I only realized this morning that we're past halfway through the month, and I have yet to write a single essay on the blog this month.

Well, it isn't unusual. I have been busy, primarily with cramming a magazine and putting together an event (happening tomorrow, I must add). But I thought about how, this time last year, I probably had written a lot of things down because it's the election season. Considering how I wrote a lot of essays critical of Noynoy Aquino during his time, I probably had a lot to say.

I checked. Nope, not really. I only wrote four essays this time six years ago, and the first one was, well, six years ago today.

Right. I was settling into a new job at the time, and all the mental anguish that it entailed. It's why I didn't write that much either throughout the campaign period. It's not that I didn't have anything to say - there was this long thing I wrote just before the elections - but, well, between me deciding to put together my thoughts before publishing them, and getting really busy, I was bound to write less.

I suppose the same is the case this time around. I have written a few things - the sort my mostly pink followers would refuse to acknowledge, I assume - and there's certainly at least one essay I'm trying to finish in my head. I don't know. I certainly don't have the energy to get down and write mile-long hot takes on this blog. I definitely don't have the time. That, and I'm pretty sure nobody reads this, so why still write, right? I mean, outside of my satisfaction about having finished yet another one of these things.

But, yes, it is tiring to have a hot take on everything. It's tiring to be actively looking out for a development, any development, on something. As yesterday's press conference on behalf of five presidential candidates unfolded yesterday - you know, the one where they pretty much gave a free throw to frontrunner Bongbong Marcos by, of all things, asking the distant second placer to give way to the even more distant folks behind her - I found myself tweeting something. Pretty much what I said earlier. I said it's going to look bad for Leni Robredo because she's the one with the most to gain when opposition against the frontrunner is unified. By implying that it's her people who's been asking the likes of Ping Lacson and Isko Moreno to yield, they've made her look like just another opportunistic politician looking to grab power and milk as much as they can out of it. It's another challenge for her team - how can a distant second who's been busy portraying her as different from everybody else deal with this? And does it even matter, if the frontrunner is way ahead?

Of course I said all that in a shorter manner. I mean, it's Twitter. Longer tweet character limits (it was 140, remember?) and the ability to make threads aside, you can't really say much without boring people, and I really didn't have anything compelling to say. At least nothing as compelling as everybody else who came to the vice president's defense. You know, pithy remarks like "sadboi presscon" and big-ish words like "misogyny". You get the idea, but you just know those tweets are... I think visceral is the better term for that.

Just seeing those tweets reminded me why it's tiring to jump into the fray. You have to say everything in the snappiest manner possible and be hot enough to break through the white noise and be worth retweeting? It's a chore. Not everybody is on social media saying what they think. I bet the majority have jobs to do, problems to deal with, that sort of thing. But the allure of being the loudest voice in the room - or even being in its presence - is hard to resist. The allure of being able to say that your voice represents the majority is hard to resist.

In the past few years I have come to realize that being able to stay on top of this circus - of any circus, of anything for that matter - is a privilege. I guess if you're comfortable enough to not worry about making ends meet, to not worry about surviving, well, you have to do something about your boredom, right? And so we make hot takes. I know. I was there, but now, I'm not.