Yes. Another chapter is about to close in my life. The requirements have been submitted. Tests have been answered. Oral exams have been concluded. Clearance is on-going. My college life is soon to be over. Yet it is in this special time after your final exams and before your actual graduation day does one begin to think more and in the process begin to reflect on a lot of things. It is in this brief transition period that I remember, that I look back, that I ponder, that I assess, that I evaluate, that I clarify, that I contemplate on, the wealth of experiences I have had during my four years of undergraduate education. It is also in this time that I look ahead to examine the possibilities on where I want to go, what I want to do, where I want to be, and how am I going to live the rest of my life.

I am afraid when a hiatus comes because it gives me more time, more time to think and usually, I over think and over analyze things that I miss the point. I fail to grasp the essence of what I am striving to find the essence of. For me, this hiatus has been a melting pot of emotions, of ideals, of beliefs, of experiences, of values and of principles for the past days. It is a point of convergence of all that was, all that is and all that will be. One thing, I surely have triumphantly discovered is that I am stuck, as most human beings undergoing the same phase as I am. I am stuck in this maelstrom and I do not know how to find myself. More importantly, I do not know how to get hold of myself.

It is rather ironic that in silence and in the calmer state of things (because of apparently not worrying and doing any academic work, which has preoccupied me in years), I am experiencing this maelstrom. In the midst of this storm and chaos, I do not know where to find peace, I do not know how to gather myself into a single, tranquil whole. Thus, I am stuck.

I am confused. I am lost. I am questioning.

But I am also hoping, that in spite of the randomness and the absurdity of my current state of affairs, I shall find myself. I shall hopefully find my center and from there I shall build my fortress, I shall build my life.

Truth be told, the greatest factor that causes these uncertainties is the very thing that makes everything possible. LOVE. Yes, love is the reason for my apparent descent to disorder. Do not get me wrong, I have been disorganized my entire life but somehow, before, I used to find order amidst chaos. Now, the disorder has been a source of my blindness and of my apparent wondering. Yet, one thing that I failed to find before that I have found now is the beauty that comes with loving. Somehow, you wonder, but the beauty of love keeps you in a state of acceptance, a state of clarity and order. Thus, I find order amidst the disorder caused by the disorder brought about by love itself.

Yes, in college, I have fallen in love. I have been a victim of love's curse. I have succumbed to the realities of the thing that makes the whole world go round. I have been a determined player in life's game of love. I have fought for it. I have lived for it. I have made it my center. I have made my love, my center and my everything. I am taking the risk of being cheesy, because apparently I am and so I continue.

Now I know what it means to live. To live is to love and to love is to live. I have lived each day with love and in every day I am loving. I am so full of love that I do not care anymore if I have given so much. Love knows no measures, love knows no quantities, and yes love knows no reasons. You love and you love well. You always love well. You always give what you can. It is this unconditional characteristic of love can you find the essence.

Perhaps, I am floating in the middle of this hiatus. Yet, I am suspended and kept still by love. Hopefully, that love, will bring me the answers. Hopefully, that love shall bring me to clarity.

To you, my love, take care. All that matters now is that...I LOVE YOU. I LOVE YOU. I LOVE YOU.

like giving you a hanky, when you've forgotten yours at home, and bringing it to your school on the other side of the metro

like falling in line in the crowded lrt2 recto terminal station, rushing inside once the doors opened to grab a seat for you. You'll seat and i'll stand coz it's the seat is just for one.

sharing a meager meal, drinking medicine together, roaming around, being together

i'm showing my love for you.

Part I: What is Commitment?

I have been very fortunate to have selected the tutelage of Mr. Tats Quiblat for my Theology 141: Theology of a Catholic Social Vision (o dahil sa Filipino ang wikang ginagamit sa pangkalahatan ng kurso, "Telohohiya ng Kristiyanong Pananaw Hinggil sa Lipunan.). As we delve deeper into our discussion of Liberation theology, we have come across the final level of practicing Liberation Theology, which is Ortho-PRAXIS. And since praxis or action is the most difficult to achieve commitment is a prerequisite in its full realization. Mr. Quiblat just made the most inspiring and truthful perspective on commitment today. I was beaming and listening intently as he render this elucidation.

Commitment is like buying a pair of shoes. You enter the store, after some time of saving up for the pair that you would like to buy, you finally bought it. And you were very happy you did. But while you are going around the mall, you saw other pairs of beautiful shoes, that made you want to have them.

"Commitment is not not looking at another beautiful pair of shoes but staying with what you have already bought."

