I counted three fine ladies who’ve sent me missives of affections and cards of happy wishes that I, for some reason (s), kept all these years. And oh how they buoyed my soul!

In those missives were written fresh hopes, shared dreams and promises of forever. I have known a handful of women, but the memories of the three I will always cherish.

I’m a man of letters myself and I simply love letters and cards (a forgotten art these days). I’m old fashioned that way. Now, I can write an opinion or my thoughts as easily as I brush my teeth, but my affections I write with agonizing sincerity and I give with childlike humility. A simple greeting card, an empathetic song lyric, a careless personal note - love letters all! These things come from the soul and each one is a monument to friendship, love, and trust.

There’s a degree of sincerity shared between the giver and the receiver, so much more with personal letters of affections. Those persons, in different times, understood and appreciated me somehow, and I trusted their affections without doubt. I remember their smiles and the twinkle in their eyes so long ago and so far away. I was admired once and maybe even loved by those people. I believe I have loved them in different degrees and I terribly miss them all. But sadly mortal love is not forever, only God is.

So many worldly things clutter our minds and delude our souls, but nothing cuts deepest than indifference.

**********Thanks for the memories ladies.**********

WHERE DOES THE LOVIN’ GO
(Music and lyrics by David Gates)

Tell me where does the lovin’ go
When it’s gone away
Tell me when does the heartache end
Or is it bound to stay

I always thought that we would last forever
A love that never, ever would be ending
But now I see it isn’t meant to be
And I’ve got to stop pretending

Tell me where are all the dreams
That we used to share
Are they lost to some other time
Or will they still begin

I can’t believe that my place could be taken
My heart so easy breaking up inside
Cause after all this time
I thought of you as mine
And it’s hard to let go
My heart says no

And I never knew we were losin’ touch
I didn’t think we could change so much
Don’t take your leave of me just yet
Smile for me once more
So I won’t forget

Tell me where is another chance
Like the one we knew
Tell me where can I find someone
Someone just like you

I can’t imagine what I’m gonna do
Cause I’ve lived my life for you and all we’ve planned
And I don’t think I’ll ever understand
Where does the lovin’go.

**************oOo*****************

“There is no remedy for love but to love more.” - Henry David Thoreau

Where Does The Lovin’ Go

To scale the skies and trample on its clouds
And once more witness the earth’s perpetual crimes;
The murder of the sun and the killing of the moon
In them my hopes renew.

Gaze upon the earth’s grazing plains as the fog along the horizon spread,
Tell, outdoorsman, the tales of your adventure quest;
And when early flowers blossom, their petals flung wide open
To receive the fragrance of earth’s morning breath,
Tell too of this lament.

I am the guardian of the earth.
Where in all her holy grounds the spirit of the Divine dwells,
In them my soul found rest.

Where in all her holy grounds I pour out my heart’s contents,
My happy thoughts and sad sorrows too,
In there my secrets hide.
Alas, it is I the earth guards!

The destruction of the great outdoors will be the end of me,
For my peace resides there and my soul felt love in her.
But the things that suffer death suffer slowly.
Behold the earth sheds its failing beauty!

Flee to paradise kin of my soul, friends of my ambition!
There in the realm of the divine where death cannot follow.
Pray salvation comes to set free our earthly place,
Her spirit death holds in its breathless embrace.

Oh the shame and ruin that will befall the destroyers of the earth!
When love finally extinguished their hate and charity damned their greed.
When nothingness becomes their second death,
‘The grave will be their house and darkness their bed!’

oOo

This poem was especially written for ‘The Outdoor Addicts‘ newsletter maiden issue.

http://bojacko.multiply.com

Inner peace

Peace to some is the comfort of one’s own company,
the harmony of one’s own space, and the serenity of one’s loneliness.

The Mind

Boredom is the natural state of the mind.

Sadness

Sadness is not having what the mind covets.

Satisfaction

Satisfaction is having the desires of the mind.

Contentment

Contentment is satisfying the curiosity of the mind.

Happiness

Happiness is fulfilling desires, satisfying curiosities, killing boredom, and
appreciating these three achievements.

Maturity

Maturity is the natural progression of
the mind.

Neutrality

Be mindful when you say you’re neutral.
People who say that do not acknowledge a wrong and take no action to correct
it. Indifference is a better term.

Creation

Creating is making something out of
nothing. Inventing is making sense of nonsense.

Freedom

The mind is free if it chooses to be. True freedom is
freedom from want.

On Optimism And Pessimism

I don’t see the glass as half full or half empty. It
doesn’t matter to me either way as long as I can drink it.

Intelligence

Having a mind open to wonder but closed to belief is
the beginning of madness. Intelligence, like sex, is over-rated. Wisdom is more
useful.

Truth

Lie is the cancer of the mind and truth is the cure.
There is no alternative to truth. The truth is what it is, true.

Truth is a sensible perception of
reality. It has many versions.

