Amidst the Storm

When a storm is raging deep inside you

You are assailed with big waves of hurt,

Anger, confusion or sadness

And you feel like you are just one small boat

Being rocked by the tempestuous wind and water

Let me know and I will come to you

I will brave the storm to cross the sea

Just to find you and be with you

I can make no miracles

I cannot stop the howling wind

Or the raging sea at will

But I can be your friend

Storm or no storm, I will share my life with you

I will be at my strongest when you are at your weakest

And in your darkest, gloomiest of days

Will I bring my light the brightest

My friend, always remember that I am just here

I am willing to share your pain

To be your listening ear, your crying shoulder

Or to simply "be there"

You are not alone, you have me

We will face the raging storm together

It may take a lot or a long, long time

But I do not mind being lost in the angry sea with you

For I know, we will surely

Bring each other home.

6 Things That I Will Never Tell a Loved One No Matter How Much I Love Him

1. You complete me. I am a complete person, not a fraction of someone else. I do not need someone to complete me. Love is a matter of complementing, not completing each other.

2. You are my life. My life is my own. I will not let myself be dependent on another person. He is merely a spice who makes living more meaningful.

3. You are my happiness. This is different from "he makes me happy" which for sure he does. I hold the key to my happiness. To put my happiness in another person's hands is like putting my life at his disposal. What if we weren't meant to be? Am I to lose my happiness or my life? Definitely not.

4. It was love at first sight. How can I possibly love someone I really don't know or I just met? Love takes time to grow in one's heart. It is gradually nurtured, not a spur of the moment feeling.

5. I am yours. I am not a property to be owned and neither is he. I want each one of us to grow individually without drifting apart from each other.

6. I will never hurt you. Because I probably will. It's just inevitable. Wittingly or unwittingly, I will hurt him, in one way or another. Sometimes, it is even our loved one who inflicts the most painful of pains and it hurts too much because we care and the person matters to us. Love is not absolute happiness. Nothing is.

Conversations with Myself: On Beauty

The Questions

Just look at you. So feminine and pretty. Is that how you define beauty now? With the neatly coiffed hair, the subtle makeup, all these dresses and skirts and "power suits" and whatnot? Whatever happened to that simple girl who used to balk at the mere idea of putting on makeup? To that impish child-woman who adorns herself with only her smile? 

Do you still remember your "hoyden" days? You were "one of the boys." You hated wearing skirts and feminine sandals and would rather starve than wear high heels. Your hair was cropped short or in instances when they were long, was almost always up in an artless ponytail or braids and seldom would you consult a mirror.

In you teen years, unlike snotty, always giggling giddy girls, you remained simple and unaffected and sneered at all those "snotty, feeling all-grown-up-but-with-brains-the-size-of-peas tweens whose stuck-up behavior made you swore to never be like any of them in whatever way or form. Some of those girls teased you mercilessly but you held your ground quite admirably. Unlike these "pa-girl" girls, you loved lugging your backpack around and were usually dressed in sneakers, tees and jeans. You even used to dress like Alex Mack, right?

Then you became sophisticated and I got scared. Where's the girl who I have been carrying a torch for all these years? I like the changes that I'm seeing but beneath those, what have you become?

The Answers

I have changed but I am still me. Why do some equate being sophisticated with being "maarte," even shallow? I've seen people treat women they consider as "eye candy" as "bimbos" only to be surprised when some of these "bimbos" converse to them with wit and style. My current case and the case of those "snotty, feeling all-grown-up-but-with-brains-the-size-of-peas tweens" in my teens are different. Don't generalize.

My job in the travel and tourism industry requires that I am always at my best, yes, even (well maybe, most of all), physically, too. I wear makeup only to enhance my natural assets. Femininity is not all about wearing skirts and dresses and putting on makeup. I can wear jeans sans the makeup and still look utterly feminine.

And you got it wrong. I did not become sophisticated. Sophistication became me. It is not those dresses and makeup and whatnot that make me look good. I make them look good on me.

Beneath the sophisticated exterior, the simple girl still lives. Look beyond the glitters and you'll find an even greater gem. My reality is defined not just by appearance but more by what my heart holds.

