Tired Of Always Being On The Defensive

I find my smile getting awkwarder and awkwarder. By any chance, have you, my dear reader, noticed? 

A few hours ago, I was trying to come up with an articulate post on how sad I feel about the tragedy that struck Japan. But no words can apparently describe the magnitude of Japan's loss. 

There were a lot of pleas for prayers. But at that moment, praying was the last thing on my mind. I was just staring at the television screen in slack-jawed disbelief over the massive tsunami that hit Japan. Being renowned for their ability to create the niftiest gadgets, I was half expecting they'd pull out a gear or two up their sleeves and deflect the tsunami like a waterproof coat deflecting raindrops. But as it turned out, they are no more invulnerable to the forces of nature than the rest of the world. 

I grieve for the loss of life. I couldn't fathom how painful and how devastating it must be to lose family members, loved ones and dear friends all in the blink of an eye. I can't even imagine how one can begin to move on from there.

It puts everything into perspective. Rather than pray, I found myself contemplating on a myriad of things--mostly about life and death. I mean it's not everyday that you get to see a tsunami wash away a whole city live on national television. It is life-altering. 

But death is not something uncommon.

We see it on the news every single day. Not as graphic but death all the same. 

The massive loss the world experienced over the past few months is nothing short of astounding. 

To say that people are now dreading the comeuppance that is expected to arrive full force in 2012 is an understatement. But have we forgotten? There really is no assurance in life and death, is there? Some people don't even get to live past 16.

Tragedies - they are wake-up calls for us to stop living like soulless automatons and start getting a real life - one with more meaning. More purpose.

If we truly wanted to do all those who perished in natural tragedies these past few weeks and months justice, all we can do is start living our life in a more purposeful way. Not as humans who merely exist under the dictatorship of the society. 

Here I am again with my endless preaching. I am sorry if i bore the crap out of you. I felt like venting today because of some people who have a mindset as narrow as a fishing rod. But I figured I shouldn't waste even half a minute of my day wasting my time on people who clearly do not wish to be anything other than being their old crappy self. So there you go. If you are reading this and you know that it is you, I'm letting you be a nuisance to yourself.

More than a couple of people said this ensemble look J-pop-esque. It wasn't intentional. I still have a bit of hang-over over Kim Tae Hee's fabulous outfits in My Princess.

I finally had a chance to meet my US-based friend Jemalyn. We had fun scouring thrift stores and taunting each other over our spending habits. She ended up with a pile of cutesy stuff and I ended up with this top and pair of shoes. Lovely. I miss hanging out with my closest friends. In this day and age, all you can do is spend a lot of time with people who you care most about and dispense with the trifling and inconsequential things.

Can You Tell Me More Sweet Nothings?

And here goes another Cristin O'Keefe Aptowicz (her last name is a mouthful) masterpiece. 

After Reading Old Unrequited Love Poems

If I didn’t think it’d make me appear crazy still,
I’d apologize to you for having been so crazy then.

Reading the poems I had written about “us”
resurrected all that nervous heat, reminded me
of the insistent stutter of my longing,
how I could never just lay it out there for you.

The answer, clearly, would have been
no, thank you. But perhaps that tough line
would have been enough to salvage all
that was good and woolly about us: your laugh,
 
that golden ring I’d always stretch a story for;
the pair of mittens we’d split in the cold

so we’d each have a hand to gesture with;
how even now, the paths we took are filled

with starry wonder and all that bright limitless air.

I’m sorry I could never see myself

out of the twitching fever of my heartache,
that I traded everything we had for something

that never ended up being. But if I could take
any of it back, it wouldn’t be the glittering hope
 I stuck in the amber of your eyes, nor would
it be the sweet eager of our conversations.

No, it would be that last stony path to nothing,
when we both gave up without telling the other.

How silence arrived like a returned valentine
that morning we finally taught our phones not to ring.

***

Have you ever found yourself out of breath, gasping, for the sheer exertion of racing after time? I have. It would seem like the past few weeks have been nothing short of hectic. 

A minute feels like half. A day feels like an hour.

In the morning, I would doze off after hitting the snooze button, futilely putting off the inevitable. After what feels like a second, my alarm clock would start prodding my brain to finally face the day, albeit reluctantly. It's a bit ironic how I would find myself at the end of the day, crawling to my bed in utter exhaustion, like a wounded animal and wake up in the morning pretty much doing the same thing.

But enough about the whole i-desperately-need-to-hibernate drama. 

