On Loop

An unfamiliar song played on my brother's desktop in 2002. The track title: On Your Side. The Artist: Pete Yorn. I heard it one sleepless night in high school. Before I knew it, I played the song on loop until I fell asleep. It was certainly not the first Yorn song that my awkward-neurotic teenage self liked. But the moment I listened to it, I knew it would be my favorite track from the album, Musicforthemorningafter.

Today, it's been more than ten years since I first heard On Your Side. Throughout the years, I've often returned to this song when I found myself quiet, alone, and unable to articulate things larger than myself: existence, growing up and apart, love, and in the general sense, most matters that inevitably escape us. While this entry will mainly be about the song and how it has become part of my life, I have to say listening to the entire album in high school foreshadowed how most of my relationships, and I, have turned out. It's one of those useless things people find out about their lives that make them feel like funny characters in fucked-up fiction (only here there are no real gods in machines. Just machines that have real hearts trying to make sense of such absurd disjunction).

Video: http://youtu.be/jclHisjkJYI
Song Lyrics:

I’m outside your house
2 am it’s dark
So many mistakes
Come back home from bars

I am on your side
I just want to tell you off

So many lies
Are taking hold
It’s not your fault
There’s many scars

I am on your side
It’s taken me a long time
I am on your side
I’m on your side

And I listen
Yeah I listen
Can you listen?
Now I’m listening

I am on your side
It’s taken me a long time
I am on your side
I’m on your side

(And I listen) I am on your side
(Yeah I listen) It’s taken me a long time
(Can you listen?) I am on your side
(Now I’m listening) I’m heading out tonight
(And I listen) I'm heading out tonight


The message of the song is comforting, as the music harmoniously complements its warm words of acceptance, "I am on your side and I listen..."

Growing up, I've always thought the voice of the man in the song is someone telling me he'll always be on my side. It's possible I've yet to meet this person, or have in fact met such person. Nevertheless, there is that person. Someone who will be there when I'm hurt, hopeful, happy, wrong and spiteful, arrogant and weak. It's a song that simply speaks about love and acceptance; a person who concedes that all other conditions do not matter because he has accepted the other person, for everything they've done, for what he/she is. While I've often wondered if there is such a thing as complete acceptance, the thought that it or something close to it exists somewhere is comforting.

Truth be told, I'm not sure if it's entirely possible for anyone out there to accept another person through and through, to love both their light and dark sides, put up with various disappointments. Relationships entail a lot of compromise; humans get tired. While we may eventually agree in relationships, we have to be honest enough to let another person understand why certain qualities/actions are unacceptable to us (yes this is me rationalizing).

These days, I prefer to think of the song's voice as the sound of my old self telling me, "It's taken me a long time, I'm on your side, and I listen, now I'm listening..."

What I'm trying to say is, I'm old enough to realize that I do not need a reassuring voice to affirm me all the time. I think I shouldn't give that burden to anyone but myself. I do get lonely, I seek company and need friends, but when it comes to affirmation, I'm only as secure as I allow myself to be.

Accepting who I am, what I've done, and what I've become has taken me a long time. While I am most grateful for my family and friends who have stayed all this time, no amount of company or attention from other people can mend my relationship with me but myself.

"Il souffira."

I gave up sleep just to find your name,

Now it's said and done, so say goodbye to the people we don't know.
Go back to sleep, and let's sail away to the beaches of Normandie.

The Inn at Kirchstetten

Notes penciled in the margins of a book 

of the Dichtungen of George Trakl

How can I thank you B, for your ear, your mind, your affection?

Some afternoons after we had given kisses we would recline

against the hard bolsters in the little inn reading and rewriting

my poems.

At first the idea of exchanging caresses with an almost heavenly

Being had frightened me. I committed little crimes so you would

Postpone this perilous happiness.

No one had told me that it was possible to make love to a voice.

Only someone who has not shared such love will condemn these 
writings.

The toy train which brought us to the town was so slow. It

stopped at every hamlet. Farm people got on and off. There was

a car for their animals: lambs, pigs, chickens. When it was very

slow we would become frantic with impatience. We had so little

time to be together.

Outside the window of the inn were the streets of the town, its

old houses. But if we watched hard enough the scene would

change into a landscape of fields, trees, a little lake and

mountains in the distance.

Horses went clip-clop down the cobbled street. It was a blessing

there were so few autos and motorbikes.

