Stalk-Friendly Google

My other site has this cool little box that shows the gateway people passed through to get to my blog. So, I can tell which sites serve as springboard for the people who find their way here. Imagine my shock when I saw one of the referrers: a google search for "chin, wett and alex." Yes, yes, you read that right. "Chin, Wett, and Alex" with the serial comma omitted. 

I am tired of hiding. Why bother? If these people want to find me, they won't stop until they do. I'm resentful that I've to keep packing up and moving just so I could avoid google searches. Kapoy na. Hago sige'g balhin-balhin. Sige, magpa-stalk na lang ko. I won't even bother hiding this site anymore. Though I'd rather poke my own eyeballs than be in the same room with some people (yes, her, especially, K), I won't run this time. Bring it on, fuglies.

Run with Me.

Get your shoes and put them on quickly. We’re going running. Sixty minutes, you and I, up the road, over that bend, past the ramshackle house at the end of the village.

Run with me so we can be tired together. Run with me so we can hurtle past everyone else dotting the road. We can be sweaty and tired all day. We can reek of sun and sweat and disappointments. I don’t mind. It can be fun. We can run until the seconds stretch into minutes and the minutes elongate into hours. We can run all day, even, and not bump into our many selves. We can run and run and pant and gasp and watch the sky as it turns orange. Yes, run with me and we will sprint until our calves throb more than our hearts do. We can glory in the half-pain. We can find meaning in the aching.

Run with me.

Fellatio, Meet Zaide.

I've never been bashful about complaining. In fourth grade, it was the spelling list. Our teacher made us spell rendezvous and a busload of other words with letters in them that shouldn't be pronounced. I wondered why fellatio wasn't part of the list. Some people insist "t" is pronounced as "th." Others believe "t" should sound like "sh." In my opinion, having to choose between "felatyo" and "felaysho" makes the word as interesting and study-worthy as rendezvous.

In first year high school, it was Zaide. My History teacher, Mr. Salinas, and I had humongous rows over the school's choice of prescribed History textbook. Why Zaide? Why? Why? I raged against Zaide's highly colored presentation of facts. "Zaide isn't narrating History; Zaide is writing an essay!"

Let it be put on record that Mr. Salinas is a pretty cool teacher. He was so cool, in fact, that most days, he simply laughed at my tirades and repeatedly challenged me to go discuss my concerns with the principal. One day, I did just that. I went to the principal and told her not only is Zaide destroying our ability to appreciate history, she is also encouraging us to freely rewrite facts to suit our storytelling methods. I also informed her it was Mr. Salinas who suggested I go see her. Mr. S was livid with rage. He turned the most ghastly shade of purple, and told me that since I found Zaide so reprehensible, I am most welcome to skip his class and spend my time in the library doing alternative schoolwork.

I no longer remember most of what transpired in the library, but I can still recall bonding with the librarian and reading Cornelius Ryan's books while munching on Japanese (yes, yes, those corn grits). The point of this long narrative, however, is not to make you go back in time and snivel at your own fond memories of high school. It is to point out that teachers ought to be more creative with their punishments. The end of my library detention didn't find me any more contrite or embarrassed. As a matter of fact, it made me develop the habit of visiting the principal so we could chat. Nuns are such lonely people.

Oh, and speaking of Zaide, I haven't changed my mind about his books; oh no, not one bit at all! I'll show you why. Gregorio and Sonia Zaide begin their  World History textbook with a highly creative take on the origin of humankind.

They ask, "Which is the true version of how life began – the story of creation or the theory of evolution?"

Then, they answer, "These two explanations on the origin of life are so different that it is not possible to reconcile them. That is why there are two different versions – and only one of them is true! The story of God’s creation of man is true, and we must believe in it because that is what the Bible says. The Darwinian idea that man evolved or developed from the ape is only a theory, not a positive scientific fact. It is full of gaps, especially with regards to the “missing link” between or the common ancestor of ape and man.”

And then, to cap off impressionable young minds' History meal, they add, "Towards the end of his life, Charles Darwin repented. He was asked what he wanted the world to remember and he answered: Tell them about Jesus Christ!”

Yes, friends and strangers, the Zaides defecated on your minds. At this point, only two courses of action would be the most appopriate:
1. Ask your high schools for a refund.
2. Stalk the Zaides online and when you find where they live, pelt their driveway with staplers, paperclips, and other office supplies.  Do this while you scream, "This one's for Darwin!"                  

Now, go mull over which action you feel like doing and while you're at it, don't forget to do Darwin's bidding. Tell them about Jesus Christ.

Sweetness

"I'm eating ube ice cream because I remember you."

Aaw. Isn't that sweet? If this girl doesn't have a boy who dotes on her already, I'm going to swear off men and ask her to be my girl.  

Hello, Friday.

I'm on my second can of delicious guilt-free coffee. Yes, that's what it says so on the label, and now that I'm 24 and my waistline isn't getting any smaller, I think there are worse vices in the world than getting drunk on caffeine. I hunker before my monitor and try shaking my brain into worker ant mode. But the objects on my desk prove too distracting, and instead of churning out sentences as I've been told to do, I end up admiring the fragile, white-crepe Japanese lamp sitting on my table. It really is pretty, this lamp. And it really is cluttered, my desk.

Speaking of clutter, I am going to spend my time littering the world with reminders that at one point, I, too, had been among the mass of humanity who led "lives of quiet desperation." I'm going to leave cluttered proof of my existence everywhere so that when I die, people are going to break into wild, abandoned weeping every time they think of me, perhaps because they miss me or because they are just so relieved I have left God's beautiful Earth.

Ah yes, hello, Friday.