A lot of times we would fall but the one you made a commitment to, will be the one with your burning yes. It is a burning yes that knocks on your door everyday. You may look at others but that is merely looking. They are just adventures, useless conquests. You would choose to say to the one. And the only thing that could make you stay is your care.

Part II: What is this commitment to me? (Me and You my love)

I'd like to interpret his words in my very own experience. Perhaps what we have is an unwritten and unverbalized commitment. But the commitment is still there. You may look at other beauties but you would always stay with me. I will always be the one. Your others are just adventures and useless conquests.

However, I'll be negating my own justifications and interpretations. Am I just consoling myself to subscribe to an idea so beautiful as the rendition of commitment in Part I? Am I just trying to say to myself..."stop your misery because you cannot do anything so might as well accept it"?

The main problem is that you (my love) made a commitment to the person by being what you two are. And yet you're saying I am the only one? And that you love me. How can you be faithful to your commitment to the other, if you have me? And how can you fulfill the unwritten and unverbalized commitment you have to me (if there really is as I say), if you are committed with some one else? Perhaps, you are not committed. A free agent. A happy cannonball, crashing everywhere, doing what it wills...riding every trajectory it travels on.

Perhaps you're playing safe. Perhaps you're really just a player, a flirt.

Is it not in the end, you are being UNFAIR and UNCLEAR? And the biggest problem is that you're hurting someone...you're hurting me. And you leave me to figure this out on my own... because you said, it's up to me. It's my problem.

As for your part, you have successfully masked all your affairs by ignoring it and not talking about them to me. But my gut feel tells me, you do what you want to do in secret...so that I may never know and our relationship/friendship would not be affected. YET, IGNORING THE PROBLEM DOES NOT MAKE IT GO AWAY. The elephant is still in the room. And it's just too big for me to not notice. Perhaps, it's just too small for you, for you to triumphantly not see it.

For weeks, I have kept my silence because you said to me that you do not want to see me sad and being too paranoid. You said, you do not want to see me crying. You want us to be happy always. I have done just that. I stayed in this quietism. But I just could not hide the manifestations of this everyday struggle that I am going through. I still cry at night. Asking the questions of why? and how could you?

I believe that you love me. I can feel it. I believe that I have the highest position in your heart and in your life as you said that I am your LIFE. You said that our heart songs are the same and that I am in your heart and that you are in my heart. BUT why must you have another? That is my only point of contention. All of my ramblings and musings revolve on your very choice of the other. That is the point that I could not understand.

On the other hand, I also think that perhaps it ended between the two of you because you're not talking about it or the person. Perhaps it is only me in your life now. But I would not know because I do not want to ask you. I want it to come from you. Because once I ask you again, you would lie, you would deny and you would use my very act of inquiry as a trigger for you to get mad again.

And you know, there is that feeling of suspicion, a suspicion that perhaps you're just omitting this very fact of the other from me so that I would not be hurt.  And this instinct of mine has its bases:
1) you do not text me as often as you do before. You do not reply anymore to questions such as where are you? or what are you doing?. That is why I do not text you those questions anymore because I know you would not reply anyway. At times, you do not even reply to me completely;
2) But when I am with you, you look at your celphone so eagerly and reply immediately to whoever is texting you or whoever it is you are texting. I see how you always look at your phone just to see if that someone replied. I neve know that someone because I do not ask.
3) Your answer to you not replying is that, "Ang mahalaga, kasama kita di ba? andito ako. Present ako with you. text lang yun". Isn't this very reasoning an indication that you're doing something anomalous. Yeah, that's only a text, but why must you not reply to me. Applying my psychology of selective attention. We can only focus on one thing at any given point in time. If you're not replying, that only means two things: either 1) you're busy with school; 2) You're busy texting or talking with someone else.

I already know your ways. I can see through you. I am just shutting up because I love you. And I believe that we choose not to see, not to hear and not to know for love. Love conquers all transgressions.

You said I am being selfish. In this current set-up who is more selfish? Who is more self-centered?

But then again, I LOVE YOU. That is the truth I am holding on to.

And how can I not fall, when through all of theses, you told me face to face my top 5 lines to you. You enumerated them to me with sweetness. I never thought you would notice the lines I'm telling to you always.  And that simple telling from you is enough to make me smile.