Curiosity

I hold this truth to be self-evident; that curiosity
is a curious thing.

Lies

Nothing is more convincing than a lie that sounded
good.

Beauty

Beauty, like truth, should be naked. So peel off the skins of pretensions and
bare your soul in all its glorious nakedness. We are born beautiful.

But our prejudicial society makes this painful, thus
we wear masks.

Mask

We all wear masks they say, but what
ever the masks we wear, to gain acceptance is the only reason we do so.

Photography And Art

If the magic hammer is the weapon of Thor, the god of
thunder; the trident the weapon of Poseidon, the sea god; the camera is the
weapon of choice for all aspiring time conjurers like me. With every picture I
took and in every second I freeze with my Nikon, I touch eternity. And in every
moment I capture, I frame immortality. Photography is freezing moments in time,
capturing light, and immortalizing fragments of life.

I have seen pictures more beautiful than the natural
subject they try portray, but anything more beautiful than what is natural is
an illusion and a lie. Some people call it art.

Dreams

Whatever happened to your dreams?

Success

Success has two elements: determination
and patience; the determination to persevere and the patience to wait.

3 Must haves
There are three things in life you can’t do without:
wine, coffee, and ketchup.

Titles

We Filipinos have a demeaning habit of calling people
by titles. Thus we say: “ma’am”, “sir”, “boss”, “bosing”, “manager”, etc. We
mask our inferiority with the excuse of being polite. To call people by title
is the true mark of a slave.

I have yet to hear a foreigner do that. Of course
sometimes we don’t mean it. I certainly don’t.

Life

Only one thing in life matters: life.

Cynicism

Human nature is sinful. Human sincerity
is doubtful. Human motive is tainted by self interest.

There is no inspiration in cynicism, avoid it like a
plague.

Dogs Love like God

How do you love? What is the
value of your loyalty? Can you love without asking for love? Can
you give and take nothing in return? How strong is your faith? Do you believe
without questions? Can you turn the other cheek and not hate your oppressor?
Can you be true to someone ’til the bitter end? Will you stay as long as life?
Can you build your world around someone else’s life?

Dogs can do that. Can you?

The Clock

Mountains are eroding. Trees are
falling. Rivers are drying. Harvest is failing. People are starving. Hearts are
empty. Spirits are poor. The earth is dying. The clock is ticking.

About The Past

There are realities we cannot change and truth we
cannot touch. The past is best left where it is, buried in itself. Regret is
the daughter of the past.

Regret

All the things I could have
done and how far I could have gone had I started earlier. This is my one true
regret in life.

The Cause To Live And Die For

Seek the truth, insist on justice, persist on peace, and believe in love.

My Birthday

What’s with the world’s predilection for birthday
celebrations? Are they truly happy the birthday boy is still alive? And what
have I done to make this world a better place to live in? Put plainly, is my
acquaintance a blessing or a curse? Is my presence welcome? Are they happy to
have known me? I have not the slightest clue.

I am a tragedy imposed on the world. We’ll celebrate
when I’m dead.

Until then, I thank all the people whose orbital
paths were somehow changed by the gravity of my influence, and mine by theirs.
They are few, but they travel with me now and make my life more bearable.

Friends! What can I do without them?

Time

Age is a perception. Time does not exist.

******************************************so glad it’s over****************************************

“Philosophy is a walk on the slippery rocks.
Religion is the smile on a dog.” - Eddie Brickel

My Multiply

Greetings fellow citizens!

My outdoor club is once again opening its door to all
adventurous spirits and entities (yes, some of us are known to be halimaws
[mystical creatures]) who dream of exploring the great outdoor,
seeking adventures and new life forms like limatiks (ferocious tiny leeches) and a
host of untamed animals like bugs and giant worms… ok, never mind wild
animals, they are rare and seldom wild. But the spectacular sunrises and
sunsets up above the avian realm and the equally spectacular aquatic world down
below the ocean city of the corals. These are the stuff we live for!

To walk the earth on its highs and lows. To scale the
skies and trample on its clouds.To peek at the ocean’s depth and stare Nemo
in the eyes. These are the adventures we breathe!

Be forewarned though, the training is long and
arduous. It includes: basic photography (our president is a passionate
photographer), basic life support (first aid training with the red cross),
ascending and rappelling, orienteering (map & compass navigation), the dreaded
water safety (with the 505th wing of the PAF no less), training climbs
on weekends and holidays, trail signing,
ropemanship, and other boring but necessary basic mountaineering skills like
whistle blowing (i mean this literally), packing, etc.

Also, there are regular runs on Thursdays (?) and
Sundays (?), including marathon events the club traditionally joins (Milo
marathon, Adidas king of the road, etc.). All of these to better equip you to
survive the challenges of the outdoor.

The training will commence on the first week of July
(?) and will culminate on the first week of November (?).  Still
interested? If you are, just
contact the amiable people listed on the flyer. Better yet, attend the
orientation meeting on 26 June 2008, 7 pm at the Chowking resto, the Fort.

