May 1999

Pity should only be a device for a good sarcasm; i.e., pity should always be sarcastic.

I am nothing. Never have I been so glad to say that I know nothing.

Upon reading Fiesta, The Sun Also Rises, you feel that life is all a long, dark, rotten night. But we shouldn’t be sore. We should make life (or the night) sparkle, spectacular and lovely through drinking tons of wine, partying wildly, living as best as we can, and having a swell time.
I almost wished I lived in a period in between two wars and a great depression. The 1920’s. I could legitimately belong to a generation that is lost, hopeless, aimless, and thus had chosen to be spontaneous and hedonistic. I would in the company of people who find themselves in the same shoes, or perhaps be someone like Jake, or even Gatsby.

No other writer or philosopher can encourage me to have an overpowering sense of strength, power and will; especially when I have often stayed on the losing end. No other philosopher can be as acquainted as N. is to poetry and truth, violence and virtue, loneliness and solitude, silence and the wisdom of speaking --- the very same things that have once made me feel as if I were powerful.
I just feel so good reading N. And what is good? “…everything that heightens thee feeling of power in man, the will to power, power itself.”
Although sometimes, or on some parts of the book, I really have no idea what the guy is talking about --- the riddles can be too tangled or the metaphors or implications can be too difficult for me.

After an untiring, effortless duty at ___, [and theater shows are of course, often delightful to see, given the opportunity to do so] I wash my oil-sodden face with hypo-allerginic Tender Care soap and fold my barong. I take the fantastically architectured staircase to the lobby, passing by the unlighted capiz chandeliers, and the art showcases at the now dimly lit hallways. Outside the LT lobby, I have a smoke and my lungs breathe with tar finally. A beautifully shaped half-moon looms with a speck of stars.
I go home, usually having a late dinner, but not tonight because the first free food I tasted in this job had made me excessively full. Surely, I go home to my chums --- boredom, booze, solitude, and the idiot box. And as only true friends do, boredom, booze, and solitude never leaves me.
I realize that it’s Saturday and this HBO series which breeds bourgeoisie values and absolutely makes too much of a hype of sex and relationships is on. I watch it, and it’s arousing and funny.
I have a few bottles.
At the end of the night, I can only find that the hardest act to do among all these is to fall asleep.

Something that is full of spirit glitters in me whenever I see both my parents smile or laugh --- especially the charming way my mother does it. Maybe because they don’t really smile and laugh a lot. Whenever they do, it must really be an honest-to-goodness laugh. The thing is, my parents are never phony when they smile and laugh.