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Monday, September 21, 2015

My guitar

One thing I miss after moving out of our family home is my guitar. Not that I'm so good at playing it, but I love making music with my guitar. On nights when I can't sleep, I go down to the bedroom at the first floor of our house and strum the night away. I play my favorite songs until my eyes hurt from drowsiness.

When I learned to play guitar, I also got encouraged to write my own songs. I have successfully completed one song (which I will share in a future blog post), after writing three unfinished songs. They remain unfinished because I do not know yet how to end the stories in those songs. Maybe someday, I'll get to finish them. Or maybe I won't.

Now that I already stay in a boarding house near my office, I'm no longer able to play my guitar at night. I can't bring my guitar to the boarding house because I share a room with three other girls. I share the house with 20 other housemates. I have no space where I can keep it. And playing guitar, especially at night, is not a good idea when 20 other housemates are sleeping and resting after a long day at work.

The callouses on my fingers are now gone, and I'm sure, my fingers will hurt again when I play the guitar. However, I don't see it happening soon. I'm busy, and I haven't stayed long enough at home to allot ample time for leisure.

I hope my guitar still remembers me when I finally get the chance to pick it up again. I hope it shows my fingers some mercy as I try to regain my callouses and get used to playing again. I hope it feels my familiar touch. And I hope it becomes one with me as I try to write more songs and make more music.

Saturday, September 12, 2015

Girl on top

It's been two weeks since I moved out of our family home and into this rented bed space in Kapitolyo, Pasig, where I am writing this blog post now. The monstrous traffic in the metro has compelled me to finally make this move, and I'm not regretting it.

In fact, I'm enjoying the convenience of living close to my place of work. I get to the office on time, if not earlier. If I have an early-morning call time for a shoot, I no longer panic as I plan my route; I no longer have EDSA to avoid. I can wake up at 9 a.m. when the previous night was so exhausting and still be able to get to the office by 10 a.m., when we are all required to be there.

Of course, being on my own requires a lot of adjustment. I share the bedroom with three other girls. That means, I shouldn't keep my things just lying around--nobody wants a slob for a roommate. I like how the four of us have carved our personal spaces in our room: where we hang our clothes, where we leave our shoes, and where we keep our personal belongings. I like how the four of us get along and get kilig when we watch James Reid and Nadine Lustre on On the Wings of Love every night.

I now buy my own toiletries, when before, I just use whatever family-size shampoo, toothpaste, and soap we buy from the grocery. I buy my own bread--literally--for breakfast. Last Monday, after work, I swung by Iko's and bought two loaves of potato cheese bread (it was yummy!) to be my breakfast and snack for two days. Then, the other night, I swung by Pioneer Center to buy bread and peanut butter to be my breakfast for the next few days. We cannot cook in the boarding house, but we have a microwave oven for reheating food. We even have a refrigerator for storing food. Everything is cool.

We have spaces where we can do our laundry and hang our clothes after. And that's what I did this morning. Last weekend, I washed my clothes at home when I got there late afternoon--to my mother's surprise. She can be a little territorial when it comes to chores at home. She asked me why I still washed my clothes when she would wash them come Monday. I told her I want the laundry to be done so I can bring my clothes back to the boarding house the next day. I can do it myself, so she has nothing to worry about.

I'm a girl on top...of the double deck, that is. There are two double decks in our room, and I occupy one of the top spaces. I see this as something great, because being on the top bed allows me to have a little private sanctuary. When I literally climb to bed every night, I feel like I'm in my own nest. I can read with my LED flashlight, surf the net, or simply just lay there dreaming. In the morning, because my roommates have to be at work earlier than I have to, I sleep peacefully as they go about doing their morning routines.

Being in Kapitolyo is great, not just because of the many restaurants the neighborhood is known for, but also because it is quiet and safe. There are security guards around the neighborhood, and people are nice. I'm happy to be here.

So cheers to my new home. I'm glad I made this move, because now that I'm not wasting precious hours stuck on traffic, I can finally focus in being a girl on top, at work and in life.

Friday, September 11, 2015

The big move

It's been months since I last posted, and it's been quite a long time since I shared something personal. I'm happy to say that in the middle of all the things I need to do, I found some time to sit down and write on this blog again. I even found time to do a little redesign and change the header (and eventually, I plan to change the look) of this blog. 

Why the change? 

Well, a lot of changes came to visit, and I let them all in. I joined a new choir last February, and I've been singing with them since. I'm adjusting to the sound and catching up on the group's repertoire, but I'm happy to be learning. Yes, it's a lot of pressure on me--on us newbies--and sometimes I pause to breathe and reset. But I'm happy. 

I've also found love after my previous relationship ended last year. This is one thing I'm really excited about, and I'm more than happy to embrace it. I thank God for giving him to me. Just as I was praying for healing and stability, He gave me a doctor who embraced my entire broken self. A literal doctor. I couldn't thank Him enough for this gift of love. I'm praying that the two of us work out, so that we'll be able to spend the rest of our lives together. 

And finally, the biggest change I welcomed is, I would say, moving out of our family home and staying at a rented space close to my office. I'm actually bed spacing in a room I share with three other girls, and in a three-story townhouse we share with 20 other bed spacers. Traffic in Metro Manila has gone from terrible to even more terrible and monstrous, and I cannot take it anymore. I deemed it wiser and more practical to rent a bed space so I would no longer waste time waiting for trains that would never come or riding buses or cabs that move inch by inch along EDSA. And how I wanted to cry tears of joy when I experienced getting home from work in just 15 minutes--a far cry from my two- to three-hour commute. 

These are all big moves: joining a new group, finding love, and moving out. These entail adjustments in routine until they are all incorporated in a new routine. And these, I believe, are changes that will help me grow and mature not just in the learning-lessons-and-being-wiser sense, but in a way that will push me out of my comfort zone. Yes, maybe this is the time that I can really say to myself that I'm ready to move out of my comfort zone. I'm turning 27 in October, and some of you might say, "You only thought of doing that now?!" But as they say, better late than never. I'm turning 27, and I'm ready to push myself out of my comfort zone, to challenge myself intellectually and creatively, and to embrace the next big move. 

Wish me luck. :)

P.S. I'm still going to tweak some parts of this blog and change the look. I want it to reflect who I am now.  I've changed my blog header (I hope you find it decent enough, if not nice hehe). I'll improve the look of my blog little by little, but for now, the new blog header will suffice.