And be one among the initiated few who have inherited
the earth.

*********************************w/ the roaches & the rodents************************************

oOo

"Twenty years from now you will
be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones
you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor.
Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover."

- Mark
Twain

oOo

http://bojacko.multiply.com

                                                                                                                         .

So the dream is over. Rudy "daboy"
Fernandez finally lost the battle against Satan’s nano demons - cancer cells.

Just the mention of that disease sends shivers,
nay, fear to every conscious handsome little cells in my chiseled body. Having
Satan’s little bastards running around your inner space is a scary thought
indeed.

Yes, if there’s a hell, it’s cancer!  I have
seen its viciousness first hand; the destruction of the flesh by Satan’s
minions, ravaging healthy human cells like little pacmans merrily feasting on
life. The physical destruction is obvious and merciless, but the turmoil in the
soul of the one suffering alone, though silent and unshown, is as loud as war
and as devastating to all as a nuclear fall-out. To know that there is hell and
it lives inside of you…ugh, only the afflicted would know. Such tragedy life
is!

Life, intent on surviving, fights bravely at
first, but the enemies are persistent and untiring. Like decay, silent and
unseen. Like chaos, unbound and untamed. Like war!

The disease and the cure (which is as destructive
as the disease) battle each other with equal cruelty. The discord rupturing the
fabric of the flesh, turning it into a wasteland of bleeding hearts, broken
spirits and shattered dreams. Like all other wars, the victim and the witnesses
- both beloved and estranged, suffer the cruelty of pain.

The collateral damage from this war is what
eventually kills, but not before the spirit falls. The human flesh is indeed
weak, but the spirit is stubborn. The spirit will endure long after the flesh
had surrendered, for the spirit is the cradle of hope. The human spirit
believes and whispers fighting words about winning, while the body shivers at
its impending doom, and hopes for divine healing amidst strife and stress.

Hope, after all, is eternal until death
tramples on it’s wings!  Ah, the little lies we tell ourselves just to
live a bit more!  To hope for mortal life is a fallacy. Let us hope for
peace that we may live and function properly. But peace will not come before
its time. God is busy making other plans sometimes.

Yet the spirit - the soul, though badly hurt,
bruised, and withered does not surrender. In the end, the soul embraces defeat
and willingly falls into the grace of peace to once again rejoin the harmonious
rhythm of the universe. Peace is the unity of all!

And in this realization, the soul shall welcome
death when it comes.

There is a certain peace that only the dying knows:
the peace of acceptance. Once the dying accepts the inevitable and rebels not
against its truth, only then will his battered body and harassed soul will find
rest.

And in accepting, the human spirit wins and the
peace of God will be his.

************************************************RIP**********************************************

Rest in peace Daboy. Rest in peace Jovan. Rest in peace world.
The time has arrived  for your souls to rest from their toils.

oOo

This is a syndication of my multiply
blog.

My photo gallery is here: http://bojacko.multiply.com
check it out!  ^_^

]]> http://emsanchez.blog.friendster.com/2008/06/if-theres-a-hell-its-cancer/feed/ http://emsanchez.blog.friendster.com/2008/01/the-death-of-hope/ http://emsanchez.blog.friendster.com/2008/01/the-death-of-hope/#comments Tue, 01 Jan 2008 07:15:11 +0000 emsanchez http://emsanchez.blog.friendster.com/2008/01/the-death-of-hope/

Time marches on unabated and unconcerned. And here we are again at the crossroad of time, of things that came and things yet to come. After tarrying along the eternity of the year, burdened with our sins both of omission and commission, we stand at the end of what was once the beginning to once again begin from the end.

Happy New Year!

That seems to be our collective wish. The same tired wish over and over again. But the years past were never happy for mankind. A 12 year old child hanged herself. Another child shot himself. Still another massacred his schoolmates before killing himself. For heaven’s sake! What is happening to our children? Have they forgotten how to laugh? They seem to just grow old and shed innocence overnight. Children are committing suicide, they’re blowing up women and children in the promise land, perversion, rape, murder, and mayhem - these are the news of our times. Life, it seemed, has become as cheap as sex! And we wish for a happy new year yet again.

Where is the love? Where is the peace? How can the year be happy without these?

We stood once on the height of hope,  partook of life without death and glory without end. Alas! Those were the realms of day when man found favor with the Divine. But we are fallen! And now we linger in the depth of despair in the realms of ruin, poor in spirit and woeful in heart. Why do we never learn? The prophets of the ages bore witness to the truth of peace, of brotherhood, and of love; but we never listened. Instead, we have destroyed the world with our inacceptance and murdered mankind with indifference. The human mind is a thousand doubting Thomases, brutalizing the truth with faithless disbelief. And here we are in the pit of despair wishing with pained longing for the peace that was once our’s, for the brotherhood that is our birthright, and for the love that was once free.

