August 20, 2004

gifts

this year, i'm treating myself to two of the material things i've been wanting to have for the longest time...

first, a drawing tablet. come august 29 (ehem, my birthday *hint hint* Ü), i'll pick up a wacom graphire 3 from my suking tindahan. ooohhh excitement!

second, a new guitar. it's been almost a year since my housemate accidentally broke my old lumanog (an heirloom from my mother *sniff*), and i've already forgotten most of the chords of the songs i love to play. yesterday, the donjon company had a sale at robinson's place malate, and the price is too sweet to resist. but more importantly, the feeling is right -- it's about time i play some music again. and so i went home with a blue, fiberglass-backed, amplifier-ready beauty. hmmmm mmm mmmm...

above all else, though, it's the blessings i've been getting this past year that i'm most thankful for...

i'm blessed with the most beautiful nephews and nieces. two boys and a girl from my sister-in-law, and just last march my sister gave birth to their first baby girl. i'm honestly not fond of kids, and they tend to cry when i'm around. but these four young souls are different, and i love them so much.

my parents are in good health, thank goodness. my mother has kept her blood pressure at normal levels. recently she went down with pneumonia, and had to stop work for four weeks, but she's well now (and gained weight as well from all the rest and recuperation. heehee!). my father's diabetes is under control, and i hope he's sticking to his regular exercises.

i'm in good health. i added a few pounds and gone are the dark rings around my eyes. the gym has worked wonders, too. it's been years since i felt this good.

for the friends that never left my side, wherever they may be, and for the friends i never realized i had. now more than ever i value all those who never pull their punches when i deserve them, because they also are the ones who will never abandon you. for those who never forget who i am and what i represent, for those who were there for me in my darkest hour, for those who have forgiven me even before i could begin to forgive myself, for the new friends that came into my life -- i'm forever thankful for them.

these, and the countless other blessings life has given me, whether or not i even comprehend them, i'm most grateful to God.

August 10, 2004

images

i've taken over two thousand snapshots in the entire two years i owned a digital camera -- a gallery of scenes, faces, places, and random images that now takes up over a gigabyte of my hard disk.
 
officemates, foreign places, festivals, grasslands, friends, school scenes, classroom scenes, churches, church scenes, strangers walking by, strangers talking, passing cars, dog in the street, cat in the corner, a flock of birds, drunk friends, flowers, caterpillars, rainfall, friends in the rain, sea, ships, boats, beaches, beautiful people, sunset, sunrise... so many images, taken as random as my eyes can blink, each holding within a small memory.
 
and just now i learned that only less than a hundred contain my image. Ü

August 04, 2004

again. again! again!!!

it's august. this is my month.
 
the air gets colder, and mornings get more vibrant each day. it heralds the coming of the "ber" months, just one of many reasons why this month is special.
 
it also triggers a storm in my faulty-wired head -- that overwhelming urge to look back at life in the past year.
 
so many failures, so many unlearned lessons... Life is again poised to crack her whip at my already raw and bleeding hands.

I want these back

I can't recall the last time I doodled, and out of nowhere, this came out today during our flag ceremony. Okay, maybe not ou...