gushing

he's right! i don't want to admit it, but what he said was true! "diyan nagsisimula yan. 'you know how we met...'" man, the things i keep replaying in my head - things i don't want to forget that he ever said. because i want my friends to know that finally someone sees me almost as well as they do.

i worry though that i am vain, that i only like favorable attention.

i worry that i am distracted, that i indulge in these things that make me feel good even if i'm not sure they're good for me.

i want a good head over my shoulders. but for now, i'll just be thankful for what's been coming, whatever it is. i'm being taken out for a spin... it's fun, and there's always time to learn...

hollow

i was reading deng's blog with her wonderful poems and my new friend karl's poems at the likhaan website, and rainer maria rilke's poem duino elegies that karl told me about this sunday, and i got to thinking...

i just stopped. i stopped writing poetry. i've been looking back at lot at my amateur writing, and i never really got better. i seem to have stopped before i got better. and i'm kind of sad about it...

because it means i have no song in my heart. i don't have the blues, none of those goth drones, no sunny grooves, and no glorious hymns of peace and praise. i'm just drifting, one borrowed song to another.

it seems like i have to get back somewhere, a place of my own. it seems like i need to figure out how this hollow heart sounds if it sings...

good vibes

...yesterday had nothing but. difficult to have anything else with good music and good people in a simple place. 200+ people, 5 reggae bands (tropical depression, junior kilat, bambu spliff, peace pipe, and skabeche), 1 rock legend (pepe smith). met many cool people, including two freelance journalists who made me drink a bit since i looked on edge. after that, it all just kind of flowed... talking with colleagues, guests, musicians, waiters, spectators... hard not to be thankful. here's to more good vibes -- cheers!

clarity, humility, patience

yesterday (and maybe even the past weeks) were just a delusion, pure imaginings of a dissatisfied (yet blessed) spirit. but clarity comes like a strong wave that set me off balance but fortunately, did not wash me away.

ais is quite the unexpected voice of reason. there is much to be thankful for, to work on, to settle into. i don't need everything to make it right. nothing is entitled to me. and that there is a difference between anticipation and patience in waiting. or just not expecting at all.

still as before, "good things come to those who wait" and "if you build it, they will come."

the promise of something new

everyday i keep on conjuring beautiful scenes in my head: time to read, time to sleep, time to exercise, sunday mass with my parents, shopping with my sisters, movies with the poochers, gigs with my holy girls, lazy coffee with anyone, fruitful flirtations...

and though the last may be more of an imagining than a reality, i look forward to the day when i'm not the only one who'll say that there's something there, whoever it turns out to be.

i need a life of my own.

it's a crazy world out there

i almost to forgot to tell you how i laughed to myself at the lack of progressive thinking and sense of history people have. a certain participant in this starmaker machinery (himself a product of the efforts of the grinding cogs in this machine) cannot, for the life of me, recognize musical styles.

seeing that i enjoy maroon 5, oasis and the cure - he thinks i like "acoustic." frankly i am even irked that acoustic is now a genre instead of a set-up. i said no, i like rock and alternative. he put on his "alternative" cd consisting of linkin park, creed and many other unspeakable things. for crap's sakes! he asked me if i listened to scorpion, and asked if that was rock. I AM VERY OFFENDED. oh, and he refers to lito camo compositions as dance and house. what the ****?!?!

needless to say, i had a smile plastered to my face the whole day, for the sake of etiquette.