But I speak of sadness on such a happy occasion. If I could force myself to think only of myself and my blessings, I could be happier. I have plenty and am thankful. But I’m not blind and certainly not ignorant. My wealth is someone else’s poverty. My deprivation is someone else’s riches. For everything gained is denied. Everything found is lost. Every answered prayer is a petition refused.  Do I keep what someone else missed?

The folly of man is indifference and his downfall is sin. We profess our empathetic concerns and do nothing. We watch the desolation of others and we give painlessly from our excesses. We commit the sin and we pray for the forgiveness of others. We impatiently wait for our favorite TV series while poverty ravages the rest of mankind. Indeed a few good men of lesser deeds and evil triumphs!

Did salvation come knocking on the door and we were asleep? Do we wait for someone to free us once again? Who are we going to crucify now to lift the burden of our guilt? The world is on fire and God watches TV!

I despair now, but I am hopeful. I disbelieve, but I have faith. I am fearful, but I am brave. For as long as good deeds still shine on all that stood dark, I will fight on! To be not only good but actually be good for something. Let not hope die!

Though reasons escape us now, wisdom is sure to come. Though times despair us now, hope is eternal. Though wars rage now, peace will battle on. Though hate prevails now, love will conquer all. This is the truth that should be true to us all: Good will succeed!

Ah, but I am only a small voice and of smaller significance. Let me withdraw then to the corner of the universe allotted to me before I contaminate you with my disease. The place where my mind walks alone and only my conscience can follow. The sanctuary of my sanity, the altar of my God! There, I will immerse myself in the murky pool of my thoughts and commune with my God and my accuser - my wounded conscience.

And we shall await the happiest New Year.

***************Happy New Year Just The Same!*******************

"What we call the beginning is often the end. And to make an end is to make a beginning. The end is where we start from." - T. S. Eliot

My Photo Gallery is Here: bojacko.multiply.com

      No one throws away memories, the good ones at least, but when bad ones stick to our minds like phlegm and torment us like a bad nursery rhyme, they should be flushed down the toilet of sweet forgetfulness like the body wastes that they truly are. Unfortunately, some episodic memories last a life time and no amount of brain killer concoctions can erase them. Such is the case with the first love poem of a high school greenhorn.

Unexposed Feeling

I long to tell you how much I love you,
Will I ever surpass this silence that reigns?
Should I be an anonymous who always hides his name?
Or be so famous in things I do and say?
Someone please advise me I’m running out of time
This unexposed feeling I must unearth it now!
                            -0-

     That poem (let’s pretend it’s a poem) was written more than a decade ago. It was inspired by a girl named Yvette. I can’t remember anything about her now except her name and her Goldilocks hair. Yes I wrote that poem and it has never left me ever since. It is engraved in my brain and, to borrow a phrase form D’ Sound’s pop song, tattooed on my mind. It is an unremarkable poem that should have been forgotten a long time ago. Instead, It afflicts me like sin and haunts me like murder and the reason escapes me like breath.    

     An art it is not! For art undresses the soul to bare its naked intent. A poem it is not! For a poem clothes our unspeakable feelings with infallible words. A love poem it is definitely not!  For a love poem glorifies the euphoric feeling of having loved, celebrates the joys of having been loved, and mourns the longing agony of being left alone. That damn thing does nothing but declare the ‘jologs’ that I was. It is more folly than art!

     The memory of it (that poem) inhabits my soul and lingers within it like life. It pops in and out of my consciousness like a brat begging for attention. It’s not a bitter memory. In fact, it is naive enough to be remembered with a fondness of childhood innocence. But it’s a memory devoid of feeling. I remember the poem but not the feeling it tried desperately to convey. Maybe there is no memory of feeling. Emotions after all cannot exist in the past nor can it persist in the future. It can only be felt in the present. If I don’t feel it now it cannot be real, at least not today, not anymore. But was it real then? Such is the nature of reality, it changes with every new experience and new knowledge and the truth changes with it. Reality is not absolute!

       And what is reality but a subjective interpretation of the world and our perception of reality is the truth we adhere to. The realities that come from knowing and understanding what is known through life experiences - these are the truths that are true to me. The universe may exist without me but it won’t matter without my awareness of it. The truth is only true if I am conscious of it. Einstein hit it squarely on the head when he postulated that everything is relative. Indeed, beauty has many faces, art has many forms and truth has many versions. Reality and even the truth are relative. Therein lies the greatest irony of all, reality is not real!

     And still the poem remains, albeit orphaned by my dissociation from it. It is from me but not of me.It is dead to me now.

     When what has been learned needs to be forgotten, when our most wished for state is forgetfulness, when innocence is our pained longing - to be a child again is the ultimate reward!

    But it is easier to remember than to forget. Alas, my memory is not loyal to me!

***************************and my poetry sucks!**************************

                                               .

