytical, clerical, boring work.
Ok. Its not at all boring. Its quite challenging actually.
Trying to do everything simultaneously with extreme amount of pressure because everything is due within the day. (And may God save the world because its already 2:55pm.)
But then, I dont want to discuss the technicality of my work here.
That's for my manager to comprehend.

What we need to talk about here is when you feel you dont want to do it anymore.

Work is trapped in your office room. It is in your PC or your laptop. It is in the equipment you use. It is in the four corners of your office building. When you walk out of that glass door after 5:30 pm. You stop working. You start living.

My hubby came home last night feeling all wasted. He asked me whether a time will come when he can retire. He's 26. He hardly slept that night.

This morning I asked him if he was feeling better, he told me he doesnt want to work anymore.

Of course I felt the same way for the last 2 and a half years. I still do. But I have a son to send to school. He needs new shoes because the last one I bought, which was expensive enough for my budget because it promised a long, sturdy lifetime, were already worn out. I needed to pay for the costume he needs to wear because he's participating in the school program. I have a daughter who loves fruits. I have 2 sisters who ask for monthly allowances. I have a cousin I send through college. and I have a hubby who occasionally requests I cook his favorite dish.

I need the job because I need the money. I can quit it anytime I want. (well, after the contract, that is) What I mean is, I could stop working. I could give it up. I could have my lifelong dream of being loving housewife. I could finally learn doing bonsai plants. But for me, it would mean I have to give them up too. My son has to stop school. And my daughter would not be able to eat apples if its not christmas and my sisters and cousin have to work their way through college.

No, money cannot buy happiness. But it could buy the remote control helicopter my son wants for his birthday. My wallet is lighter by a few hundred pesos but my heart is heavier with love and happiness when I see him with his dada playing under the sun.

However, work has its bad days as it has good. And sometimes the bad are reason enough to stop loving your work. Or liking it, for that matter. Because you feel stranded. Your work is going nowhere and you feel you are too. There will be failures, there are bad memos, there are For-Improvement notices, missed deadlines, money loss, and hurt ego. But one thing I learned in this lifetime, you go where you choose to. Everybody gets a chance to play. If you let all the downfalls get into you. It will. Nobody is a failure until he thinks he is. Get up. There's no better way than standing up from your fall and not falling on the same spot again.

Work to live, not live to work. Let work worry you for 8 hours all during company time, leave all the worries behind when its time to go home. Do not let it take over your life. As I say, there's so much more to life than the big project you're handling right now. Go home, take you kids to their favorite fastfood. Eat fries. Watch a feel-good movie with your wife. Pray. Sleep well.

When you wake up. There is work. But it will be better. Because you feel better for yourself.

You and your work is a compromise. Its like a relationship. You take care of it and it takes care of you. And you get a fair share of the bargain.

Stained Glass

I will tell you about that Thursday.

History.

Anything can happen. Good things happen. Bad things happen. You can meet good people. You meet bad. You go up. Or you go down. There is good karma and there is bad karma. Good things happen almost everyday. One good thing at a time.

All bad things happen on thursdays.

I dont know when I started noticing it. But it does.

When I was in highschool, break-ups happen on thursdays. It was a thursday when I missed the one-day school interaction because I was sick. I received the news I will graduate salutatorian instead of the much-coveted-and-expected-already-prepared-valedictory-speech 1st place on a thursday.

When I was in college, I get surprise-I-dont-know-anything-havent-slept-due-to-design tests on thursdays. I got my class card with my first ever 3.0 grade on a thursday. I get stuck in traffic during thursdays. Always.

But this is not about my other hundred misfits during thursday. This is about THAT thursday.

Where to start?

My attendance for the last three years had been very bad. I accumulated a number of not-so-pleasing memos because of my tardiness. Both my immediate supervisor and manager have been monitoring my monthly attendance.

I travel for 2.5 hours from our home to work. My trip consists of a 3-minute walk, 5-minute tricycle ride, 15-minute bus ride, 25-minute train ride and a 90-minute bus ride. That's minus the technical failures of the LRT, and the heavy traffic at SLEX due to road widening projects of the so-called government.

I now have an average of 5 tardy days a month. Ive been worse.

So I've been trying really hard to keep my attendance at a good light. Ive suceeded so far.

Then thursday. I am late. Not a good way to start the morning.

That day, my manager sent me a summary of my tardiness for last month. Not a good sight either.

What happened next?

I went through my daily routine, e-mails, follow-ups, file reviews, reading blogs in between, reports, the usual. And then...

A week ago we decided to organize a "savings group" every payday, every member of the group is required to give a decided amount of money and one member is to receive the sum. This will continue until every one in the group received the same amount of money. It was like saving for the rainy days.

The problem begins when everyone claims his rainy day will come at one chosen date. And everyone wanted to receive the lump sum first. or second, at the least.. which is entirely, absolutely IMPOSSIBLE!

So to make things fair, I raffled the numbers. Each one will pick a number from the box to represent the date of his "salary". Easier said than done. Because as soon as the person picked up his number, seeing it was not what he hoped for, all the babbles and the rabbles began again. I feel so completely harassed. As if I jinxed them so they would receive the last number or something.

After everyone had his pick, "some" (but of course it is still just someone) were still not contented and were still making a fuss about all it, threatening to withdraw his share, blathering about not wanting to be a part of the group anymore. What an @*$h0l3.

What could be worse?

A few months ago, somebody left a message in my friendster inbox asking me about my father. The first thing I noticed is that he's carrying my surname. So he got my interest. He gave the name of my father and asked if that person is my father. And so I answered yes. Being more conclusive than I should, I asked him if we have the same father.

He answered a yes.

Last tuesday, my father sent me a very weird text message, he told me he wanted to ask me something. And that he wanted to thank me beforehand for the question. I was supposed to meet them that day because it was my mother's birthday but I wasn't able to come and we didn't had the chance to talk about it.

Yesterday, it just occurred to me. I texted my dad and asked him if he was going to ask me about that somebody from friendster.

He answered a yes.

He told me he didnt where to begin. Or how to start explaining. He told me there would be the right place and time for that.

I told him he didnt need to explain anything to me. I'm old enough to know how the real world works.

I told him there's no easy way. No matter how he does it, it will still hurt. We dont know how the rest of the family will react to this but its something he has to face. Alone.

I told him there will never be the right place nor the right time for this stuff. It doesnt matter where, or when, delaying the fact doesnt change it. They will feel pain. Bigtime. He needs to tell it now, or soon, waiting for another 24 years will not help him. It will not help us either. I hope my mom's busy enough she wont miss reading my blog. This is something she should not know. Not from me anyway.

Well. Life sucks sometimes. Shit happens.