embracing the S box

i am sure, that in our collective lives, we've filled out forms and have been forced to categorize one's self in a box meant to represent either a choice, one's status, or opinion about something. and to me, person who loves filling out all types of forms with a misplaced sense of giddiness, there's a thrill (or dread, as in the case of age) when one "moves" from one category to another.

income, for one, has been a sore spot in my life. so moving another tier up, that was a biggie! and age, sigh, if only i can still celebrate march 2 without gaining a year ... turning 36 means that i will be moving from the 30 - 35 range to one that is <--this--> close to 40. in the words of the characters in the archie comic book series (shucks, yet another affirmation of my "aged" status), EGAD!

but while i've moved from one category or another, there's one box that i can't seem to escape (even the religion boxes i've moved from "others" to "roman catholic"!) -- the "S" box. it comes just after you declare your age, an accusation of sorts, similar to relatives who you see once a year in holiday gatherings who look at you with unmasked pity in their eyes as they ask if you have a boyfriend or you've plans to get married and you reply with a "no". i'm a girl, so they'd remind me about my dwindling chances of becoming a mother, with the more modern one's urging, pabuntis ka na lang, as if sex were as easy and uncomplicated as buying coke from the corner sari-sari store.

growing up, "old maids" were few and far in between. everyone gets married, sooner or later. some even get married twice (and no, no one died, and no one's muslim so you get the picture, right?). lola peng, my mom's aunt, and lola nanay, my paternal grandmother's best friend, were novelties, generous grand-aunts who'd adopt us as their own grandchildren, their gifts a happy addition to those expected from grandparents. none of us even deigned to imagine we'd end up like them, after all, wasn't finding the ONE, getting married, and having kids part of the series that begins with go to school and get a job?

maybe my mom was right when she made an offhand comment to me in high school. by then, the martha stewart gene had kicked in and i turned into that kind of person who prepared  baons for road trips, something my mom never did (she never espoused eating in the car). and then, when i decided to shift to education in college, she noted that my course choice would definitely be another nail in the "single" coffin. i, her only daughter, was most likely going to grow old alone.

funnily enough, my mom's prophetic words should not have had any basis then - i dated behind my parents' back, and when i actually could date, i did, and had boyfriends of all shapes and sizes. once, vanessa wrote a draft screenplay loosely based on my relationships and her mentor commented that art should at least imitate life and vanessa's story of my life was certainly more art than anything. i wanted to send a note - life is more complex than any of the things people could come up with; mine certainly was.

when i broke up with the last person i actually consider my boyfriend, i made a pledge not to date until i passed the bar. i've been a lawyer for five and a half years already ... my status has yet to change. it's as if i've reached my quota of possible beaus after the dating spree in my twenties. sometimes i try to imagine myself ending up with any of the boys i dated, as well as the boys who tried to date me, and save for a guy who i turned down and eventually became my best friend, i actually can't imagine spending the rest of my life with any of them.

on the wall of my bathroom, right beside the mirror, there's a post-it that reads, "i'd rather be single that be married to the wrong man." ironically, a boy i dated, after using the bathroom, plucked the post-it from the wall and kept it in his wallet, claiming that it will be a constant reminder to him to be the right man. i put a replacement up (actually immediately after he stole the original post-it from the wall) ... this wasn't something that was going to be negotiable for me.

when i acknowledged that marriage isn't something that happens with the mere passing of time, when i accepted that i didn't really want any of the boys i dated, when i realized that life is infinitely more complicated than any of the plots of a sweet dreams book, that's when i had finally embraced the S box.

"choose frustration over indifference"

there i was at landmark, wasting precious time as the cashier (vainly) attempted to find an additional ten centavos. you see, she had "proudly" handed me my change, proclaiming it to be exact until i pointed out that she had given me two five-centavo coins, making her short ten centavos.

her defense, "i thought they were ten centavo coins." which, seriously, how could you go wrong, right? i mean one has a hole in the middle?!?!? so i waited, and waited, and waited for my ten centavos. for some reason she wouldn't open her drawer but attempted to persuade the others to open theirs (there were three other cashiers). in the end, i walked out in a huff. it was taking her forever, and i think she was enjoying it.

now i know that thought running through the minds of the cashier, the checker, and the other people in the area was that i was being petty. after all, it was just ten centavos. even the pulubis on the street would scoff at you if you were to give them change as small as that. i didn't know either, until i read market man's blog and realized that if there was one thing i shared with this amazing blogger, it was his motto:

choose frustration over indifference

and that was what i was doing exactly. i refused to accept the fact that the cashier short-changed me.

over the past couple of months, i've been struggling to develop what i learned to be "holy indifference". you see, in the catholic singles community where i belong, one of the major teachings is to preserve relationships over results. having spent a chunk of my professional life with the opus dei, it was pretty difficult letting go and letting things be. if you've been to any institution run by the opus dei, you'd know that not only are they precise, on time, and perfectionists, but they believe that if something must be done, then it must be done well. so, i never really developed the skill to be indifferent; rather, i thrived on pushing, pounding, and hitting until things wouldn't have a choice but to go right.

of course, they never do. that's how life is. so i spend a lot of time being frustrated: about how everyone's always tardy, about how things are almost always planned the last minute, about how you really should not count on certain people cause their heads are just up out there in the clouds. while others could easily say, "at least we learned over the experience," i couldn't. rather i'd push and push and push and frustrate myself enough to tear my hair out.

reading market man's rant, and eventually his motto, i was struck by the fact that yes, i too am one of those people who'd choose frustration over indifference at any given time. so what if ford edsa refuses to acknowledge their oh-so-poor service. i would spend hours on end tracking down the manager of the service department and give him woe for the poor service that they did. i would call and call and call service hotlines to complain, and when the customer service assistant is being especially useless, i'd be the one who'd spend a good 45 minutes waiting for the supervisor to come on the line so i can bit his head off for his team's lack of abilities. and yes, i'm the one who'd fill out customer satisfaction surveys - restaurants, hotels, airlines - because if they care enough to have these surveys, then i should do my part by telling them things they ought to hear, even if they don't really want to hear it.