fortunate encounters

though today was long and tedious (i don't think i've ever been so impatient in a car), i was so glad to see people i haven't been with for a long time. of course i was kind of anticipating it - i had scheduled that cheap rapper for to be a guest on angel radyo, where i interned almost two years ago. so i went there and saw my old bosses. i really think the place is nice for interns. they really do make it easy for the students to fit into the groove of the station. i had a good time there. nobody minded that i was much more quiet that the rest of the interns. sadly the place was bare, devoid of staff. i hope it's just today, though the technician said many people have left the company. anyway, i had a polite chat with two hosts: sir tony cuevas and sir... hmm.. so sorry i forgot his name but he's a very endearing gay man who works there... and ma'am margie the news director who's thinner with long hair, has a new foster kid with her afp husband... and of course sir loi landicho the program director and kuya brendo the technician. i kept badgering them to trade their jack skellington ashtray with me. clearly jack is an underrated member of their office! well, sa joey naman daw kasi yun. dammit, i should have asked nikki to get it for me before he left! as always i asked where co-interns are and who followed me from my school... it was really fun. they took quite a bit of our time, but i'm glad since i was able to talk to them. serendipitous were the two other encounters. at abs-cbn, i saw my blockmate jen lanuzga exiting the building. she was really thin. (speaking of which, thanks kuya bren for thinking i lost weight since my internship.) i gave her a hug and it was really genuine surprise! natulala nga siya, as she said. and i do miss those hugs that all of us in the block share especially during early mass comm mornings and after gruelling hours of schoolwork. i also saw broadguild batchmate chris del rosario at the newsroom. unfortunately we weren't able to talk. ah, the past it just too romantic for me.

scrooge

my boss told me not to charge cab fare going home (take note, it was at 1 am). i kind of hate her for it. the finance officer kind of pulled that one before, but hers was more reasonable since she was talking of a decent hour of the day. i understood and agreed. and it sucks that the next time i have to stay out late, i'll have to go through this whole confrontation again. i feel at a loss for being the new kid.

saturday stood out for me this week. it was one of those days i love - incredibly tiring but oh so fun. Lunch with my sister and her boyfriend, afternoon shopping with my holy girl May, a free show and dinner with my whole org (and the poochers, of course). May and Jennie Jo picked me up again for a nightcap at Mayric's. amazing - one whole day of pure fun. how often does that happen to a city girl? i mean, unless you set your mind to it, it rarely happens. i guess i was really focused yesterday. my sister and her boyfriend hilariously helped me fend off a freak who was texting me over lunch. it's funny how differently women see things compared to men. what may just seem polite to us is actually encouraging for them... or at least not discouraging enough. finally, we all came up with something polite enough, cold enough and clear. here's to hoping he really got the message. may and i gossiped and shopped till we couldn't walk no more. she dished out good stuff, no doubt. hehehe... skipp picked me up at greenbelt 3, along with annie. after a snack at mcdo philcoa (where jill joined us), we passed by for deng and chely en route to the applicants' final prod venue. mark, leo a.k.a prince charming (with a plus-one) and ais (with a plus-one too - just her long lost best friend mark) a.k.a princess charming were already there. so was rolan. and pam (a young padawan) who dressed up as minnie mouse. it was pretty impressive until brian (broadguild make gigolo) showed up as a shakespearean prince...with a plus one three - his own male gigolo named ken. sa wakas, nakahanap ng katapat. hahaha! the applicants had a crazy fairytale show. the fairy guild-mother in drag would give many of the men nightmares exposing leghair underneath white tights and a tutu and "mulawin" eyebrows.. *cringe* they also posted arrows to navigate the house, which turns out to be a practical guide to navigating the dating scene: "le pasukan" - pussy, "le labasan" - dick, and "forbidden grounds" - ass. hahaha... of course, there are exceptions to the rule. after much hullabaloo over how to meet may and jennie jo after the show, we finally ended up two cars away on tomas morato. jennie jo was too funny - making a fuss on where to take a u-turn. she missed all the legit ones, so she still had to break the law. hahaha! parallel parking seems to follow her everywhere, but she got it right this time. we watched two bands, only 5 songs each. one was a punk-ska band, the other was a new wave one. they were quite good. next time we should arrive earlier. back as the baby of the family today, i accompanied my parents to do the grocery-shopping. oh, and i bought a single ticket to the alicia keys show on october 9. i got a pretty good spot. hehehe.. quite a lonely predicament, but music's music. i don't care what the pretty salesgirl says. =)

freud's wonderland

my mind last night would probably have been freud's wonderland. i had around 3 weird dreams that i could almost be sure were separate and yet they bled into each other. i even thought i was awake, remembering what i dreamt of earlier, only to find out that what i was recalling became the springboard for a new adventure... anyway...