Common Grammatical Errors

I found these lists in the peyups.com forum (titled common grammatical errors). Some entries are really funny but are enlightening 'coz sometimes, we really are unaware that we commit grammatical errors, especially verbally. The written world is simpler, given the fact that we can edit and rewrite what we have written. But words, once they left our mouths sure won't come back. As said, the damage has been done, and an irreversible damage at that. Hope these will all help us to be more aware of our use of the english language. Have some fun too, while going along the list 'coz as said, some are really funny. :)

COMMON GRAMMATICAL ERRORS

1. Let's repeat it again once more for the second time around

2. It's up for you

3. Stand up everybody, the flag is being raised down

4. Form a circle and make it straight

5. Your grammatical error is incorrect

6. Anyways

7. I'll tell you what this is all about is

8. Stand up and sit down. (stand and sit are enough to convey the commands)

9. It's depends

10. More better

11. Last, last week (Filipinos are quite fond of using this. The correct term is the week before last)

12. I don't see no _____ (double negative)

13. With regards to (the correct form is with regard to)

14. Jewelries, informations, advices, furnitures (these words have no plural form. To make them plural, use pieces of or bits of )

15. Heard from someone: "Did you went to school today?"

16. Heard from someone: "Do you sure?"

17. Heard from someone: "Ayy, wrong mistake!"

18. Irregardless (double negative)

19. Heard from someone: "What did you did?"

20. Cope with" not "cope up with" But, you do say "keep up with." Ex. "It is hard to cope with the demands of single-parenthood."

21. The reason is that because of _____ (double negative)

22. At this point in time (use at this point)

23. A pleasant good morning (redundant)

24. His answer is more correct than hers. - if an answer is correct, nothing can be more correct than it

25. This circle is rounder than the other circle - all circles are round, no circle is rounder or more round than other circles

26. Forums (the plural form is fora)

27. Past history (redundant)

Here are some of the really amusing ones. Have a great laugh! :P

1. I couldn't care a damn!

2. What's your next class before this?( ANO RAW???!!!)

3. Nothing in this world is perfect except the word "change"

4. Can you repeat that for the second time around once more from the top?(ulitin natin hanggang mamatay tayo!)

5. My dad brought home a lot of hand-me-downs! (Translation: ang daming pasalubong ng tatay ko.)

6. Standard and Chartered Bank

7. I'm very iterated!!! (translation: galit sya!)

8. I'm sorry, my boss just passed away. (translation: kakadaan lang ng boss nya.)

9. Hello, my boss is out of town. Would you like to wait?

10. What happened after the erection of Mayon Volcano?

11. Don't touch me not!

12. Hello?... For a while, please hang yourself...

13. Its spilled milk under the bridge.

14. Don't change anything! Keep it at ease.

15. Hello McDo? Mag-i-inquire lang ako kung magkano ang kidney meal? ('yong pambatang pagkain)

16. You!!! You're not a boy anymore! You're a man anymore!

17. Out of fit ako these days eh... (translation: 'di sya nakakapag-exercise)

18. Come, lets join us!

19. Bring down the house down!

20. I'm the world champion of the World!!!

21. Mark ! Dan! Joboy! Come here both of you! I want to talk to you tomorrow morning 7AM sharp!!! RIGHT NOW!!!!

Hope you had a great time perusing over these lists as I had. :)

====================

taken from an e-mail I sent to my friends in 2003. Posted because of that funny interview of Janina, this year's Binibining Pilipinas Ms. World winner

You in a Very Special Place

Inside each one of us is a very special place

A place hidden from others and the place we go to

When we want to be alone and just be ourselves

Inside of me is my own private realm

The place where my past, present and future intersect

This is a place where secrets have no place

Here all about me is known - my vulnerabilities,

My dreams, my innermost fears, my untold yearnings,

My joys, my pains, my thoughts, my hopes...