yes, the frustration had added wrinkles onto my face. and yes, the frustration has turned most (if not all) of my hair gray. but i don't care. the day i become indifferent is the day i die. until then, i will allow myself to be frustrated. 

and btw - i got into an accident yesterday. my six-month old car is now officially not scar-free. hopefully my insurance will come through.

change of heart

yesterday, i watched a movie that (i believe) would change my life forever.

it started with an email from one of the lawyers at work last friday. she told us to watch GIVE UP TOMORROW, a documentary about paco larranaga and the chiong murder case that happened way back in 1997. now, i grew up reading about hubert webb, and while i never really formed an opinion as to his guilt or innocence, i firmly believed that there was reasonable doubt as to his guilt when i read the supreme court decision acquitting him. as for paco larranage, well, i had heard about the crime, but i never really knew much about it. so when kbbb asked us to go watch the movie, it wasn't really out of curiosity about paco's plight as it was to verify her statement that the movie showed how bulok our judicial system is. coming from the disappointment on how the senate (with the help of the media) railroaded corona's impeachment (not to say i am for corona, but i do believe that they weren't able to prove that what he did was an impeachable offense).

i entered the movie house expecting a two-hour discovery channel - like documentary. i came out with a heavy heart, not only cause i knew there wasn't much i could do about it, but because the very system that's supposed to make the world a better place has severely failed this one person. and if this one person who had the luxury of the spanish government's assistance is still suffering for a crime he may not have committed, how many innocent others are there inside our jails?

of course, there's that joke that everyone inside bilibid is innocent. i am a lawyer, i must believe that the system does work most of the time. but what about those times when it hasn't? would the interest of the many whom we are saving be greater than that of the "evil man" from whom we are saving them from? what if we got the wrong "evil man"? what if the judge made a mistake, hoping the court of appeals would scrutinize those he skipped during his deliberations, and what if the court of appeals made a mistake, believing the supreme court would make a more intensive deliberation, and what if the supreme court, finding merit in the unanimous decisions of the trial court and the court of appeals, decides that affirming their decisions is more prudent than finding the man innocent? so many what ifs in exchange for a man's life.

most of my life i've believed in the vindictive kind of justice. the death penalty, for me, was fair and just for the most heinous crimes. but when a man's life is on the line, knowing all the frailties that come with being human, can one really be the proper judge to decide whether a man ought to live or not?

two days ago, i would've said differently. but yesterday changed me. yesterday, it finally struck me that if abolishing the death penalty means that the life of one innocent man among hundreds of guilty men may be saved, then so be it. because no one really knows for sure. no one.

juju jeans and memories of my mom

{cheap jeans from the landmark}

last friday, i bought a pair of cheap jeans.  you see, last january, i promised myself i'd lose a lot of weight and that i'd buy clothes once i've lost everything i've set out to lose. well, i lost some, and then i stopped watching what i ate and exercising, so i gained back some of what i've lost. and i'm miserable not buying, especially since my jeans have all but faded in the wash. and you do know how everyone seems to be wearing dark rinse, so i decided to be kind myself and bought me a pair of jeans. but only the cheap kind - i still intend to lose a lot of weight, i just don't intend to wear old, worn-out jeans till then.

but this post isn't just about jeans, it's about the memories of cheap jeans - what my mom and i used to call juju jeans - and all those times i spent shopping with my mom.  you see, when i was a kid, i didn't have a lot of friends. i probably had a good friend or two from my class and spent all of my free time with my mom (and my brother, but that's a different issue altogether, haha!).  in fact, when i was in grade two, we were asked who our best friend was and i said "my mom" and my teacher got angry and all that and told me, "it has to be someone else." probably she had her own mommy issues.

of course as with all mothers and daughters, we had our major issues, and there were times that i couldn't wait to go back to the dorm to "escape" my mother.  i suppose she wasn't too happy with me either - i had a boyfriend real early, dated the most inappropriate boys (and men -- i was horrible at picking them, i tell you), and got three quatros on my second semester in UP.  and while she discouraged one of our dearest helpers from taking up education when the latter finally went to college and hated the fact that my grandfather was a lawyer (she felt they were poor growing up cause he never made much as a lawyer), irony of ironies was the fact that i took up education in UP in preparation for law. and while she did "succeed" in discouraging me from going to law school right after graduation, i eventually went to law school, albeit two years later.

still, i'd like to believe that my grade two self was correct - my mom is my best friend.  so what if she hates north park (which i love) and thinks my curtains are cheap?  my mom was the one who taught me how to ride a bike without training wheels, inspired me to be an amazing driver despite the fact that i'm female, and made sure that i was first in line for the csa grade 1 entrance test even if my last name starts with the letter "v". to this day, my mom buys random things with flowers simply because i love flowers on things, and sends them to me in a big balikbayan box even if her budget is overstretched from the horrible economy and the mortgage payments they're making monthly. i may not look like my mom, but i look at my toenails and my calves and overtake inside the village despite the speedbump on the road and i know, i am her daughter through and through.

so yesterday, after buying the jeans i sent a text message to my mom telling her of the purchase and how i was reminded of her.  this morning, she replied, and said the words that makes me feel good no matter how far she is from me, "i love you."

mean words make you even more unpretty

last friday, a person i consider to be a good friend was just plain mean.  i couldn't understand why she had to be so cutting with her remarks, and the funny thing was, it was so totally unprovoked, so totally unnecessary, and (here's the mean girl in me) so not even witty (i'm a firm believer that you have to be at least witty to insult people) that all i could say was, "that was mean."

of course, as i was driving home that night, i had a hundred million perfect retorts swirling in my head, and the fact that i'm still thinking about it now, almost a week later, means that i felt truly offended by what she did.  the ironic thing was that, i think (of course i could be wrong) that she was just trying to be funny, except that i wasn't laughing.

you judge:

me: hey, our outfits are similar. (she was wearing a blouse with studs, and i was wearing a dress with studs)
her: oo nga eh, nakakainis.

well, she's known as one of those mataray girls, and remarks like that are normal for her.  but for once, i didn't appreciate the (lack of ) humor in her words, and even after i told her that what she said wasn't very nice, she shrugged my comments off as if she didn't really care and meant every single word of it.

in any case, let that experience be a lesson for me: mean words don't only hurt other people; mean words make the speaker even more unpretty.

