A list to whittle the worries

1.) D., with the help of V., baking home baked brownies. Moist and fudgy.  Perfect with 

2.) Sagada Dark Coffee that you buy at a fair price from a local reseller who repack the goods they get up North. Also good with 

3.) Ciabatta bread (bought buy-one-take-one) from a local cafe, with butter, tuna, or beef burger patties. Perfect to eat and drink while reading

4.) Junichiro Tanizaki's Naomi. In conversation with a few students, I learned later on that the title really was 痴人の愛, Chijin no Ai, or literaly, A Fool's Love. It's a little erotic, one of the students commented. It's a good read, especially while listening to 

5.) Chilled Cow's lofi hiphop playlists, or 

6.) I. practicing Chopin's Etude Op. 10. No. 5 in G flat major. 

Sparingly

Manila was spared by 2020's strongest typhoon, and with effects of climate change, probably an epoch's strongest. We were expecting the worst as signal number five was raised. But it was our southern provinces, Albay, Catanduanes, the Bicol Region which was ravaged. We are safe, but ultimately sorry for what we will read/watch in our news feeds in the next few hours. 

It's Sunday. 

Our President's probably sleeping. 

Today's the first of November, the day we remember our dearly departed. 

We are alive, but we constantly think about our loved ones who passed away. 

I always think of my own passing. And if we think of others, how undeserving we are of the joys we've reaped. I'm reading another Joan Didion (Blue Nights) and this was my last highlight: "How inadequately I appreciated the moment when it was here is something else I could never afford to see."

It's been years since I read "The Year of Magical Thinking" but I clearly remember her journalistic account of her husband's passing. It tells a story of grief with personal and historical accounts in an unbelievably elegant literary expression. How could she write and not lose it? I'm am profoundly sympathetic and yet awed. And now I am again, with her daughter's passing.  

If I were to give my own journalistic account of today, here in my own confessional box, I worry and empathize but I'm here in my home doing my most adequate, appreciating of the moment I can afford. Reading ebooks with V., playing the piano with I., two cups of excellent coffee, a movie, and drinks with D. with an amazing beef soup lunch and salad, pasta, and fish balls for dinner. Reading Joan Didion again.  

We grieve just as much we allow ourselves a few joys. 

Still, I'm sorry.