I don't recall where I learned this, but it's quite true when you think of it. As I told Katia, "possibilities are everything, while probabilities aren't."
I think it was philosophy class. Probabilities are mathematical, as I remember - it's a number, derived from a mathematical equation, derived from a multitude of observations. Possibilities, on the other hand, just happen - as long as it isn't a deviation of the laws of nature, which, as I just remembered, is different from natural law.
When I met Noelle Wenceslao, one of the three Filipinas who successfully traversed Mount Everest early this year, it was on the day my right hand stopped bleeding profusely. I think she was the fourteenth person to hear of my story, of how I got wounded at the CCP for the sake of watching Ligaw Liham. Never in my right mind would I ever have thought that this would happen - not until Karylle actually reminded me through her comment on Shale - but never would I also have thought of the thing she said, about my wounds, my stupidity (if you'd put it that way) or my then impending shoot. Having been to Everest probably changed things, but she says stumbling, or blood itself, is a lucky sign.
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7/31/2007
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7/30/2007
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There are the small decisions you'll live to regret, or maybe not live to regret about it at all, and yet these form the essence of living perfectly human lives. What is it about accidentally saying an expletive on live television, or stepping on your dance partner's toes despite a perfectly-rehearsed dance routine? I'm all too aware - you never have to rub it in - that I make so many of them, and to be honest I spend so much time regretting I eventually never move on.
Totally confused. Exactly what I am right now. Sure, I can use my tools to make sense of what's happening. Something went wrong between (my name) and (your name) over the weekend, and it seems that two days later it's going to end up being another torn friendship. Yet on one day I had my headphones plugged, and the next day I wasn't paying enough attention. Today it seems I've got this old feeling of it's-back-to-square-one, a feeling that I've never had in quite a while. But eventually we stumble.
So the first step to regaining lost ground is to stop thinking that it's actually gone sour. I hope it becomes a rule of some sort - everything is a misunderstanding, we all stumble sometimes, and we eventually survive in utopia at the end of it all. Maybe we should stop observing subject treatments and then compare it to voices you've heard in the background. Maybe we should stop putting some meaning to a quick walk out of the room, to the opposite direction, and just presume. We'll all dream happily then.
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Totally confused. Exactly what I am right now. Sure, I can use my tools to make sense of what's happening. Something went wrong between (my name) and (your name) over the weekend, and it seems that two days later it's going to end up being another torn friendship. Yet on one day I had my headphones plugged, and the next day I wasn't paying enough attention. Today it seems I've got this old feeling of it's-back-to-square-one, a feeling that I've never had in quite a while. But eventually we stumble.
So the first step to regaining lost ground is to stop thinking that it's actually gone sour. I hope it becomes a rule of some sort - everything is a misunderstanding, we all stumble sometimes, and we eventually survive in utopia at the end of it all. Maybe we should stop observing subject treatments and then compare it to voices you've heard in the background. Maybe we should stop putting some meaning to a quick walk out of the room, to the opposite direction, and just presume. We'll all dream happily then.
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7/25/2007
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Is it just me, and the way I was brought up to think that people around me need help, or do I just have a natural magnetism towards the most vulnerable side of people?
I've been thinking about it for quite a while, or maybe the past fifteen minutes. Never rarely did I see myself reaching out to someone, giving advice on topics that I can't possibly give reliable advice on because, in the first place, I haven't been in an inkling on their position. Sometimes I see it as an offshoot of my love for talking (but not the gift of gab, ironically) but most of the time I surprise myself when I realize that the person on the other end is thanking me profusely, because apparently, because of my nosiness, things have become much clearer.
Well, yes, for the most part I am the nosiest person you could ever meet. Sometimes I blame my memory, like ten minutes ago when I noticed Reena's status message was a line that Sir Unson left us from philosophy class. Sometimes it's my intellect - not to rub it in, but sometimes it's got to happen - in the way a status message is written, and how I manage to read between (and within) the lines even if it's all constrained to one. Who knows, maybe because the folks back in high school called me Boy Abunda because I look like him when I have a haircut. His questioning style could have rubbed off on me, and thus, I interview to no end, while my heart beats faster than usual.
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I've been thinking about it for quite a while, or maybe the past fifteen minutes. Never rarely did I see myself reaching out to someone, giving advice on topics that I can't possibly give reliable advice on because, in the first place, I haven't been in an inkling on their position. Sometimes I see it as an offshoot of my love for talking (but not the gift of gab, ironically) but most of the time I surprise myself when I realize that the person on the other end is thanking me profusely, because apparently, because of my nosiness, things have become much clearer.
