"The Soundtrack of My Life"

I got this from mayette. I thought it was fun, so I opened my iTunes music library.

Here’s how it works:

1. Open your library like iTunes, Winamp, Media Player, iPod and so forth.
2. Put it on shuffle.
3. Press play.
4. For every question, type the song that’s playing.
5. When you go to a new question, press the next button.
6. Don’t lie and try to pretend you’re cool.

1. Opening Credits:
In My Place - Coldplay

2. Waking Up:
Could It Be Any Harder – The Calling

3. First Day at School:
With Arms Wide Open - Creed

4. Falling in Love:
I Dare You To Move - Switchfoot

5. Fight Song:
The Reason - Hoobastank

6. Breaking Up:
Unbelievable – Craig David

7. Prom:
The Blowers Daughter – Damien Rice

8. Life’s Ok:
Kumot at Unan - Boldstar

9. Mental Breakdown:
Too Bad - Nickelback

10. Driving:
One Last Breath – Creed

11. Flashback:
In The End – Linking Park

12. Getting Back Together:
Warm Beer, Cold Women – Tom Waits

13. Wedding:
Best I Ever Had – Vertical Horizon

14. Birth of a Child:
Dreams – The Cranberries

15. Death Scene:
Rape Me – Nirvana

16. Funeral Song:
How Do You Love - Collective Soul

17. End Credits:
Freedom - Jimi Hendrix

I love no. 17 and 8, so apt and so Cameron Crowe. No. 2 and 15 are hilarious! I am bothered though of no.1. I am still learning how to drive, shall I continue?

The Phallic Mushroom

(Parental advisory: mook content)

I felt I am a broken piece and I should be allowed to feel shattered.

So I went home during the holy week to lick my wounds and
wallow  in the mud.

When I was home, my annoying nephews spoiled my supposed
time for self indulgence. 

Every morning they would jump into my bed to wake me up. They
would pull the sheet and my blanket and push me into the floor.
They would clamp my eyelids open.

My vacation would be greeted with anticipation and great
excitement.They would always wait for my arrival by the street
and they would run to hug me and carry my things.

They are are sweet. They adore me.

But it comes with a price. It means I have to go biking with them
in the field to gather fruits and vegetable, or hunt birds with them
in the forest with a slingshot or we would climb the hills whenever
they feel like it. Or we would swim in the river. This activities
are forbidden. They are allowed only if I am around.

And I would tell them stories before they go to bed. 

I have told them all the stories I could recollect. So,I have to
invent and recreate stories from bits and pieces of my childhood
memories. One time, they asked for a story, I ran out of stories
so I related this naughty story told to me by our neighbor when I
was, I think, about five years old. The story brought them to
laughing fits and they literally rolled on the floor.

The story goes:

 (The backdrop of the story is our rustic barrio, circa 1970s.
You see in the barrio, girls are coy: The type who would cover
their mouth with their hanky when the smile; The type who
would just flatter their long eyelashes when accosted by
gentleman.)      

The rainy month of August is the season for gathering wild
mushrooms. According to old wisdom, during rainy season
mushrooms hiding beneath the ground would come out.
Apparently,the sudden streak of lightning and roar of thunder
would startle the mushroom hiding beneath the ground.
Panicked and astounded, these mushrooms would come out
and the ground would break open, the way a popcorns burst
from the pan when heated. 

Pedro, our "bida" in the story is in love with Maria. However,
he is afraid to show his interest or declare his love to Maria.
Maria’s father is strict and his preoccupation is sharpening
every bolo or knife in their home. 

One day, Pedro overheard Maria and his friends talking about
their plans of gathering mushroom in the field.Pedro thought it
was his last chance, so he devised a plan.

The following day, Pedro went to the field where there was
plenty of mushroom and buried himself lying from his back on
the ground… except his “mushroom”(…nakalitaw lang kabute
niya).

Soon after, Maria and her friends came. They grabbed very
mushroom they saw and filled their basket. As luck would have
it, it was Maria who saw Pedro’s “mushroom”. She grabbed the
mushroom but she could not pull it from the ground. She was
confused because the stronger she pulled, the mushroom was
getting sturdier and harder. Even bigger. Thinking that that
the mushroom was planted firmly on the ground she thought of
softening the soil around it.

Maria peed on the mushroom.

Ok I am a bad bad Uncle!

Drama King

…when the thunder storms start
increasing over the southeast
and south central portions
of my apartment, I get upset

and a line of thunderstorms was
developing in the early morning
ahead of a slow moving coldfront
cold blooded
with tornado watches issued shortly
before noon Sunday, for the areas
including, the western region
of my mental health

 and the northern portions of my ability to deal rationally
with my disconcerted precarious emotional situation,
it's cold out there colder than a ticket taker's smile at the
Ivar Theatre, on a Saturday nigh flash flood watches
covered the southern portion of my disposition...

Underscored by the above song Emotional Weather Report by
TomWaits, I was in the mood for drama.

The phone rang. I wiped a tear from myleft eye and answered in a
melancholic “hello”. 

 “So, how are you?” my friend Kate.

 I thought of a heart rending remark… that best capture my inner
turmoil:“Shattered. I want to escape this smoking wreckage called
my life.”

“For crying out loud, stop speaking in metaphors! I get confused.”

“Ok, I flunked the bar exam and this is the worst time of my life.
Satisfied? You?”

“I was diagnosed with this worst kind of diabetes; I have to be
 injectedwith insulin once in a while. Plus, I have a heart problem.
The doctor said it’s serious."

 “So you called to compete with my misery?”

 She sobbed.

 I cried.

 We both engaged in lachrymal exhaustion.

 “If this is a crying contest, I give up. You win.”

 “How about dinner tonight? Lets celebrate”.

 “Celebrate what?”

 “Darn, our misery!”

 “Buti pa nga”

 “Sisig. Crispy pata.” We chorused.

a damp of excrement on a tissue paper

I failed in the bar exam.

I feel bad. No, that’s an understatement. I feel like ten frat men hit me on the gut a hundred times.

In the movie Sideways, there is a scene where the lead actor, fraught with so many frustrations in life, bottled up violent emotions, finally vented, cried hysterically to his friend and uttered the words:

“I am just tiny damp of excrement on a tissue paper, desperately reaching out to the sea.”

I spout the same words. I shed copious tears. I am weak. I blame my mother for raising me weak. Right now I want to return to her bosom and cry like a baby and she would hug me, hush and assure me that everything is gonna be alright.

I don’t know what went wrong. I have assembled my arsenal for the battle. I failed. This is my greatest defeat and everything around me just crumbled.

I am ashamed of the people around me: those people who have been counting on me, relatives and friends who have been supporting me one way or another. I am ashamed of my brother who is working on the other side of the word to support me during and after the bar exam. I feel bad that victory and joy I should have given to my already old parents had eluded them. I hope it will not be too late.

“What does not kill you will make you stronger”. “Life isn’t over after that single exam” “Everything happens for a reason. Accept and move on.”

I wish those kind words could ease the pain and frustration I feel.

I am such total failure.