(and that same night, a new friend went up to me and said, "i really like the way you dress" which was totally unexpected since (1) it was a guy speaking and (2) he wasn't gay. some measure of comfort, right? and come one, since you're reading this and you're my friend, wouldn't you agree that you wouldn't mind wearing a similar outfit if you could look as cute as i was in that outfit? hahaha.)

collect moments, not things

a long time ago, right after i sort of regretted picking the mini lin over the monogram, i told myself that i'll get myself a monogram speedy 35 when i turn 35.

that was last march. so far, i don't see any additional louis in my closet.

i did surprise myself by taking an almost impromptu trip to singapore. i hadn't really budgeted for it, and most of my good friends didn't even know about it. but when i'm tired or stressed or lost, i think of the weekend i spent walking around the city with my cousin, the sunday riding coasters with a friend, or the saturday night i met up again with a friend i used to spend hours talking to and i know in my heart that while a speedy 35 would look insanely amazing on my arm, not getting one isn't something that's going to haunt me on my death bed.

so last weekend i was able to go up mayon volcano. and while i didn't get to swim with the butandings, i did give it two tries. the money i spent could've gone towards renovating the master's bedroom + bath, but i had fun, got to know my friends a bit more, and chalked up another city on my list.

as someone living on a single income, and someone still trying to figure out what exactly it means to be an adult, there money that comes every payday can only be stretched so much. oh i won't deny how much i want to buy those platform pumps at payless, but for now, between the pumps i've been eyeing for more than a month now and treating my boss + secretary on account of my regularization, i think i'll opt for the latter for now.

experiences before things. yes, that's my motto for now. and maybe, just maybe, by the time i have extra money for those platform pumps, they'll be on sale :)

meatballs na lang ang kulang

i have a friend who, after dating this guy several times, was told by the guy that the reason why he felt he had to stop was that he felt like he was just "meatballs" to her "spaghetti" -- nice to have but really essential to make things complete.

after the requisite laughter at the end of the narration, my friend turned to me and said, "you're also like that -- your life is so complete, so put together already that any guy dating you would just feel like meatballs to your spaghetti."

now for someone who doesn't even like meatballs in her spaghetti, that was more than slightly distressing! does that mean i turn men off cause i've got it all figured out? do i have to revert to helpless status and pretend i can't do anything by myself? when i tell people i can change the bathroom sink's p-trap (and i really can!) and replace the double lock on my front door (pretty easy), am i in effect telling the universe that (1) i can handle it and (2) - gasp - i don't need a man?

i'd like to hope all my hard-earned handyman skills aren't turning men off. and if i am the "complete" package already then let it be just something to make the total package even more attractive. yes, for men i guess it's nice to feel needed. but at the end of the day, wouldn't they want someone who isn't a shadow of the person she could be but someone who is living out her full potential every single day?

considering i'm still single, maybe my "i'm a survivor" stance isn't really the most attractive thing in the world. but then again, my brother has repeatedly dated a host of simpering wusses. yes, they're there for a couple of months, basking is unaduleterated love. but at the end of the day, their little helpless worlds are shattered once he deems them too needy for his taste.

so i think i'll stay the way i am and wait for that wonderful man who wouldn't mind being meatballs to my spaghetti. because while my spaghetti's complete, meatballs would it even better.

two less lonely people in the world

basking in the joy that can only come with finding a new love, my friend has been tweeting "two less lonely people in the world" almost daily for more than a month now. and while someone else's luck in the love department usually has this way of highlighting how utterly alone i am, i'd like to think that i love this particular friend so dearly, and has been witness to so much of his own heartaches and frustrations in the heart department that i couldn't help but cheer him along each step of the way.

it's crazy how when i was in college, i never expected to be 34 and single, and with no prospects in sight. i can't help but remember how in this interview, a prospective boss asked me if i had plans of getting married and my answer was, "not in the immediate future." maybe i was just too engrossed in pleasing said prospective boss (the HR girl had "tipped" me that she was also single) but with one ovary left and a utterly diseased uterus, i'm beginning to think that me, the girl who dated with a vengeance in college and in law school is truly meant to live the single life.

so, as i was on my way home last night with a couple of friends, i pathetically (because really, it was!) warbled, "one less lonely person in the world," and when asked to explain, i reasoned that with acceptance comes peace. i'd like to believe that i had come to terms that should i have been designated by God to be single for the rest of my life, and i'm fairly okay with it. of course, i knew i'd probably miss out on certain aspects of my fantasy life (yes, i have elaborate scenarios in my head how married life will be like, and it includes a daughter named ava - pronounced ey-va - and a son whose name will be paolo niccolo, and how they'll proudly write their parents' alma matter in their college application forms and how my daughter will be a fourth generation iskolar ng bayan and how my son will probably be some gwapo genius walking around the halls of the ateneo just like his dad) but how can you "miss out" on a life you never had, right?