"better by far you should forget and smile than to remember and be sad." - Christina Rossetti

Birthdays

It is sad when people you care about forget your birthday. It’s a tragedy when people you don’t care enough remember.

Literature

Is inventing and rephrasing words.

Art

All artist are copycats.

Grammar

I’m terrible at punctuations and hopeless in spelling. But the English grammar is naturally confusing and I’m naturally confused.

Labor

One of the most decent things a human being can do is work for a living. It is the source of his pride, the measure of his worthiness and the emblem of his dignity.

Respect honest labor at all times.

Dreams

What is the form of the mind? What are my thoughts? electrons traveling from neurons to neurons? When I dream, what is it I see? particles of light forming and reforming like the simulator ‘hollideck’ on Star Trek Enterprise? What purpose does it serve? Why am I even here?

I guess my dreams are the grand productions of my subconscious mind to keep me from asking too many questions.

It’s a curious thing isn’t it?

Life

Since I have long accepted that there are no meanings, no pre-designed purpose and no grand agenda to my life, the only thing i can do with life is to live it. Live it good or live it bad, I’ve done both. I basically choose between what make sense and what does not and act accordingly. Anything good should make sense and what does not is a sin - this is my morality.

I have resigned myself to my insignificance.

Enemies

What turns one into an enemy? Hurting words? Denial? Envy? Rejection? Disagreement? It’s all of the above and more! The enemy sees you as a thief and desires to punish you like a criminal.

To trust in the goodwill of the enemy is foolishness.

Guilt

Religion has turned everything pleasurable into sin.

The consciousness of having violated societal norms or religious morality is what we call guilt. The development of human culture has led to the suppression of our physical appetites and the taming of the primal instinct of the animal man. Indeed, the invention of civil laws and the formulation of social behavioral standards have civilized the human mind. Without these civilizing aspect of human behavior guilt is impossible.

Guilt is the confusion that arises from the conflict of biological functions and reactions with the civilized mind.

And that is why ignorance is bliss. The ignorant do not have a civilized mind.

Friends

I have three sets of friends. Those who know me as myself, those who know me as someone else, and those who do not know me at all. Or Those who think highly of me, those who think less of me and those who think nothing of me.

A friend in need is always in need. But like I always say, what are friends for if you can’t abuse them.

Destiny

Death and taxes are our shared fate.

Time

Time is the ultimate determinant, the cosmic cause. And its only effect is age. The growing of seeds, the blossoming of flowers, the usual wear and tear, the silent burning of decay. All changes, as a matter of fact, are symptoms of aging. We give value to time only because we age.

The only evidence of time is age. If we don’t age time won’t matter.

The cosmic blunder

What’s the point in peeking outside the boundaries of our solar system if we can’t get out anyway? Why look for another habitable planet if we can’t get there anyway? Why bother about black holes and supernovas if we are powerless to escape them should one suddenly appears in the midst of our solar system? Why land on Mars if we can’t survive there? Why seek out alien life forms while we continue to eradicate terrestrial ones? It seems the only thing we are capable of doing in a cosmic scale is to destroy this planet and ourselves along with it.

There’s an entire planet to protect and the whole of humanity to save. But then again, it is the nature of the universe and everything in it to self-destruct.

Are we hopeless?

The language of God

The entire fabric of the universe can be broken down not on atoms and molecules but in numbers. Two atoms of Hydrogen is Helium, two volumes of Hydrogen to one of Oxygen is water, the precise distance of the earth from the sun and the moon from the earth, all the exact numbers associated with the structure of a DNA. The whole of creation is written in numbers.

Arithmetic is the language of God - it’s a matter of fact!

Competition

My only true and worthy adversaries are time and myself.

Holidays

There are two kinds of holidays. The ones we celebrate and the ones we commemorate. The victors celebrate and the losers commemorate.

Consumerism

The drive to accumulate material possessions is the symptom of a social disease we call consumerism.

The feudal lords and clerico fascist  of long ago invented words like ‘alms’, ‘charity’, ‘royalty’, ‘mortal sins’, ‘nobility’, ‘tax’ and many more illusions to keep the poor away from the reality of their poverty. They made the poor believe they need a king to rule them and an army to protect them and so pay taxes to have them. Thus finance their own oppression. And when the poor finally wizen up to their tricks they invented democracy.

Now we have consumer advertising, the driving force behind the telenovelas, fantaserye and all the productions of free TV to keep us preoccupied. The ruling class keeps this cycle to keep us happy in our poverty. Consumer advertising is their most lethal weapon against the revolution.

This is the simple truth: the rich do not want us to contaminate them with our poverty.

What can I say? The capitalist won!

Decisions

Don’t waste time deciding what to do next. Anticipate, make plans and follow through.

Boredom

I don’t know if either Sigmund Freud or Carl Jung ever extrapolated the psychology of boredom.

It’s when possibilities don’t hold interests. If being here nor there doesn’t matter. It is temporarily losing purpose.