And everything and everyone I cherish most

This is my place of questions and answers

My shelter of reasons and uncertainties

This is my sanctuary, the place where I weave

The tapestries of events in my life

To create a story all uniquely my own

This is a place where I and only I

Know of and can enter for only I hold the key

But through God’s design, someone comes along

To get past my barriers and to see the very special place

That no one had ever even glimpsed of before

With understanding and love, this person sees

All in my realm and much, much more

Amidst the pains, she sees the growing person within

And amidst the river of tears shed, she sees

An ocean freely flowing to meet the horizon with smiles

With great faith, she believes in what I can and will be

And since her coming, she has been gradually

Bringing into the open the bits and pieces

Of the self that I used to hide

With her, I have come to know and love my whole being

It feels good to be me but it feels even better and freeing

To know that I am accepted and loved as I am

By this person who is continuously adding new dimensions

To my sanctuary and has settled her self familiarly down

Her special corner in my realm where she will stay forever

And since here stay there, the very special place expanded

To include not only this person but other people as well...

That very special place is my heart,

A sheltered heart no longer but a universal one

Thanks to this person who is YOU - you who made me

See things in a different light and you who saw all of me

But had chosen to stay right here with me all these times

In spite of the bruised and flawed heart you saw

My heart has been changing since you came into my life

And so I thank you now, my dearest, special friend

For loving me as I am

And I give you an even greater thanks

For you are loving me in spite of my self

And at the same time motivating me

To rise above my limitations

By being an inspiration and a model to me...

Thank God for the gift of and God bless your good heart.

=============

for my best friend

Random Thoughts - # 3

Never underestimate the power of a woman with a way with words.

===================
inspired by Reese Witherspoon's quote:
"Never Underestimate a girl with a Harvard Law Degree and a french manicure!"

- from the movie Legally Blonde

"Evil" Stepmother

A person, they say, learns trust and other values in his early childhood. That wasn’t the case for me though because at the tender age of six, I learned to mistrust, be wary of and even be angry at some people.

Mom’s the second wife, you see, and this put her in the category of the “evil” stepmother. The children, my half siblings, were actually nice (I think children by nature are nice except when they were through some painful experiences like I was). It was the people around them who weren’t. In the neighborhood lived the sister of the first wife and she would tell my sister (I never referred to them as half sisters or brother except when I need to be politically correct) who was under her care to not go to our house. She forbade her to play with us and would go ballistic if she found out that my sister visited us.

Tongues kept wagging too. People talked about my mom a lot, always portraying her in a negative light. Some even went as far as saying that even when the first wife was still alive, she and daddy already had an affair. There were talks too about her being after my dad’s money.

I was only a child then but I was a child who was sensitive and very astute. Children are more susceptible to pain and so that time, I was the one grieving for my mom. There was even a time when I overheard a mother of a playmate said this to her son, “Don’t play with her because she is not nice. Like mother, like daughter.” Needless to say, I was raving mad. Why said such an absurdity to a child? What did we, innocent kids, know of or do to deserve that?!

Mom was very civil and polite about everything. She was too nice to a fault. She just told me to understand and forgive people, to make allowances for them. That they may say whatever they wanted to say but these really didn’t matter because we ourselves knew the truth.

I took my mom’s advice at heart but I vowed to myself to never fully trust people. I knew what people were capable of so I built walls around myself to shield myself from pains.

Not all people are cruel, of course, this being in line with the truth that not all stepmothers are “evil.” Mom was the best of mothers. I am my mother’s daughter, all right and I am so damned proud to be that. Like mother and daughter? I sure hope so because mom, unlike me, was very forgiving and the epitome of kindness and generosity. And these traits are what I hope to emulate always.

Now if only I can shed off my being jaded and cynical about people…

Scorched

you stare
with those penetrating,
soulful eyes...
i averted my gaze
and bit my lower lip
but the intensity
of your stare
burned.

i looked up
and,
finding myself
wanting,
stared back.

you smiled,
a dimple showing...
i squirmed in my seat
and quivered
as i watched you
come closer.

passion.
desire.
as primeval
as the blood
roaring in our veins.

heart pounding,
i watched you
cross the distance
for what seemed
like eternity...
then you are there
at last.

everything faded
out of focus
except for your eyes
and i was rendered
speechless
as i let myself
be lost
in them.