and ironically, the pseudo-relationships i've had in the past couple of years has left me pretty much frustrated and wanting out within a week after a while. i get frustrated with the roller coaster of emotions, and am torn between being used to doing things for myself by myself and the desire to finally share things with someone. just this week, a friend "introduced" me to his friend and while we haven't officially met yet (it's your good old fashioned -- well not so old fashioned -- textmate. oooh, the shame just kills me!), i'm getting slightly exhausted when he turns into this pretend-whiny person and texts me "huhuhu" when i'm just too busy to reply. clearly, i'm not 18 anymore, and at the end of the day, it's not romance that i'm craving for (although flowers and presents still get to me! haha) but stability, reliability, maturity, and friendship.

yes, there, i've said it. if i were going to get myself a happily ever after, it's going to have to be with someone who i know inside out, someone who i can stand in spite of, say, my dislike for the slacks-and-rubbershoes combo. someone who i would proudly introduce to my family and friends even if i very well know that this person's looks will illicit raised eyebrows. it'll have to be someone who i respect, someone whose judgment i trust, the first person i'd call when something great happens, and the person i know who'd be there if i got into a major accident. it would have to be a good friend.

and, much unlike the lyrics of the song, we're not going to be two less lonely people in the world, cause we were never lonely to begin with. we were complete without each other to begin with. and it's not like we're going to be saying "i just can't believe you're mine" because it's going to be believable because it's a decision made not only with our hearts but also with our minds.

don't hold your breath though, cause i'm not holding mine.

botox is expensive

dear self,

please remember that ...

worry = wrinkled forehead = wrinkles = need for botox. as i said, botox is expensive (plus no one wants to look like a porcelain bust in real life.)

so please don't stress yourself over things at work ... they don't pay you enough to invest so much feeling into it. i mean, if you're spending even your free time on how to "fix" things, that isn't really good, especially since (1) you're not responsible for "fixing" stuff and (2) you've got other stuff to do (like understand the valuation process, haha!).

and please don't stress yourself over things at lingkod ... your standards are not their standards, and you're just making enemies wanting to elevate things to the next level.

do stress about stuff you can control, like the mess that's gathering at home once more, cebu plans, and the PDIC thing.

hugs,

me

*image from here.

the courtesy of a reply

there's a couple of things that i dislike.

chipped nail polish.

ampalaya.

an empty train that i fail to catch.

people who don't reply to text messages.

so i might be one of the reasons why the philippines is the text capital of the world, and yes, one of the happiest things in my life is the fact that my phone plan provides for unlimited globe-to-globe and globe-to-TM text messages. i admit that i'm that friend who sends a crazy number of text messages in a single day, especially to good friends. believe me - i understand that you cannot reply to every single text message i send, especially if the only reply you'll be sending is a half-hearted HA!HA!

but once in a blue moon, i do send text messages that require a reply.

like when i'm asking you to confirm your attendance in an activity.

or when i'm waiting somewhere for you and don't know where you are.

or when i'm picking you up and i'm double-parked, the hazard lights are on, and the security guard is telling me to get the hell out of there and you're not there.

so if i might seem kulit about my stories or my anecdotes or i'm ranting about something. but if the text message clearly requires a reply, please do. that's the polite thing to do.

and, oh, i also dislike the reply "k" ... but that's an entirely separate post. ☺

on splurging on real designer bags and scrimping on fake dvds

my brother, he's a purist.

he doesn't download music. he doesn't buy rubbershoes from greenhills. and he doesn't buy pirated DVDs. he believes that notwithstanding our third world status, we should buy deserve nothing but the originals. so you can just imagine what he spends his hard-earned money on and what our balikbayan boxes from our parents look like.

me - who happens to be the lawyer in the family - i'm not as virtuous. i buy bootleg DVDs (almost got caught in a raid once!), the 40 newest songs on my ipod have been downloaded from 4shared, and got a major virus attack cause of the number of games i got online. but - and this is a major but, at least as far as my wallet is concerned - i believe that if i were going to buy a bag and it's going to have some designer's logo stamped all over it, well, it's going to have to be the real thing.

ironic, isn't it?

now, given my clearly less-than-honorable position on intellectual property rights, i've abstained from making any sort of judgment when it comes to other people's choices. so what if that girl beside me is lugging what is an obviously fake burberry -- her choice, her price points. if she believes that the greenhills version is as good as the real thing, then i won't be mocking her. if you don't judge me for spending my 13th month pay (and then some!) on what used to be the outer covering of an animal, i won't judge you if yours was manufactured somewhere in china.

why the rant?

the other day, someone asked that i scrap the idea of including as a task (in an activity we were planning) the purchase of pirated dvds. while i was wasn't happy about it, i said, okay, the task can be easily changed. after all, he may be a purist like my brother. what got me upset though was when someone who i know actually purchases fake DVDs and not-real bags (and proud about it too -- she mentioned that people spend way too much on designer bags and she couldn't justify the purchase to herself, hence the buying of non-originals) commented insinuated that i was so wrong in including that activity as it clearly promotes piracy which - for all intents and purposes - is stealing (and therefore a sin).

my first reaction? i wanted to point out each and every single faux designer bag in her closet. i wanted to list all the times we bought fake DVDs together. i wanted to express how plastic she was for citing my intellectual property violations when she herself is oh-so-guilty of the same thing herself. i was UPSET ... wait, upset doesn't even begin to cover it.

after i'd calmed down, i realized that more than the fake/real bags, and beyond the authentic/pirated DVDs, what got me upset was my pride. she had pointed out a flaw, and i was upset that i wasn't perfect. i wanted to be praised for my brilliance, not to be dressed down for my lack of foresight. ah, pride. and even if i had all the pretty bags in the universe (including the coveted hermes birkin) none of them will get me into heaven, and none of them will change the fact that i -- a child of God -- was too proud to admit a fault.

why i don't have internet at home

a long time ago, everyone had to dial-up to connect to the internet. and while it took forever, it was fine cause we didn't know any better. late at night, amazingly, i could actually use the yahoo videochat feature even though i was using a pre-paid dial-up service.

and then dsl came, and it allowed me to download a whole lot of stuff, especially when i was at tita mayu's house. but my brother and i never got around to getting dsl for the house, and then he moved out, and it seemed to expensive to be shelling out that amount of money for internet considering that (1) i was hardly at home and (2) i had internet at work.

then they had these amazing internet usb things, and i got the sun wireless prepaid thing and it's serviceable, sometimes fast, sometimes slow. it could take forever sometimes, at times not even loading, but it was okay for my needs.

i went home to cabanatuan over the holy week where internet was fast and free at my aunt's house. once more, i couldn't help but imagine how life would be if i had dsl at home. downloads! surfing! watching movies! skype-ing and magic jack-ing with family! tweet till i fall asleep! tweet when i wake up! upload pics! download pics! anything! everything!

and then i realized this: if i had internet at home, i probably wouldn't get anything done.

so no more dsl for me at home. case closed.