It’s a realization that you should be somewhere else doing something else.

When the mind is unchallenged you get bored. I know this because I’m bored now. in fact I’m so bored I’m writing this blog.

Do stupid people get bored?

***********************Happy birthday to me***************************

"Somebody’s boring me, I think it’s me." - Dylan Thomas

      Geez someone is poking about like a curious penis bedeviling me with intrusive inquisitions on my pointed shoutout and what it means to me (i.e. to my lovelife or the lack of it). What is it with some women and their love affair with intrigue? And why do i always find myself on the other end of the poking stick? Am I intriguing? Controversial perhaps? Do they find me mysterious in some ways? Or ehem, sexy maybe? Or God forbid they think I’m cute?! I wonder if they hear those cheesy lust chant in their head every time I pass by, "cute boy alert, cute boy alert!" (lol). Nah, if that was true I’d get laid everyday. Far from it, the only romance i get right now is from my Nikon D200 DSLR camera (Yeah, me and my Nikon, we click!). But seriously, while i enjoy conversing with women, I find it discomforting to be asked questions only women of despair ask and only lesser men answer. I welcome questions even, to some extent, those of a personal nature but please do not pry open my mind with a crow bar. There is a gulf of a difference between being interested and being nosy. Some people wear their hearts on their sleeves; I prefer mine out of sight. That sounded really lame.

       I love women but I will never understand them but then again they will never understand me. Yes, everything is as it should be. God is wise.

      It is sad that people do not recognize anymore a phrase so distinct and once renowned such as those in my shoutout. A phrase culled from a true literary classic that introduced a genius to the world; a true master of the arts who once said: "peace goes into the making of a poem as flour is into the making of bread". Alas, in this troubled world the only peace that remains is the peace of the dead. (Sigh) If only peace of mind doesn’t desert us. Cry humanity, poetry is dead to the modern world!

      It is rarity to meet people who actually read nowadays. It’s even rarer to find people who truly know how to listen. Rarest of all are people who ask pertinent questions and seek meaningful answers. People are busy watching shadows on the wall or these days in the idiot box. Living has become a cliche, an overused routine of human boredom and mediocrity. Today, people make more money than sense.

     Where are the muses that enchant us to invent? Where are the barbs that stoke the fire of our imaginations? Where are the poets that transform God’s thoughts into words? Are there no more heroes to inspire us? The troubadours of old have long traded their songs for alms. Knowledge has lost its glitter. Heroism is confined to the comic books. The realms of wonder and adventure are only for the the initiated. We do not dream, we do not dare!

      The world is deprived. The truth is buried within its lies. Beauty is hidden from it. Today’s literacy is a farce. Education is a failure. Religion is a fallacy. Freedom is an illusion. Good is rampaged by evil and the world watches TV. The world has gone mad!

      Cry humanity! You have lost Eden must you loose everything too?

      I am deprived. The truth is buried within my lies. Many things are hidden from me and the works of Pablo Neruda was once one of them.

The Song of Despair
by Pablo Neruda
The memory of you emerges from the night around me. The river mingles its stubborn lament with the sea. Deserted like the wharves at dawn. It is the hour of departure, oh deserted one! Cold flower heads are raining over my heart. Oh pit of debris, fierce cave of the shipwrecked. In you the wars and the flights accumulated. From you the wings of the song birds rose. You swallowed everything, like distance. Like the sea, like time. In you everything sank! It was the happy hour of assault and the kiss. The hour of the spell that blazed like a lighthouse. Pilot’s dread, fury of a blind diver, turbulent drunkenness of love, in you everything sank! In the childhood of mist my soul, winged and wounded. Lost discoverer, in you everything sank! You girdled sorrow, you clung to desire, sadness stunned you, in you everything sank! I made the wall of shadow draw back, beyond desire and act, I walked on. Oh flesh, my own flesh, woman whom I loved and lost, I summon you in the moist hour, I raise my song to you. Like a jar you housed the infinite tenderness, and the infinite oblivion shattered you like a jar. There was the black solitude of the islands, and there, woman of love, your arms took me in. There were thirst and hunger, and you were the fruit. There were grief and the ruins, and you were the miracle. Ah woman, I do not know how you could contain me in the earth of your soul, in the cross of your arms! How terrible and brief was my desire of you! How difficult and drunken, how tensed and avid. Cemetery of kisses, there is still fire in your tombs, still the fruited boughs burn, pecked at by birds. Oh the bitten mouth, oh the kissed limbs, oh the hungering teeth, oh the entwined bodies. Oh the mad coupling of hope and force in which we merged and despaired. And the tenderness, light as water and as flour. And the word scarcely begun on the lips. This was my destiny and in it was the voyage of my longing, and in it my longing fell, in you everything sank! Oh pit of debris, everything fell into you, what sorrow did you not express, in what sorrow are you not drowned! From billow to billow you still called and sang. Standing like a sailor in the prow of a vessel. You still flowered in songs, you still broke in currents. Oh pit of debris, open and bitter well. Pale blind diver, luckless slinger, lost discoverer, in you everything sank! It is the hour of departure, the hard cold hour which the night fastens to all the timetables. The rustling belt of the sea girdles the shore. Cold stars heave up, black birds migrate. Deserted like the wharves at dawn. Only the tremulous shadow twists in my hands. Oh farther than everything. Oh farther than everything. It is the hour of departure. Oh abandoned one.                  ***end of poem***