There was a gilt-framed mirror on the wall of the room. Why did

we see in it the reflection of only one person?

The sound of rain in the window. The sound of the wind. The

sound of the sun. Yes, even sunlight has its sound though only

lovers are likely to hear it.

You were disgusted by the big cockroaches that scuttled across

the floor until I convinced you they carried secret messages. Our

postmen.

I always bought flowers to talk when love had rendered us

silent.

Sometimes you would say, I can’t remember who we are. I have

to look at the shoes on the carpet to recall our names.

A strange ballet. The horizontal pas des deux. Hands mimicking

the dancer’s feet. Your long hair is your costume?

A bird struck the window with a thud and fell into the street. It

was eager to join us but couldn’t see the glass.

We read no more that day. There was nothing the book could tell

us. Paolo and Francesca, you said. We often heard faint footsteps

in the hall, not as heavy as those of the inn servants. You said it

was the revenants who wanted to be with us. You opened the

door but no one was there.

The inn servants seemed an honest lot but it was just as well to

tip them a bit too much. I used the name Reseguier but you

might have been recognized from your pictures in the magazines.

There were porcelain basins and pitchers, two of each, on the

stand and eider puffs in the bed, two fat white pancakes on the

matrimonial.

There was a picture on the wall which I couldn’t place, most

unusual for a village inn, not a religious or hunting scene. It was

an abstract drawing in several colors. A grid of little nearly

identical shapes connected by ink lines. Perhaps an artist from

the city hadn’t been able to pay his bill.

Sometimes, if you dozed, I would change the time on your watch

that you always put on the bedside stand. I knew you would

wake with a start and say it was time to go home, he would be

waiting for your company at tea. There were later trains on the

toy railroad.

Hot and cold weather, we went there for nearly a year. Who is

using that room now? Perhaps a series of lonely travelling

salesmen.

You must know that none of these things may ever have

happened, that we imagined them. . . How can we be sure it was

not all an illusion? Remember the wineglass you dropped and it

shattered? We tried to get up all the crumbs of glass but some

were too small and worked their way into the fabric of the carpet.

They would prove we were there.

-- James Laughlin

Unanswered Plea

I learn things by myself, which is why
it takes so long. I'm asking you
to be patient. That's not asking much.
I learn by myself, learn to cross the village,
it's not every day I recognize you
in the timberwork of the roof,
the builders' sweat alight in the air even now.
The river is sluggish here, the lake is asleep,
one's step less heavy, but I'm no longer
convinced I've read it right: instructions
for painting a woodpecker's wings in red
and black and red, and how to cast a spell upon
the ankles of a pregnant girl. I don't know
nor want to know her name, and maybe that's
the reason I can't breathe, but I won't forget
the way she makes me feel. Did I really
read it right? Okay, I accept these signposts
in the humid moss, in the backbone curving
throughout every season, in scarlet shells
cracked apart at the feast to which I'm called.
Yes, this I accept. But where in the language
should I look for you, when the language
is unworthy of what you are? It might be
that you assume a common form, such as love,
or maybe you're something awful down the road
that will, after all, come to pass.

- Aleš Debeljak

Shit got real.

So yeah. The teaching thing keeps me from finishing the previous series. Who would have thought. Also: Eternal torture to kids who don't read. Ha!

Nothing I dream is new

20 & anything goes

1. I have trouble holding down a job. In my first job, I was an account manager in a PR company for barely 2 months. I hated my boss and my officemates (there were only 5 of them, boss included.) I was a program researcher for a TV show but I only worked there 6 months. I hated the people there 100 times more. This is the reason why I couldn’t stay in one company: I have a hard time pretending to be nice around people I dislike / di ko vibes for various reasons (e.g. unprofessional, too loud, freeloaders, backstabbers etc.) The longest I’ve ever been employed was 10 months. I just bummed around and did freelance gigs, and mostly went to school in between all that.

2. I do miss having an office job. If ever I find another job, I’ll probably quit it again in less than a year. HA!

3. I loathe unnecessary plastikan. I’m getting too old for that.

4. Most of what I do today is influenced by my mood. I’m so afraid my mood swings have taken over my life that I can’t become productive anymore.

5. Despite my lack of commitment to any type of job, being late for classes or meetings, and not having any real structure in my life for the past 2 and a half years, I am in fact what you call a manang. Proof: I spend Friday nights at home with chips and soda / tea / coffee AND a lovely book. I don’t keep alcohol for myself at home (well, not anymore.)