*image from ehow.com

why at the end of the day, i still love my job

yesterday, as i was contemplating on the meaning of life (while watching law and order, ha!ha!), i couldn't help but thinking why am i where i am right now. i mean, my first lawyer job paid better. and my second lawyer job paid better as well. this job, it pays peanuts. seriously. don't believe it when they say the pharma industry pays well. last time i checked, we're in the pharma business and my paycheck says otherwise.

so my car's aircon still hasn't been fixed, notwithstanding that summer is officially here and i lost five pounds of water weight in the sauna-like conditions every time i drive from qc to las pinas.

and i haven't really bought anything fabulous since i got here. anything fabulous i have is courtesy of generous family members who feel sorry for the only lawyer in the family who, for some weird twist of fate, happens to be the poorest family member as well.

as a matter of fact, while i was that girl who was driving a cute car at 25 (on a teacher's salary, no less), i am now that 30++ girl who rides a non-aircon bus from ayala to sucat. a bus that screams "fire! fire!" to attract passengers.

but you know what?

this job doesn't stress me at all. i go to work at 8 and i leave by 5 and i can actually go to sleep without thinking of the million and one things that have yet to be done. when i leave at the end of the day, i'm done with (at least) most of the tasks on my checklist. my boss says "okay!" when i tell her i haven't finished something yet and will get it done as soon as i can manage. they ask me if i'm swamped, or if i'm still okay with the load, or i need any help with the stuff i have to do.

this job allows me to grow (well, hopefully not literally). since i arrived here, i've learned stuff about corporate law, IP practice, valuation procedures, and where to find cheap designer shoes (okay, so this may not exactly be work-related, but i did learn that from my boss and having lovely shoes is a must to boost one's morale and confidence, right?) gwapo boss has encouraged me to learn stuff other than labor law (my greatest passion in life) but, at the same time, has supported all my labor law related shenanigans. i've gone to one in-house seminar last year and will be attending one seminar next week ... and although my budget allocation will be used up by next week's seminar, my boss said that in the event i find one that i like, i can tell her so they'd share their budget with me.

and that picture up there? that's from when we did something for the plant. friday afternoon was v. v. lovely indeed.

i can still remember that sinking feeling after i resigned from the law firm and had to deal with the realization that losing my tax shelter meant losing almost a third of my monthly salary. i think i must've blanched at the thought, and freak out feeling was further bolstered when the partners all kept telling me how good i was at litigation, how with a couple more of years i was going to be at the top of my game, and how -- as i mentioned during my interview with them -- being a litigation lawyer was being a "real lawyer." how can i then, by reviewing contracts left and right, sending out prissy opinions, and taking the minutes of board meetings, consider myself a "real lawyer."

and then the decision to that god-awful case came out and i had to rush the appeal in ten days. i was writing things i didn't believe in. it was labor law, all right, but i hated every single bit of it. i hated the "legal engineering", i hated researching for case law that wasn't there, i hated having to milk more money from the client (who we hadn't properly billed yet and had racked up way more hours than his deposit actually covered), and i hated appeasing the client who i just wanted to shake severely so i'd be able to drive some sense into his addled brain. i was so miserable with the entire exercise that i just wanted to eat one subway sandwich after the other, buy an incessant amount of clothing i might never use, and sleep till kingdom come.

so i may not be as rich as i used to be. and i may have been reduced to taking crazy public transportation every single working day of my life. my heart may be yearning for that LV speedy monogram 35 that i promised to get myself for my 35th birthday (sad, but if i'm riding non-aircon bus, what good will it be that i have a speedy 35 right? it will just probably be viewed as fake, as fake as that lady's neverfull this morning.). but i'm happy. and i'm fulfilled.

and who knows, maybe i won't be this poor once we sell more cough syrup in the future. right, boss?

there's no place like home*

i'm writing this old school -- with a bunny-tipped ballpen that i discovered in megamall years ago and have bought countless copies of since then for its smooth glide-on-paper technology. i can spy what seems to be taal volcano from the window, although i can't really say. over the PA system, they're signalling for the crew to get ready.

now, i can see metro manila's intricate road network. i've no doubt that it'll be traffic when i meet with friends in megamall and i'll probably miss the get-everywhere-in-five-minutes travel time in dumaguete. i don't care though. i'm bound for home -- where there's an SM mall every ten kilometers, where good friends are just a text away, and where it's all good. ☺

*the original post was written on a notebook as i was flying home from dumaguete

** if you actually watch the video (yes, it's a bit boring, i know), you'll notice it was a pretty smooth landing. it was actually the smoothest landing i've ever experienced, so kudos to the pilot and first officer!

inseperable

five kilometers away from the house, i realized that i had left my phone at home. i was 16 kilometers away from ortigas, with 45 minutes to spare. i wasn't sure i could turn back, grab my phones, and make it to my lecture at 9am. so, it was decided for me: i was going to have to spend an entire day without a cellphone.