I just watched Happy Feet with my love. Yes, I must admit, I was influenced by the apparent mass media hype about the film. I was not disappointed because the movie turned out to be more than an entertainment comfort...it is a poignant and sweet rendition of how being different is acceptable as long as you could make a difference. It's amazing how the profound realities of environmental destruction, acceptance inspite of deformity and making a difference were all captured and delivered in the simplest platform of graphical and comical presentation...that is an animated film.

I'd like to think that I have not lost my fascination towards animated films. Even though the stereotypical view of them as child modes of entertainment still pervades the human psyche. To put it frankly, I enjoyed the film especially when you're with your special one.

You asked me what my heart song is. You answered it by saying, you know it already. And then you added, "That's my heart song too. We have the same heart song."

I could only reminisce how you always ask me who is the one I love. I will always answer, "Siyempre ikaw lang." And then I would throw the question back at you and of all your answers, here is the most memorable one, "I am torn between two...Gerald and Kinsky." Okay, that may be the corniest of all the corn-inflicted, cheesy moments of love. It may also be one of the cliches. But hey, for me that's sweet. Laugh out loud. hahaha

It is rather amazing how you do crazy things for love. By crazy, I mean to the extent of offering a sacrifice...the ultimate sacrifice of prioritizing the other over yourself...no matter what...and damn all the odds. Today, I did not attend class just to finish an academic paper for my love. I barely had slept because I was busy filtering and integrating materials from different sources, I had researched and gathered. With such short notice, I was rather surprised I made it to the required 15-page, fully-annoted, properly-cited and referenced paper. Moreover, I was extremely amused at how I managed to write something I have not even had the chance to learn for myself due to the fact that it is not the area of concentration of my studies. Nevertheless, I praise myself for the effort I made to write something under the umbrella of International Political Economy. Using the hegemonic stability and balance of power theories, I desperately attempted to discuss the possibility of China, as an emerging regional power to share co-hegemon status to the United States. Quite ambitious of a topic, I know. I thought of it for my love.

But then again, you don't question what you do for love because it is part of the mystery and magic of that which render us stupid and blind. That which could not make me say no to you. And that which could command me to do everything for you. You do not question the whys or the hows. It is this unconditionality, that makes love...love in its truest essence. Then you look back, you would not feel any regret, or any tiredness anymore...because you did it for love. I did it all for love.

That's my way of saying..."I LOVE YOU."

Last night I contented myself to have coffee at Gloria Jean's in Robinson's Manila. I decided to settle to the place after hours of roaming around the mall. The long time of settlement accounted to the fact that it was my first time to visit the place. I commuted to go there. I could not find Starbucks, which I eventually discovered to be at the Pedro Gil exit, after surveying the mall for I-don't-remember-how-many-times. And I waited for you there. The mall closed and I'm still waiting for you, on the stairs of the Padre Faura exit. I was the only human entity left there. It was sad that I could not find the place where the 22nd anniversary of Ang Pahayagang Plaridel was celebrated. You also did not know which roads lead to Robinson's from the party. Only to realize, it was just right across the P.faura exit. I could have joined you earlier instead.

While waiting and reading for my theology class on monday, I texted kristoff on how much I believe my martyrdom is when it comes to love and he gave a direct and perfect reply...

"I believe that pagiging martyr which is synonymous with the word tanga is part of the word love."

INDEED!

And then after long hours of waiting, you came walking right across the street smiling in your formal wear, holding copies of your newspaper. You gave me three things (in order): a fresh yellow rose, a commemorative souvenir of the occasion (a magenta colored refrigerator magnet in the shape of a flower) and your special magazine issue. We walked the streets of Pedro Gil, close to midnight. And together, we headed home. Here was home.

You're not sure that you love me
But you're not sure enough to let me go
Baby it ain't fair you know
To just keep me hangin' 'round

You say you don't wanna hurt me
Don't wanna to see my tears
So why are you still standing here
Just watching me drown

You not making up your mind
Is killing me and wasting time
I need so much more than that
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah

Kung minsan humaharap sa mga di pagkakaunawaan ang samahan ng berde at asul, kaparangan at katubigan, dahon at kalangitan. Sa kabila nito, pagmasdan mo ang mundo mula sa kalawakan...hindi ba't kay ganda ng talaban ng luntian at bughaw? Hindi ba't walang katulad ang perpektong imaheng nabuo sa dalawang kulay ng buhay?

Asul akong magiting, gumuhit sa kalangitan mong luntian. Luntian kang matikas, kinulayan ang bughaw kong landas.

Tayo'y mga kulay ng buhay at ito ang ating buhay. Buhay ko. Buhay mo. Buhay natin.

Salamat. Salamat. Salamat.