      The shoutout was lifted from the 21st stanza of the poem. Don’t ask me to explain or interpret. I don’t believe I can say anymore than what the poem so effectively speaks. How can I? I am unable to speak the language of gods and therefore am mute. My word is poison to the flowering letters of each word in that poem. But I need not speak. The silent shout of longing that echo in each verse reverberates in all the hollow chambers of my heart. It speaks to me in the language of the soul and I understand for I too have a soul.

      It is the irony of art that there can be beauty in sadness and that one can find art in despair. I guess everything inspires.

*********************************I’m done***************************************

     She was sexy until she opened her mouth. Some days it is better to have sex than talk. - ems

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The advent of digital cameras and cellular phones with built in cameras that can capture both still and moving pictures has turned everyone into a potential porn star. Those unedited amateur sex videos we appropriately call ’scandals’ have not scandalized us at all. On the contrary, the elements of raw passion and horniness that can give even a priest a rock solid hard-on have turned us all into voyeurs.

We have "CDO scandal", "Manila scandal", "Calapan scandal", "Dipolog scandal", "QC scandal", "Ateneo scandal", "De La Salle scandal", "UP scandal", "St. Paul scandal", "CEU scandal", and many more scandals named after places and schools. In fact, they could hold an UAAP tournament of scandals to find out which school has the best fornicators.

Maybe FAMAS or any of the sham award giving bodies should include categories for best scandal, scandal of the year, best actor and actress in a scandal, best beaver ("i love you behbeh" would win this one. Now there’s a beaver with an attitude!), hardest woody, etc.

Yes, I have seen most of these reality porn flicks. How could I not? They’re all around me. Everyone in the office is watching them on his or her PC. I was drawn to it like a curious cat. I have no choice!

It would be a lie to say they do not entertain. If these flicks were marketed the same way they do production films, they’ll be top grossers. Voyeurism has its lure. It appeals to the peeping Tom in us all.

The awakening of peeping Tom

Only a hypocrite would deny ever having peeped at someone. One does not have to drill a peephole to qualify as a peeping Tom. People who do that are hardcore peepers. I know someone who almost automatically rotate his head a la Linda Blair in The Exorcist every time the lady behind us wears a skirt. And another who actually searched for peepholes on some rooms in the hotel we were billeted and bragged about his ‘hits’ afterwards. These people are chronic peepers who are one step away from being classified as sex maniacs. People who go the extra mile just to look at someone’s bare skin without shame and remorse have some serious psychological issues.

A chance glance with malice or an appreciative look, which is a more subtle form of ogling, is the norm for the civilized peeping Tom. But can one appreciate the physical endowment of the opposite sex without lustful malice? And what do we mean when we call someone sexy? I believe when we call someone sexy what we really mean is we want to have sex with her or him. Sugarcoating with congeniality the expressions of our sexual desires saves us from being labeled as ‘bastos’ or immoral by civil society and most importantly, it shields us from a possible sexual harassment lawsuit. The hypocrisy of having to be civil in our appreciation of the human anatomy is a conscious effort to keep rein on the free expression of our innate drive to procreate. That is why we never ever call our siblings or parents sexy. Just the thought of that leaves a bad taste in the mouth.

Come to think of it, just who exactly is peeping Tom? He is as surreal as the bogeyman and as mythical as Santa Claus. We all have him lurking around our libidinal subconscious waiting for the opportune time to peek at some unwitting victim. And just when did he first manifested his presence, his awakening, the first rising, the first flight of the hatchling? And at what age? I can’t remember anymore. It seemed so long ago but this I know for sure; my age of innocence ended the moment peeping Tom awakened. And he never slept again.

The awakening of peeping Tom is the first sign of adolescence. It’s the first step outside the playpen of childhood. It’s the time when Mickey Mouse and his ilk stood aside and proclaimed "The king is risen! Long live the king!" and the opposite sex never looked the same again. The age of innocence is over.

Peeping Tom is the first sex offender. He is the weaver of our sexual dreams. The slayer of our childhood fantasies. He is the doubting Thomas that keeps telling us it’s not a sin to feel pleasure in secretly watching someone, by chance or intention, scandalously exposed, undressing or otherwise. He is the father of voyeurism. The director of those ’scandal’ flicks. The "bosero" in all of us.