remember the time when people could actually live without phones? that summer between high school and college, my friends and i watched a movie almost every week. at the morning of each designated movie day, someone would call the others on their landlines, inform them of the meeting time, place, and the movie to be watched and we'd all be there, arriving within minutes of each other. i remember no one would dare be more than a few minutes late -- after all, if everyone left the meeting place before you arrived, you'd be stuck in greenbelt with no friends.

now, plans are hardly made, schedules hardly followed, and punctuality is virtually dead. at the very most, you'd tentatively set a meeting place and time, and end the planning with the all-too-familiar line "text-text". if you're running late, you send a text message. if you're thinking of cancelling plans, you send a text message. if you'd rather change the meeting place, you send a text message. nothing is final, nothing is definite.

as i sulked in my phone-less glory the entire day, it crossed my mind that me being without a phone would have been truly tragic if it happened last week -- how would i be able to meet up with che, who i was going to pass by for in shang, and ann, who would be waiting somewhere at the fort for me? i remember something like this happening in the past -- i was supposed to meet someone at mall of asia (yes, the biggest mall in asia!!!) and my phone had died. i challenged my inner resourcefulness and went to the administration office to have my friend paged. she wasn't all too happy hearing her name over the PA system, but as i explained when we finally met, would she have rather searched for me around MOA?

still, even with all the comforts being armed with a cellphone brings, i realized that to a certain extent, being phone-less wasn't, or wouldn't, be that insufferable. rather than rushing home after the lecture, i made a pit stop at sm sucat where i finally bought a replacement dvd player (which i should've done rather than buying that horribly expensive dvd lens cleaner which didn't exactly work :( boo!), a digital weighing scale (to, of course, aid me in my year-long quest to lose all that weight), an optical mouse (which i am okay using my laptop without a mouse, i knew i was going to spend an inordinate amount of time this weekend getting re-acquainted with PvZ, and we all know a mouse is necessary in the endeavor), and a mouse pad (shempre kailangan kumpleto, haha.) i also loaded by sun broadband prepaid wireless (which, for some reason, is working really well these days, good job!). i lingered and dawdled at the mall, checking out booksale, carefully weighing my dvd options, and avoiding all those places i promised not to visit for the meantime (translation: dessert places and clothing stores). by the time i was done, i had spent almost three hours at the mall, and while i wanted to go home already, it was because i wanted to try out the stuff i had gotten more than to check my phones.

of course, irony of ironies -- one phone had two text messages from meralco while the other phone had an info text from globe and a generic text message from the intercessory prayer team of lingkod alabang. clearly, no one missed me as much as i thought they would.

type A

last saturday, while i was at my community's leaders' retreat and planning, one of my leaders sent me this text message: tone down po ang pitch mg voice. para kang nasa korte attorney :) alalahanin mo, BL* pa rn yun kaharap mo :).

yesterday evening, immediately after we had our meeting for the anniversary, another leader sent this message: Hi rosa. gentle remindr. was not able to talk wd u aftr d miting. i knw kampante k sa relatnshp mo wd jc or i dnt knw if still mern pa rn ung inis mo sa kanya. nevrtheless, try to tone dwn a bit.

wow ... two messages of the same nature in one week.

there's a huge part of me that's discouraged, and an equally huge part of me that's chastised. i know myself to be a passionate, hard hitting person. maybe that's why i became a lawyer, and maybe that's why my former bosses said it was a shame that i chose to leave litigation and move to the corporate world. (maybe that's also why i'm still single but that's another matter altogether.)

i could gripe and say a whole lot of stuff about this matter, or i could be submissive and totally admit i was wrong (even if i were seething deep inside which might make me burst like a balloon and that's no good at all). so, instead, i'll just channel that line i got from this uber funny email i got from my boss: UMASAL LAMANG NANG AYON SA GANDA. (i should really post the text, cause its crazy funny, but blogger won't let me do it, and i've too many things to do to even begin to figure out how to do it). it said stuff that hit me the most, like how i don't have pretty underarms and i'm fat. that said, wala akong kaparapatang mag-taray.

quiet and gentle spirit, here i come.

edit: here's the link to the text of umasal lamang ayon sa ganda. enjoy reading.

*branch leader

i am so worth it

last year, two of my closest friends went to the st. james bazaar without me and bought me a shirt. in front, it says in gigantic letters "i am so worth it."

being black, oh-so-comfortable, and with a cheeky message to boot, i've worn the shirt bazillions of times - to vietnam, to dinner with friends, to mass, to the grocery, and to the occasional date. i think i will be sad when the t-shirt dies a natural death, but until that happens, i think i will wear it as much as a can, and mend it as long as i can stitch its seams together.

after all, it is the best reminder there is that i am so worth it.

i guess the realization truly hit me last saturday as i was conducting my lecture and this uber-gorgeous male specimen entered the room and flashed me the winning-est smile ever. the last time i was struck by a guy's looks that way was when i first laid eyes on the pilot, at a friend's birthday party. six and a half years later, i am once more enthralled (starstruck? enamoured? dumbfounded?) by a guy's looks, and i can't help but ask myself, am i worth this guy's love and attention if, by some miracle, the opportunity presents itself?

when i first met the pilot, the first answer that crossed my mind was no. he was gorgeous, he was tall, and he was a pilot who drives a bmw. how could i, a teacher who goes to law school at night, ever merit this handsome guy's attention. but somehow, i did. and while that relationship ended a week shy of our first anniversary (although we still did go out on our anniversary, although no one mentioned the import of the date), to this day, i am still incredulous at how i was able to snag a guy as hot as he was.

and so here i am again, smitten with an almost-perfect specimen of the male species, and dreaming of future perfect offspring should he get down on one knee and propose. i am in major crush, so much so that i couldn't look at him the entire time i was doing my lecture. for the first time, i hated the fact that i had left the firm and couldn't hand him my business card and offer him my services (legal, of course). he was tall. he was cute. he was something i'd gladly melt into a puddle for.

