The Error of Parallax

The only reason I hate you now is because I loved you then. 

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I can't stand listening to this music when I type this. I am not typing, I am shouting at you! But the rules of conduct and playing the game means I can't do that. Tables are turned now. I can't even say anything. In a last effort to save some face I can't even sms. I wish I could take some of them back before.

You've made a fool of me, just as I am sure you've done many times before with many girls. Undeserving! I replayed it on my mind and I can't understand why? I suppose this is a frequently asked question but it's not one I am used to asking. Am I not enough? 

I checked my mail constantly. I knew I shouldn't and I felt even more defeated with every empty inbox. You did nothing. You didn't do anything. I didn't understand? If you didn't do what you do, I would be enough. But because of this world and you in it, I am not enough. I didn't understand.

I never hated you, though I was blindingly angry with you for a time.

I'm not angry with you any longer, though you were judgmental and cruel in ways which were crystalline in their ingenuity. I can't even imagine how you've lived through the years after you abandoned me and said that you no longer loved me.

Because of that, the years we've spent happily together just banished together with those good memories we made. Then I stopped wishing that I could spend any more time with you. It also stopped me from thinking that you're a kind person because I felt that you've been terribly unkind to me.

But. I still love you, yes I do, not the same way as before but I know I can't hate you forever. This love will always remain in my heart in spite of all of that heartaches you gave me. But you're wrong, you know  when you said that "love is not 'only a two-way street', otherwise it isn't love." Because I'm all alone here on this infinite one-way street but I know what I feel.

Thanks for that liberating talk we had. 

-russ d'great-

Baliwan 101

Sa pagiging distress lagi sa buhay, minsan na e'inspire tuloy ako na sana maging baliw na lang. Feeling ko kasi wala na silang feelings, tila wala na rin silang kapagoran kakalakad kahit saan, parang hindi na rin sila na gugutom---at kung gutom man unli naman pagkain nila sa daan...weeeheee... =)

Bilib rin ako sa confidence nila. Wala silang pakialam anuman sabihin ng mga tao sa kanila, wala silang pakialam sa pamatay amoy nila, sa damit nila, sa buhok, sa paa, sa langaw, sa dumi, sa matraffic na daan, sa lubak na kalsada, global warming, baha, mahal na bill ng kuryente, internet, cell phone load, bigas, leptospirosis, kung corrupt nga ba si binay, kung mananalo nga ba si duterte, kung bakit may FB at IG na, o sa 1D kung nagkawatak-watak man sila....Ang sa kanila lang----ay ewan ko ba...

Sa tingin ko ang lakas rin ng immune system nila-----kasi kahit palaboy-laboy sila sa daan---under the sun at biglaang ulan-----never ko pa silang napansing umuubo o nagkasipon man lang... O diba? para silang mga zombie...pero di lang nanganga-in ng tao---nambabato lang, nangdudura, nangangaway, nanghihingi, at kung anu-ano pa...Pero bilib rin ako sa mga normal na tao dahil okay lang din sa kanila---kumbaga normal lang sa kanila....O dibah? gusto ko na talaga maging baliw.....wala rin kasi silang pakialam sa mundo....waaaaaaaaaaaaaaah...!!!

Sabi nga ni Paulo Coelho sa librong sinulat nya "If one day I could get out of here, I would allow myself to be crazy. Everyone is indeed crazy, but the craziest are the ones who don't know they're crazy; they just keep repeating what others tell them to.” 

Di ko masyado matranslate pero isa lang ibig sabihin nyan na baliw man sila eh normal din sila sa sarili nilang mundo..mas ok na yun kaysa maging pabigat ka o pasaway ka sa gobyerno at wala kang naitulong sa ekonomiya. Charot! 

baliw na rin siguro ako sa ka-iisip nito...hehehe 

salamat sa pagdaan,

russ d'great

Veronika Decides To Die: A Short Rundown

As a fan of Paulo Coelho’s much-celebrated and classic book, The Alchemist, I stumbled upon Veronika Decides to Die through a  good friend's recommendation and was intrigued by the topic of the book and the major questions it asks about life and death. 

Inspired by events from his past, Coelho tells the story of Veronika, who seems to have everything in life that most people would envy and consider fulfilling, but who nonetheless feels dissatisfied and makes a decision to end her life by overdosing on sleeping pills.

Veronika, who attempts suicide, fails, is institutionalized, and is informed that her attempted suicide damaged her heart and she has only five days to live. In the hospital she has to come to grips with what it means to be dying, but also what it means to be insane.

“Decides” is the key word in the title of this book: Coelho weaves his storytelling around the major, life-altering decisions that the central characters—the protagonist and those with whom she interacts in the mental hospital—must ponder when they learn of her imminent death. 

With her days numbered, Veronika goes on a journey of self-discovery that makes her contemplate her original reasons for wanting to die as well as the meaning of life as a whole. 

Readers join Veronika in her self-discovery quest by inquiring what they themselves would do if they were to learn that the ends of their lives were happening in a matter of days, rather than in the several years ahead, which many people hope for.

In the end Veronika finds that she is truly free. She seems to have everything at the beginning of the story: a job, boyfriends, and popularity. However, they're those things that enslave her, and that’s what leads to the attempted suicide. 

In a way, Veronika is doubly freed. She is free because she is dying, and what can one do to a dying person. Second, she has been labeled crazy, and, having such a label, people expect her to act oddly. She has the freedom to do those things she has been too frightened to do all her life.

Thoughts About The Author 

Veronika Decides to Die made me fall in love even more with Coelho’s writing style, because he seamlessly introduces to the reader a vast expanse of topics revolving around spirituality and psychology. The writing resembles that of a teacher who gently instructs his students without acting like a pretentious know-it-all trying to force people to believe everything he teaches.

It offers food for thought rather than preachy absolute truths. As readers are engrossed in an engaging story that keeps them asking, “What will Veronika (and others) decide next?”, Coelho is a master at allowing his audience to absorb any new information without making them feel dumb for never having thought of or known about it before.

This book is not something to read once and then completely forget. It is meant to be one of those books in which the topics on psychology and spirituality make you want to do more research and reading in order to understand better the concepts being questioned.

Also, the events and characters in this book are bound to linger in readers’ thoughts well after the book is finished, simply because it will make them wonder about the exact meanings of their own lives, especially if the ends of their lives were happening a lot sooner than they expected. 

I’d recommend this book. It’s short, readable, and offers clear food for thought.

thanks for reading,

russ d'great