first, i saw an old flame in rockwell. he was all dressed up, in a long-sleeved shirt and tie, flat-front trousers - but the shirt was untucked and he had a mailman bag (like a stupid little punk). i think he said it was because he had just come from mass or some such function and he just wanted to relax. hmm.. very unlike him. anyway, we went home to hang around and he got EVEN MORE comfortable! (the trousers may have come off. without coaxing.) needless to say, we had quite a good time afterwards. oohh la la... (i actually want to bash my head in, in any case, for enjoying that dream immensely... well, i could always blame a friend for starting a risque conversation last night, which i enjoyed immensely as well. but i'm not guilty about that, hehehe.)

after that we were walking around somewhere and the poochers were in the same place, milling around. and for some reason we launched into one of those old childhood games, taguan, i think (which i hate). and i didn't want to play. i said it a lot like i said so before when the org played hide and seek in one of our sem enders.

i dunno what happened next. i remember there's another dream, and it might have been with my holy girls... hmm. ah, some things should happen in real life.

self-image issues

we all struggle with our own self-image, and we embody both what we love and what we loathe. and we live with it: our weight, skin, hair, ethnicity, personality, and our character. and we nurture it. some may starve, others might be bloated by now. after 21 years of it, i have finally come to believe that i am attractive. and to believe it is to exude it. i've almost proven it to myself. until i realize: i don't actually attract people to me. after working my ass off to be a little slimmer, slimmer just doesn't cut it anymore. everyone's slim now. everyone dresses well. and the fact that i'm a tad bit more glamorous and original (flamboyant or ostentatious, even) is something that is way beyond men. and it's a lie that dusky features are making a comeback. trust me, the fair chinese/mestiza girls still have it. to top it all off, miko said it's quite nice to have a girl who's kikay and innocent - and he said that clearly i'm not the latter. i don't prattle. i speak when i have something worth hearing. i keep quiet and then i come on too strong. and i know too much. even to men who have more sophisticated taste, i am wanting. i end up too naive, too conservative, too sheltered and safe. sometimes maybe even too down-to-earth. too bitchy for the nice guys, too nice for the jerks. and this all puts me back in the never-ending struggle for self-improvement. to make a habit of taking care of myself is something that i must learn, and that the revelation of my persona is an art to master. (*shock*horror*gasp* am i a non-leveler?!?!)

work it!

two things:
1) i know now how you have to work for everything that you want to happen.
2) i know now how people can fall out of the circuit.

1) my dad explained to me how i must strive to find out about the big picture and the little details. and that i'm not really entitled to anything. well, he didn't tell me that. i just realized it, as an adjunct to the fact that i must work for everything. although the feeling of entitlement helps with dreaming big. there is much to be learned and there is much coaxing out to do. sir ton ton told us that there will always be an opportunity for those who want to learn. but i always feel left behind. like i'm a late adapter. or that i missed the bandwagon. that really sucks. but there's nothing else to do but to try to catch up. am i not a go-getter enough?! i have friends i look up to in terms of achievement and i keep on thinking, am i lazier? dumber? prissier? more naive? too boring? too safe? i'm fucking magna cum laude, damn it. if everyone's greeting me, then it has to count for something! but i always suspected it doesn't mean shit. and right now, it really feels like it doesn't. I have such a long way to go, and i do hope i'm on the right track. (oh lord, teach me how it's done, show me where to go...)

2) it dawned on me why lovers want to live together, why friends lose touch, why we forget to hear mass or pray, why we get fat and still not exercise, why we can't follow trends anymore... there just isn't enough time, it seems. not that i don't have time anymore. au contraire, i'm lucky to be able to talk to friends and family still. but it's been a while since i exercised, and i haven't been watching enough tv (there's such a thing pala). if you still want to sleep 8 hours a day, good luck.

ambition and entitlement... why do i want to have it all?!