as i was driving home that day, i texted a friend and declared that despite my delusions that i was slowly falling in like with this guy that i think i'm dating (i don't really know what our status is -- we've been eating out for two years, and he pays, but he never brings me home), i realized the moment almost-perfect male specimen walked inside my classroom that if i end up with guy i'm sorta dating, i would forever be hounded by "what if". and, if you've ever watched letter to juliet, you know how fabulous the ending is if you act on your "what if".

plus -- lest i forget the entire point of this post -- I AM SO WORTH IT. so what if i'm almost an old maid, and i am not yet thin. so what if my face is like the full moon and my right knee hurts like hell when i walk. so what if i drive a seven-year-old car and my homemaker skills are next to non-existent. I AM SO WORTH IT. the t-shirt says so.

a volunteer's heart

if there's one thing that i'm proud of, it's the fact that i work with former street children at least once a week. for the past three years, i've been tutoring kids on thursday evenings, helping them with their assignments, projects, and what nots. and, once every two years, i also have the honor of being part of a major sportfest wherein at least thirty centers - a total of more than a thousand kids - participate.

i love the fact that i am proud of something bigger than myself, that in my spare time, i am able to change lives of children. i am proud of the fact that while each and every second of my professional life may be billed to a client, i can give it freely and without reservations to those who do not have a single peso to their name.

but sometimes, even the most generous of hearts gets burned, frustrated, and mad. last night, that heart was mine.

i do not mind spending my hard-earned cash. i do not mind giving up my personal activities to spend more time with the kids. i do not mind loving, caring, and nurturing these children. what i do mind is when another volunteer wastes my time with her own negligence, with her irresponsibility, with her inability to respect the fact that other volunteers have plans of their own and would appreciate, at the very least, a text message informing them of a change of plans.

i was so mad at her i couldn't help but lash out behind her back last night. if i had more guts, i probably would've lashed at her to her face. and, late into the night, i was still sending text messages to a friend at how frustrated i was about the entire thing.

in three text messages, he reminded me that more than anything, i was a volunteer who wanted to make a difference in the lives of these children. he made me realize the fact that ang asar ay talo. and he wanted me to keep in mind that a humble heart is the most beautiful kind of heart there is (okay, this last part was more interpretation than the text itself, hahaha.).

so, i guess i'm fine now. or maybe not. we'll see later.

on red cups and lifelong friendships

now that the red cups are back, i'm willing to bet that a number of people will be blogging (or tweeting!) about their favorite starbucks christmas drink. mine happens to be the peppermint one, and the cherry one. gay, i know, happens to love the toffee nut.

i'm also willing to bet that several will be gaining a couple of extra pounds as they complete the required number of stickers (this year its 17 + 8 i think) to get the ubiquitous starbucks planner. i believe my brother will be one of those people.

to me, however, the red cups bring back memories of my first actual female barkada -- two women who became my friend because of a "lotto" comment made by one to the other, thereby making it necessary for the offended party to "invite" me to her imaginary wedding, notwitstanding the fact that she had known me for a grand total of 36 hours. with these women, i share lovely memories of "baby boy t____" in the form of a bugs bunny pillow, "the wrong a", and a certain man standing on the corner of their street with his overnight bag all packed. it's a friendship that isn't perfect - oh how many days have i suffered from the silent treatment, and how many days did i myself inflict the silent treatment - but one that is real -- we've seen each other cry, laugh, hurt, triumph. we've gone through the worst possible dilemna from the least expected source, and yet we're still here -- good friends, kumares because of a wonderful little boy.

our initial bonding was over hot cups of specialty christmas coffee from starbucks. that year, if i'm not mistaken, we all got the planner. whoever wanted airtime would have to treat the other two to a cup of coffee each, and the other two would be bound to listen, interject only at appropriate times, and agree without reservations. it was a pact that we have to this day ... and a pact that would live as long as the red cups keep coming back.

as i write this, and wax romantic about two of my closest friends, i also can't help but think of a friendship that i abruptly and quite rudely ended this year. i am the offending party, and i know that there are a million and one opportunities that came my way to actually mend the friendship, but for some reason, i couldn't. worse, i didn't even want to try. well-meaning friends have told me that the harshness i've exhibited isn't the best way to deal with the situation, and a number have pointed out that pride is the only thing that's fueling the feud between us, but, sad to say, i guess it's a thorn that i'll have to carry with me for the rest of my life. i can't, i just can't.

maybe cause she doesn't shop at surplus shop. maybe cause she's as bossy as i am. maybe cause she's just too nice to me that i can't live up to her expecting the exact same thing from me.

and maybe it's cause we never bonded over a cup of coffee in a red cup.

bawal mangopya

bago ako naging ganap na abogado, isa akong guro.




ako yung guro na minumura ng mga estudyante kasi matigas ako. mataray. walang puso. ang paniniwala ko kasi, lalo na sa klase ng mga mag-aaral na tinuturuan ako, hindi chika ang pag-aaral. sa laki ng binabayaran ng magulang nila sa paaralan, kailangan ko siguraduhing may matututunan sila sa akin. at, dahil nga sanay sila sa marangyang buhay, alien concept sa kanila ang mahirapan at pahirapan. kaya ayun -- kung nakamamatay ang mura, hindi na ako umabot ng 30.


correction. hindi na ako siguro umabot ng 25. kasi lahat ang majority sa kanila, galit sa akin.


tanda ko tuloy, nung isang beses, may nakita akong dating estudyante sa premiere ng isang sine ni john lloyd at bea. at kahit na nakanigiti siya sa akin nung magtama ang aming mga mata, binulong niya dun sa isa ding guro na kasama na niya sa trabaho ngayon na inakusahan ko daw siya ng plagiarism na hindi naman daw totoo.


natawa na lang ako doon. kasi, sa pagkakaalam ko, pag kinopya, tapos hindi inilagay kung saan galing, plagiarism na yun.