Scandals vs. Larry Flynt

And that’s where the difference between these ’scandal’ flicks and Larry Flynt’s production lies. Watching these ’scandals’ is almost as real as peeping inside the sex protagonist’s bedroom. They have the ‘boso’ element in them. You just know those moans are real and that they are really feeling the pleasures of their sexual adventures. It’s the next best thing to actually being there watching unnoticed and as unintrusive as the digicam itself. Those packaged porno flicks of Larry Flynt do not have that realism. No matter how good the productions and the acting are, they will always be just that, packaged acting. You can’t fake passion.

15 minutes of fame

What was it that drew these couples to copulate in front of the camera? A secret fantasy to be a porn star? Was it just role playing to spice up sex? Or was it the thrill of watching oneself perform? I can understand people video recording their indiscretions and wanting to watch themselves having sex. I wouldn’t mind being sexually deviant myself but only for my own amusement and, of course, with my partner’s consent. I would never ever allow anyone to view a video recording of me having sex and I would most likely delete it after a good long laugh. I have never been proud of my transgressions and would much prefer to keep them to myself.

But such is the nature of the Neanderthal man. He found a willing female who professes eternal devotion to him; turned her into a sex slave; video recorded their sexual intercourse with the promise of not showing it to anyone (a big fat lie!); bragged to his peers, beating his chest like a drunken gorilla for giving a performance he believed was at par with such professional fornicator as the famed Rocco of Tarzan X; e-mailed a copy to a friend (or maybe one of his friends stole a copy) and the clock of fame ticked.

They had their 15 minutes of fame and a lifetime of shame!

In the cyberworld everyone is god

The impositions of civility are confined only within the common consent of society and the natural constitution of man. In the virtual society of the Internet, there are no binding and enforceable rules. It is an anarcho-individualist on-line society where government presence is least felt and civil laws are almost non-existent. The Internet has no president and no institutionalized government!

And for these reasons, rumors, lies and scandals propagate like mating bacterium in every nook and cranny of the Cyberworld. It is there that information, scandalous or otherwise, are disseminated with or without the consent of the person(s) involved. And whatever goes in the Internet stays there and propagate probably for all of cyber eternety.

In the cyberworld of the Internet, everyone is omnipotent and immortal. It’s the playground of virtual gods.

The Judas kiss

There is a high degree of trust involved in the making of these ’scandal’ videos. In fact, trust was the production outfit that made them all possible. How else could anyone be convinced into participating in these porno flicks without compensation? And in all these videos, the man was always the instigator. He was the director, choreographer, distributor and lead actor. He was the Judas that planted the kiss of betrayal. And he, like Judas, should burn in hell!

Betrayal is the worst form of exploitation.

The immoral of the story

These ’scandals’ are nothing more than the exploitation of women. In these videos, like all other pornographic materials, the woman is presented as a passive object of sexual fantasies. A mere sexual object rather than a thinking and feeling person. In short, a vagina with a personality!

In this day and age, the patriarchal culture of old still persists. All the advances in gender equality advocated by the feminist movements in the last century have, at least in our piece of the earth, failed to eliminate the subordination of women by patriarchy.

It would not be a surprise to hear some religious zealots and purists put blame on the women in these ’scandals’ for being cheap and would just as quickly pin the scarlet letter of sin on them for threading outside the accepted boundaries of societal morality. Our’s is a society less tolerant and unforgiving to women!

Sexual exploitation and violence against women are practiced norms in our male dominated society. And I suspect this gender oppression will continue for many more generations to come. I guess culture die slowly.

Street of Indifference                                  

We should be crying a river of tears for the demise of common decency in our society. Consumerism, promiscuity, racism, violence, obesity, sensationalism, sexual perversions and other cultural aberrations prevalent in the West, aided by Hollywood, the mass media and the Internet, are spreading like a bubonic plague contaminating the modern world. Indeed, the late ayatollah was correct in his assertion; the great Satan is the inventor of the modern western culture!

The battle between good and evil rages on and society’s indifference and complicity to its own evils will win it for the devil!

Alas, the road to eternal perdition is named "Indifference St."

Murder

We should be demanding authorities to go after the perpetrators of these scandals. Instead, we are excitedly forwarding to and reproducing copies for our friends and peers. But then again, most of these ’scandal’ videos are freewares (assuming that the rights owners were the ones who distributed them for free). And aren’t we accomplices in the propagation of these ’scandals’? Is it even a crime to forward e-mails of these kinds?

It seems the only real crimes are the murder of morality and the rape of decency.

Humans are conflicted beings

In watching the sexual subordination of women in these ’scandals’ (I barely noticed the men. The only thing I remember of them is that they are all butt ugly!), we feel arousal and empathy at the same time. It is the classic conflict between the id and the super ego.

I guess in the Freudian clash between libidinal drive and morality, the libido oftentimes win!

Pity the unwitting porn star and her parents.

************And shame on me for patronizing these scandals***********

God created woman.  And boredom did indeed cease from that moment-but many other things ceased as well! Woman was God’s second blunder. - Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

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