"o kay bilis naman ng buhay, pati tayo natangay..." - sugarfree

buzzed

i'm so buzzed about this thing my sister saw in the paper. i'm so glad they pointed it out to me! the first asian music & marketing conference. i really feel like i need to go. it's extremely expensive but of course i'm willing to pay. but as with all marketing conferences, this one will be held on 2 weekdays. i really hope that i'm allowed to go without filing for leave of absence. hey, maybe if they're really generous, they'll make it a company thing. it really might be good for me. i went to the site but there's no data there yet. and i'm still waiting for the programme/schedule of activities, and other details like that. i want to pitch it to my boss asap since there's an early bird discount. actually last night, i was really antsy about it, i couldn't sit still at all...

for more... ambition...

...world domination, even...

for now i'll start with trying to take control of my life. =)

ambition

i'm bothered by the fact that on my third day of work, i'm already worrying about the groove of my office.

i don't know if it's a premature generalization but i feel that not everyone here gets the big picture. i don't think there's a main objective that everyone works toward. i feel like the rank-and-file (including me) are only made to understand our own individual tasks, which really just makes things inefficient. if a person doesn't know how things affect each other and how a small detail will contribute to an ultimate goal, then he won't take the menial tasks seriously. critical thinking won't be developed and a narrow perspective will be set. it's just that i don't feel that enough is being communicated to me in order for me to be really oriented to a specific company outlook. frankly, older employees don't seem to have the company outlook either. this leads me to believe that maybe there is no company spirit (like school spirit, huh?). i don't know if it's a lack of structure in policies and procedures (or maybe there are none?), i haven't been told everything. handbook please! listening session please! anything's welcome. nothing's very formal. not even the informal things seem to be formal enough to be passed on as company culture. my officemate told me there's no regular office meeting... what?!?! i wanna know what's going on! there may be less responsibility this way, but how the hell will i know what i'm liable for?! it's the only way i can police myself. i may not be able to be a boss to anyone, but certainly i want to be able to discipline myself. i really want to know how this thing runs, and how will i if no one is telling me anything? (i know how a record company runs, duh, i read up on it. but i want to know it in its practical sense.) knowledge creates a more intense hunger.

i have managerial ambitions! i want them fulfilled!!

p.s. my sis says there's a conference on music in marketing or something like that. i have to check it out.

smoking pope!

dinner at ais' was a feast - ready to cook beef teriyaki, vienna sausage and mark's own pork adobo. oh, and i was happily suited "down" in shorts and flipflops after my pants, sneaks and socks were soaked from the rain. i tried to continue to wear my huge grape earrings but my earlobes were already swollen. a queer predicament. i ended up sporting leo's clear glasses. for more sultry nerds.

ais, mark, and leo arrived at chaquico's and we were welcomed by my batchmate april who manages pope. sir reev went too, mentor extraordinaire, at least to us who want to be part of the starmaker machinery. the place wasn't hostile, thank god (i even spotted a cutie). but it's damn expensive. at least 200 bucks worth of food and drink each; i'm glad dinner was free.

pope's good. his band has potential but they still need to practice. they don't sound quite gelled enough. later into the first set though, they really got into the groove of things. they lost it by the second set, sadly. daming sablay. magaganda pa naman mga covers nila. (#41, message in a bottle, demon, sunshine of your love, interstate love song, everlong). what can i say? freeway jam still does a better cover of cream (aba'y syempre, panahon at genre nila talaga yun, gurang nga sila! nahasa na sa tugtugan!. oh, and that MAYBE i'd produce them if their sound was intrinsically DISTINCT.

speaking of freeway jam, i realized that nikki had already played there before (he also complained of the prices). he sang for legendary guitarist wally gonzales' new classic rock act. upon leaving, i saw that the wally gonzales band still played thursdays.
i wonder if he still sings for them. something to spend 200 pesos and lose sleep over? hey, he's supposed to be a legend anyway... we'll see...