minsan naman may isang estudyante, binagsak ko din dahil kumopya ng isang article. ang paliwanag niya, tito niya yung nagsulat sa isang website o pahayagan at pinayagan siya gamitin yung texto, kaya okay lang yun. ang sagot ko, hindi. pwede walang copyright infringement, pero hindi nun ibig sabihin na tama yung pag-alis niya ng attribution sa source.


sa totoo nga, may mas malala pa sa akin. yun teacher ni pam pastor, ibinagsak siya for plagiarism kasi i-sinubmit niya as an assignment sa teacher yung isang article na na-publish na dati sa pahayagan. tanda ko yung blog post pa niya noon -- aniya, i didn't know i could plagiarize myself.


so bakit ito yung pinag-uusapan natin ngayon? dahil dito. ayon sa mga punong mahistrado, wala daw plagiarism. malamang there was inadvertence at it was all an accident at the documents went through so many revisions that the original footnotes ended up being deleted in the editing process. pero para sa akin -- makitid man ang paningin ko, sana lang, they called a spade a spade.


because, inadvertent or not, accidental or otherwise, plagiarism took place. siguro, pwedeng mitigating circumstance yung hindi naman sinadya nung abogada na mawala yung mga footnotes niya. at malamang totoo namang ni-research niya ang draft decision. pero kung ang mga estudyante sa paaralan ay pwedeng ibagsak dahil sa pagkopya na walang attribution to the source, hindi ba dapat mas maalam ang isang mahistrado ng pinakamataas na hukuman ng bansa?


tama si justice sereno, and i quote (kasi baka ako masabihang nag-plagiarize din)

"Contrary to the view of my esteemed colleagues, the above is not a fair presentation of what happens in electronically generated writings aided by electronic research.

First, for a decision to make full attribution for lifted passages, one starts with block quote formatting or the “keying-in” of quotation marks at the beginning and at the end of the lifted passages. These keyed-in computer commands are not easily accidentally deleted, but should be deliberately inputted where there is an intention to quote and attribute.

Second, a beginning acknowledgment or similar introduction to a lengthy passage copied verbatim should not be accidentally deleted; it must be deliberately placed.

Third, the above explanation regarding the lines quoted in A.1 in the majority Decision may touch upon what happened in incident A.1, but it does not relate to what happened in incidents B.1 to C.6 of the Tables of Comparison, which are wholesale lifting of excerpts from both the body and the footnotes of the referenced works, without any attribution, specifically to the works of Criddle & Fox-Decent and of Ellis. While mention was made of Tams’s work, no mention was made at all of the works of Criddle & Fox-Decent and of Ellis even though the discussions and analyses in their discursive footnotes were used wholesale.

Fourth, the researcher’s explanation regarding the accidental deletion of 2 footnotes out of 119 does not plausibly account for the extensive amount of text used with little to no modifications from the works of Criddle & Fox-Decent and Ellis. As was presented in Tables B and C, copied text occurs in 22 instances in pages 27, 31, and 32 of the Vinuya decision. All these instances of non-attribution cannot be remedied by the reinstatement of 2 footnotes.

Fifth, the mention of Tams in “See Tams, Enforcing Obligations Erga omnes in International Law (2005)” in footnote 69 of the Vinuya decision was not a mere insufficiency in “clarity of writing,” but a case of plagiarism under the rule prohibiting the use of misleading citations.

Sixth, the analogy that was chosen ─ that of a carpenter who discards materials that do not fit into his carpentry work ─ is completely inappropriate. In the scheme of
“cutting and pasting” that the researcher did during her work, it is standard practice for the original sources of the downloaded and copied materials to be regarded as integral parts of the excerpts, not extraneous or ill-fitting. A computer-generated ocument can accommodate as many quotation marks, explanatory notes, citations nd attributions as the writer desires and in multiple places. The limits of most desktop computer drives, even those used in the Supreme Court, are in magnitudes of gigabytes and megabytes, capable of accommodating 200 to 400 books per gigabyte (with each book just consuming roughly 3 to 5 megabytes). The addition of a footnote to the amount of file space taken up by an electronic document is practically negligible. It is not as if the researcher lacked any electronic space; there was simply no attribution.

Seventh, contrary to what is implied in the statement on Microsoft Word’s lack of an
alarm and in paragraph 4 of the decretal portion of the majority Decision, no software exists that will automatically type in quotation marks at the beginning and end of a passage that was lifted verbatim; these attribution marks must be made with deliberate effort by the human researcher. Nor can a software program generate the necessary citations without input from the human researcher. Neither is there a built-in software alarm that sounds every time attribution marks or citations are deleted. The best guarantee for works of high intellectual integrity is consistent, ethical practice in the writing habits of court researchers and judges. All lawyers are supposed to be knowledgeable on the standard of ethical practice, if they took their legal research courses in law school and their undergraduate research courses seriously. This knowledge can be easily picked up and updated by browsing many free online sources on the subject of writing standards. In addition, available on the market are software programs that can detect some, but not all, similarities in the phraseology of a work-in-progress with those in selected published materials; however, these programs cannot supply the citations on their own. Technology can help diminish instances of plagiarism by allowing supervisors of researchers to make partial audits of their work, but it is still the human writer who must decide to give
the proper attribution and act on this decision."

ang pinakamalungkot sa lahat? baka isang araw, mabasa ng mga estudyante kong ibinagsak yung desisyon ng en banc sa kaso at isipin nilang tama sila sa pagkopya. ano na lang sasabihin ko? read the dissenting opinion of justice sereno? yun yung ni-point-out sa artikulong ito.

pero bago pa ako maging mas passionate at emotional sa topic na ito. titigil na ako. baka pati ako, padalhan ng show cause order ng korte suprema. unfortunately for me, unlike the UP College of Law, i may not have harry roque and dean leonen on my side.

* image from http://crizlai.blogspot.com/2007/06/understanding-meaning-of-plagiarism.html