Well, yes, for the most part I am the nosiest person you could ever meet. Sometimes I blame my memory, like ten minutes ago when I noticed Reena's status message was a line that Sir Unson left us from philosophy class. Sometimes it's my intellect - not to rub it in, but sometimes it's got to happen - in the way a status message is written, and how I manage to read between (and within) the lines even if it's all constrained to one. Who knows, maybe because the folks back in high school called me Boy Abunda because I look like him when I have a haircut. His questioning style could have rubbed off on me, and thus, I interview to no end, while my heart beats faster than usual.
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7/23/2007
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It's funny to think that one person can make you contemplate about the very life you're living. It's funnier thinking that you're not really supposed to. But when your thoughts drift to, maybe, hearing things from out of the blue once you set the association - ahhh, you really have a problem.
I spent most of my day at the editing bay. Sure enough, I got depressed, walking in and out of the door to answer metaphorical phone calls, or quench my stress. Or maybe I felt too nosey that morning, for definitely everybody's thinking of nothing but another strike for animosity's sake. At the end of the day, however, I'm the one you probably met the very first time - extremely preppy, extremely giddy, and with an overwhelming sense of self-deprecation, forever referencing the depression that happened earlier. Maybe it's my aura that's dropping to never-heard lows, or maybe it's just fatigue plus stress making an always-potent combination of knock-ups and mishaps, but I didn't like how it felt. Most especially, why.
Yes, for once I knew why I dropped to those depths. It can be as superficial as a comment taken wrongly - in fact it could be - but I know, it's something about reaching for something, knowing you can't reach it, and doing the next best thing. Some time last week I wrote something on a piece of scratch paper, one thing I probably have always regretted, and yet have done consistently.
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I spent most of my day at the editing bay. Sure enough, I got depressed, walking in and out of the door to answer metaphorical phone calls, or quench my stress. Or maybe I felt too nosey that morning, for definitely everybody's thinking of nothing but another strike for animosity's sake. At the end of the day, however, I'm the one you probably met the very first time - extremely preppy, extremely giddy, and with an overwhelming sense of self-deprecation, forever referencing the depression that happened earlier. Maybe it's my aura that's dropping to never-heard lows, or maybe it's just fatigue plus stress making an always-potent combination of knock-ups and mishaps, but I didn't like how it felt. Most especially, why.
Yes, for once I knew why I dropped to those depths. It can be as superficial as a comment taken wrongly - in fact it could be - but I know, it's something about reaching for something, knowing you can't reach it, and doing the next best thing. Some time last week I wrote something on a piece of scratch paper, one thing I probably have always regretted, and yet have done consistently.
Read more »
7/22/2007
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It was a bit surprising when I realized that, fifty minutes after I met with Chex at Starbucks, I still haven't received a text message from Misha, Fran or anybody else. It was already two in the afternoon, and after having two-thirds of the mango frap my guest (if you'd put it at that) treated me, because she apparently owed me a Krispy Kreme, I left for the second floor of the Miguel building. Back to the scripts, to the headlines, and to then-unimaginable stress.
The day before, Mae wanted me to become the technical director. I was okay with it, but I decided to open the issue on the story conference the morning after, since there was just no way I'd raise that without disturbing everybody from whatever it is they're doing. Eventually, she became the technical director and I handled the graphics - she got the hang of it, she said, just as I started getting lessons on how the key-ins worked. I was also hanging the curtains and rechecking the script.
And Misha was doing well as, as Arlene put it, the "captain of the ship". Despite apparent aversion to anybody that's out of the circle - I still think I'm a lame duck of a producer - things still somehow went well: I decided some things and Misha was doing others; Arlene was setting up the set, with Meh's bar table working solo because of miscommunication on Fran's part; the anchors (Fran and Nadia) were reading through the script I made the morning earlier and were rearranging everything; John was rehearsing doing three things at one time - you can imagine the shuffle.
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The day before, Mae wanted me to become the technical director. I was okay with it, but I decided to open the issue on the story conference the morning after, since there was just no way I'd raise that without disturbing everybody from whatever it is they're doing. Eventually, she became the technical director and I handled the graphics - she got the hang of it, she said, just as I started getting lessons on how the key-ins worked. I was also hanging the curtains and rechecking the script.
And Misha was doing well as, as Arlene put it, the "captain of the ship". Despite apparent aversion to anybody that's out of the circle - I still think I'm a lame duck of a producer - things still somehow went well: I decided some things and Misha was doing others; Arlene was setting up the set, with Meh's bar table working solo because of miscommunication on Fran's part; the anchors (Fran and Nadia) were reading through the script I made the morning earlier and were rearranging everything; John was rehearsing doing three things at one time - you can imagine the shuffle.