6. On the evening of my high school graduation, I got a call from my old yaya who left when I was ten years old. After congratulating me, she asked if I already knew I was adopted. I had no idea what she was talking about, so I tried my best to sound unsurprised. I ended up sort of saying I’ve known it for a while. When I asked who told her I was adopted, she simply said one of our other maids (her cousin) revealed it to her. I didn’t believe her because something about how she knew a thing like that seemed fishy. However unconvinced, I still felt insecure. What if it was true? I started fishing for information from my brother, the other maids, and my folks. You could imagine how my heart dropped when my brother said he couldn’t remember our mom being pregnant with me. Of course he could have been too young to remember, but it still left me worried. Anyway, to cut the long story short, I talked to our oldest maid and I found out it’s just a joke one of the yaya’s made up which my old yaya apparently took too seriously. What a bummer.

7. I’ve had pneumonia 3 times in my 25 years of existence. Most of my friends know I quit smoking (except when I was in Dumaguete, but I haven’t touched a stick since I came back) and this, aside from my fear of getting cancer, is the reason why. I was 16 when I first got sick with it not knowing how serious it was after coughing and wheezing for a month. I got well after taking antibiotics for a week every six hours. The second time I had it was after a medical exam administered by the college I was attending. A week later the family doctor said I got it again. I got really scared the third time around (call me paranoid but I think it’s bronchitis!) I swear to god if I get it again it might be the end of me.

8. There was a time I dated a girl in college when my then boyfriend was away in Ilo-ilo. The girl turned out to have a girlfriend as well. An even sadder story? When we both decided to return to our partners, none of our relationships worked out. It took us a year to talk casually with each other again. We endured another 2 years of awkwardly working together on group projects (e.g. shooting a film for an entire semester.) After we graduated, I messaged her just to say I was sorry. The girl asked to meet me and I never replied. We’re still friends on FB.

9. I received an indecent proposal when I was working in GMA. A gay make-up artist tried to convince me to sleep with a lesbian balik bayan from the U.K. He thought I’d be delighted with the prospect of having a sugar mama. (I wonder why?)

10. Other indecent proposals: When I was 19, a girl who was stalking me on Multiply asked if I was interested in having a threesome with her and her ex-boyfriend. I was so young and innocent I turned it down. Today I think I should put this on my bucket list. (We’ll see?)

11. I have never seen A Walk to Remember.

12. Four years ago, I almost got caught with marijuana when the police stopped our car for a random check-point under the Katipunan flyover. My ex-boyfriend and I were in a friend’s car and we were smoking weed on our way to Mag:net (oh god where have I been?!) We noticed the police before hitting the U-turn slot and pulled over a few blocks. We opened our windows and turned the A/C on full blast. Our friend came prepared with Lysol. We hid the stash under my seat. After briefing ourselves with what to say when the police asked us stuff, we went for it. It was one of the scariest experiences of my life. Good thing they didn’t have a drug sniffing dog. I remember laughing like a retard after passing the police, but I was depressed for 3 days after that.

13. I was a member of our parish choir for 5 years. I used to love singing in church. I even learned how to play the guitar in church.

14. I am vacillating between agnosticism and atheism. Don’t worry; I am very tolerant with religious beliefs EXCEPT the bigoted kind.

15. I’ve tried sending my CV to schools in hopes of becoming a college professor. Good luck with that.

16. I am mostly insecure about everything because I know that whatever I do well can be done better by someone else. It’s a very humbling thought, and also a very inhibiting one.

17. Latest realization: Nothing’s / nobody’s worth all the trouble. At the end of the day, you only have yourself. Well, that’s just me.

18. I don’t invest energy on being liked anymore. I think I’m merely making life easier for all of us. I’ve let go of some social aspects of myself for a year now. I really don’t mind if people find me boring, inattentive, insensitive, aloof etc. It’s mostly true. And I find that being away from a lot of people keeps me from wondering what other people think of me (did I say anything offensive? did I do well enough? why is so and so mean towards me? etc.,) an activity which isn’t exactly productive either. But when I’m there, I’m there. I give you all my time and attention.

19. What makes me sad: Having impossible standards even I can’t achieve.

20. Truth: I am a better reader/critic than I am a writer. 

As much as I’d like to claim I am a writer, I’m not sure I’ll ever be good enough to become one. I've always had to remind myself that the writing and the poetry is all just part of it. The goal has always been to live.