I've been saving this whole ensemble for the longest time now. I called upon the girly-girly forces hovering around me and finally made myself wear it before the ensemble gets buried under piles of clothes in my closet. So there you go--my "my princess-esque", lacey-lacey, girly-girly outfit.

PS: I badly need to lose weight. Any healthy suggestions?

I'm On A Roll

"I can believe things that are true and things that aren't true and I can believe things where nobody knows if they're true or not.

I believe that mankind's destiny lies in the stars. I believe that candy really did taste better when I was a kid, that it's aerodynamically impossible for a bumble bee to fly, that light is a wave and a particle, that there's a cat in a box somewhere who's alive and dead at the same time (although if they don't ever open the box to feed it it'll eventually just be two different kinds of dead), and that there are stars in the universe billions of years older than the universe itself.

I believe in a personal god who cares about me and worries and oversees everything I do. I believe in an impersonal god who set the universe in motion and went off to hang with her girlfriends and doesn't even know that I'm alive. I believe in an empty and godless universe of causal chaos, background noise, and sheer blind luck.

I believe in absolute honesty and sensible social lies. I believe in a woman's right to choose, a baby's right to live, that while all human life is sacred there's nothing wrong with the death penalty if you can trust the legal system implicitly, and that no one but a moron would ever trust the legal system.

 

I believe that life is a game, that life is a cruel joke, and that life is what happens when you're alive and that you might as well lie back and enjoy it." - Neil Gaiman, American Gods

 I'm really not reading anything. hoho. Contrived much?

Neil Gaiman is my personal literary hero. No one can be as jaded while simultaneously being inspiring as Neil Gaiman. If only I can be half as inspiring as he is, I can probably save the drunkards in my neighborhood from their impending doom.  

But anyway, I was planning on posting this some time next week since I don't like to be a weekend-only-blogger...but what the hey! There's no difference anyways. And I promised myself I'm never letting social norms and expectations eat me alive. So there you go. A new blog post.

And by some unadulterated miracle, my ability to put words together is finally coming back. Imagine that. I have to tell you my secret. Empanda. You know, that orange thing filled with papaya, egg and longganisa deep-fried in oil. It has to be eaten with spicy sukang iloko. It will rev up your brain like no other.

Now that I can think far more clearly, I have arrived to a tentative decision. I'm going to quit lookbook. haha! I haven't had much success gaining hypes or whatever it is you have to gain from there. And I just discovered that Lookbook pretty much filters outfit posts from users with a comparatively low Karma. I don't get it. The whole purpose of posting outfits is to gain more Karma. If they're not going to show your photos to all users, how in the world are you going to get more Karma?

So my tiny world is going to get significantly tinier with me inconspicuously being MIA in lookbook. Not that my absence is going to be missed.

Moving on, if you have noticed, this blog underwent a few changes. How do you like the new layout so far? I don't claim to be a graphic guru but I hope this new layout is good enough for you to want to come back to my blog. T__T

About the outfit:

I'm really not in the habit of checking back labels. I go thrift shopping a lot. Like 2 times a month or more. And I buy in bulk. I know! It's crazy. But that's the beauty of thrifting. You can shop sans the guilt. You can buy very cheap items. Most of them are still in good condition. 

outer: blazer, thrifted

inner: lace top, thrifted

shorts: bubble polka dot shorts, thrifted

hair accessory: lace made into a headband

My Eyes Zero In On Anything With Dots And Lace

Thrift shopping is so addictive! You'll get heaps of stuff in the price of one item in the department store. I rarely shop in department stores these days because I can't find the clothes I want. I don't want to end up wearing clothes everyone else is wearing.

Perhaps I'll take photos of my last thrift haul for this year tomorrow. But today, I'm practically brain-dead and my hands are still aching from this week's ultimate writing challenge. I had to do my work for the 24th and 31st in advance so I can take a much-needed holiday! I haven't gone shopping for Christmas presents yet but I'm already broke as a joke. Excuse me while I take a moment to weep over my lack of self-control. But anyway I am counting on the fact that December is the month when money is like quicksand on your hands. Before you know it, it's gone. So it's probably not just me! hehe.

Before I end this post with a few more photos, may I just say I absolutely adore the dress I am wearing in these photos? Its a lace dress that was thrifted by my sister last Tuesday. It's positively divine!

outfit details: 
lace dress: thrifted
vest: local department store
boots: thrifted
rings: sister's