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7/18/2007
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Language does prove to be a barrier to everything. I mean, I know everyone can do perfect English, at least in my molecular part of the world, but eventually we all stutter. I stutter terribly. And, consider the fact that when I pretend to be a DJ, making links in between the music I play on the PC, I sound perfectly well.
But sure. I guess it's the need to assert yourself, which means you speak in a loud voice, and you focus too much on getting heard you never bother to see whether your English gets mangled, as if your tongue was chopped off, tied to the train track, and got hit by (obviously) a train. Or maybe you're actually trying hard to impress. I often get that idea. Or is it just me?
I've been thinking about it for, believe it or not, the past three weeks. It's the question of knowing that, somewhere amidst the ranks, you'll belatedly realize that the one person you're starting to get fascinated with, for some (or no) particular reason, actually has nothing in common with you. Nothing at all. Even funnier is the way you realize this: in the most involuntary of ways, when you're not asking for anything, or to be particular about it, when your mind is on an entirely different plane. And then, in that idle point in time, all of these things rush in. Social disparity rules, I guess.
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But sure. I guess it's the need to assert yourself, which means you speak in a loud voice, and you focus too much on getting heard you never bother to see whether your English gets mangled, as if your tongue was chopped off, tied to the train track, and got hit by (obviously) a train. Or maybe you're actually trying hard to impress. I often get that idea. Or is it just me?
I've been thinking about it for, believe it or not, the past three weeks. It's the question of knowing that, somewhere amidst the ranks, you'll belatedly realize that the one person you're starting to get fascinated with, for some (or no) particular reason, actually has nothing in common with you. Nothing at all. Even funnier is the way you realize this: in the most involuntary of ways, when you're not asking for anything, or to be particular about it, when your mind is on an entirely different plane. And then, in that idle point in time, all of these things rush in. Social disparity rules, I guess.
Read more »
7/17/2007
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You'd be surprised at how quick things can change, even if they're just under your nose. For one thing, Kelly finally noticed the blinker and picked up the phone. Ale already has a DSL connection, and we're chatting without a terribly noticeable lag. Lau doesn't look sick, although she's been sick for a week now. And me, well, I have become irritated far too many times already.
And yet, after the cliché comes another cliché. After the clouds come a rainbow. After the rain comes the sun. After all's been said and done, well, it's been said and done, and everybody forgets about it. Was it something in the clouds that made everyone go terribly emotional, in one way or another?
Because, all of a sudden, Sarah has started wearing pink.
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And yet, after the cliché comes another cliché. After the clouds come a rainbow. After the rain comes the sun. After all's been said and done, well, it's been said and done, and everybody forgets about it. Was it something in the clouds that made everyone go terribly emotional, in one way or another?
Because, all of a sudden, Sarah has started wearing pink.
Read more »
7/11/2007
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I wonder what Julia Campbell thinks of us now.
For some reason, I chanced upon her blog. And you all know what happened to her. Her very last entry had three hundred twenty-four comments, most posted days after her disappearance, and the eventual discovery of her dead body. I wonder what happened to her foster families in the two years she's been here. I wonder what happened to the suspect, and about his story of thinking that the person who bumped him accidentally is his bullying neighbor. I wonder what that bullying neighbor thinks of himself, if he is still alive.
I wonder why I decided to stay in DLSU just to wait for Chex to come.
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For some reason, I chanced upon her blog. And you all know what happened to her. Her very last entry had three hundred twenty-four comments, most posted days after her disappearance, and the eventual discovery of her dead body. I wonder what happened to her foster families in the two years she's been here. I wonder what happened to the suspect, and about his story of thinking that the person who bumped him accidentally is his bullying neighbor. I wonder what that bullying neighbor thinks of himself, if he is still alive.
I wonder why I decided to stay in DLSU just to wait for Chex to come.
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7/09/2007
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"Pag namatay kaya ako, anong gagawin ng mga tao?"
"I-b-blog ka. Hahaha."
"Seryoso ako. For some reason, lumapag na naman ako sa Friendster profile ni Drew. Ganon kaya mangyari sakin? Or is it too late?"
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"I-b-blog ka. Hahaha."
"Seryoso ako. For some reason, lumapag na naman ako sa Friendster profile ni Drew. Ganon kaya mangyari sakin? Or is it too late?"
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7/07/2007
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Finally. After two weeks or so, we finished doing our first major television production: a talk show.
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Niko Batallones writes The Upper Blog.
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