Look Beyond the Narrow Window

December 5. I’m pensive. As always. How time flies for this year 2005. Awesome! Met the worst people. People who took away my money, some who took away my pride, and worst – one who took away my heart. But yet I met the best once too. People true to the substance of friendship.

A lot of things have been learned. A lot have been unlearned. I wept two days ago when I came to look back how I was a year ago. And it merely took six, almost seven, to lose everything I have achieved… including myself.

A friend said - well several of them have observed - that I have become different from the loving, positive, and gentle person that I was. Many times I have gone home drunk with my actuations typical of rebellion. Bitter. Angry. Negative about the possibility of a one-true-everlasting-love. Once I got pursued by somebody with the impression that, between me and my lover, I was the one who kept the long term relationship possible. Well, can’t blame him. I have an 8 years relationship as feather on my hat! Lately, a number of guys have pursued me again. Sayang (sigh). Nega na ko dyan (my reaction to that issue is quite negative) . Cliché to say: di tutoo yang long term relationship na yan (that long term relationship is not true)… kalokohan (it’s crazy and stupid). There was one who said, "You don't deserve to be bitter. You deserve to be loved..." Narinig ko na yan! (I heard that before) Tangina mo (you sone of a bitch), don't you dare promise me marriage! My sebderm acts up when I hear that just like a friend who would take it personal when he is called "Pare" (Bro). I almost threw one of my buddhas at the television when I saw this Lucky-Mom Smart ad. Lucky walks along the beach talking to Ate Vi over the cellphone. They were talking about his new love. Ate Vi wants to talk to her. Lucky picks her up and drew the cellphone next to the puppy's ear. Ate Vi said, "I love you Papi!" Now I hate watching Mexican films. Everyone calls their father Papi.

Good thing that somebody has yet to blatantly tell me I LOVE YOU. I would have hurled myself to an approaching bus.

But I'm so terribly sorry about this boy who fell in-love with me. After having him eat Burger King for lunch, he started to shower me with miss-calls, endless texts... etc. Di ko sinasagot (I’m not responding to them). According to him, I made him felt that I love him. Word of advice: bata ka pa (you’re too young). I'm already 36 when somebody did that to me.

Nope, I'm not bitter. That's an understatement.

So now I’m what you call The Player. At least, that’s what my new housemate was seeing in me. Well, that’s exactly what I’m trying to show. And, mind you, I was so good at it. When I and my ex of 8 years met his new lover, the lovable guy said I look like a player. Thank you but my ex was quick to rebut the statement. In our 8 years of relationship, he said, he was the player. I won’t elaborate.

I’ve been going to Manila’s gay area, Malate, for 9 years now and never have I lost my composure. I never danced on the ledge; I never see myself worthy. I never approached guys; that’s the job for my flirty exes. I never go drunk; there’s no reason to. I never take off my shirt; I don’t want to earn the ire of the Spanish Inquisition. Not until the past six months. Just when I have turned thirty six, I began to do what most malate-neophytes and conceited pretty boys (count in as well the not-so-pretty) would do when their drunk in a party full of raging hormones and shining flesh: dance uncontrollably, flirt like it’s one of the 3 Virtues, kiss anyone notwithstanding halitosis. Then two days ago, I took off my shirt. That was a first. I swear.

When I cried two days ago, it was not just for the career, possessions, and loves that I have lost. The tears were mostly intended to wash away the regrets that come in having the angry me:

Angry at reality – love ends no matter what the promises. And, yes, no matter how deep. Nah! I rather not fall into fits of how-could-you-do-this-to-me histrionics. And, oh, friends are not what they really say they are.

Angry at the past – I lost it. How and when do I regain it is one for Homer’s Iliad. Lovers do come and go but material possessions and a strong career are hard to find.

Angry with God – I think he couldn’t accept the fact that Dom Gregory Ma. Lloren is now Ligaya (bliss)… or Dolor (sorrow) for that matter. So he follows me around and withdraws his blessing on my secular endeavours.

I look at myself in the mirror. Wow, I never had this body even since I was having steroid shots in the US. I have to go through an excruciating depression to earn it. But then, I painfully ask, what have I done to myself? I’ll keep the answer inside lest I gain unsolicited opinions.

Whenever I spend some time at my friend’s 23^rd floor unit in Makati City, I stand before his room’s floor-to-ceiling glass window and gaze at the horizon beyond. Where the sun mingles with the ocean I see my future lies. I yearned to reach it by hand. Thank heavens the windows are too narrow.