Sometimes, people can trick me into getting on a mile high escalator- the kind that skips over three floors of a building in an architect’s attempt to please the public. Meaning, in a world that now opts to waive lunch for the extra cash, modern infrastructure would not be deemed effective if the blueprints don’t generate a positive comment at the end of every review that the said blueprints: will save time. What is the trick? They talk to me. Not just for those terrifying steps on motion; even those ridiculously steep and elevated walkways on streets for crossing from one side to the other. They have to talk to me. It’s a dangerous and very imposing “one over me,” though something I still have to teach myself to be wary of.

       The last time this happened, I was walking with someone who probably uses banal chatter to ward off fatigue and the urge to suddenly drop his mounting irritability on someone else.  It was a concrete pedestrian bridge with so many concrete steps and I hadn’t eaten much of a day’s noontime meal.

“ Oh,God.” I said to myself while looking around for an alternative route to the northern end of the avenue. Truthfully, if I had known that meeting him would entail any sort of walking and for this specifically: climbing, I truly would have begged off. But he was one of the sly friends of mine that I’ve spoken of. “It’ll be fine,” he said. “I’ll help you. And what, by the way, were you saying about your old boyfriend?” Now that was a pretty fine maneuver. Checkmate. I talked the talk and he wasn’t even listening. It was actually sweet of him; that which he did. He allowed me to expound on a topic he didn’t care much about and he saved himself a considerable amount of time. After all, I was on vacation. He on the other hand, was rushing back to work.

                                                                 Must not have friends who are afraid of heights.  

I’ve never been on a ferris wheel. What a real roller coaster ride feels like remains a mystery to me. The most dangerous ride I’ve ever been on [ school fair time] has been the caterpillar. I loved school fairs as a Paulinian. Not for the rides, obviously.

I loved them for the street food freely allowed during school fair weeks. Fishballs and singkamas  with bagoong. Manggang hilaw  with bagoong. Cotton candy, 3M pizza slices and MERALCO cheesepie slices. Real Coca-Cola and shaved ice treats[ blue or red ]. Taho and Mamang Sorbetero  ice cream [ ice cream chi-chi]

If I ever see that sly friend of mine again, I will try to look like Catherine Zeta Jones in that movie “ Terminal” [ The Terminal? ] Exactly like that [ except for her nose]wearing 5 inch heels. I’d race and beat him to the gentleman’s act of hailing me a cab.

                             Must not have friends who are afraid of heights but can run on dangerous [and very “illegal”] high heels.

Then rush back to work he surely will.

                                  Oh my, she ran away from my goodbye kiss. Again. I wonder why?

School fair. I’ve been on this theme park “ride” for years now.  I have enough tokens for five years more on it. I don’t want the happy chaos to end [so soon] for me. Trying to educate the learned man on how to win the game of “kiss the fair lady”.

In the middle of this theme park life, “ Just nearly caught you. Come now. You can’t run away. Where to? Oh don’t worry about those heels. I win and I want that kiss now.”

F: Wait…you need to have a token. Do you have it? It’s red and round. With the word / WINNER/  stenciled on it. Didn’t you know?

                                                           Must not have friends who know the rules more than I do.

                               But I won and I really wanted that kiss! There, there are those damned clowns when you really need them.

                                         “Hey, you clowns. Lend me a token; red and round. Please and hurry. It’s an emergency. ”

F: Must not have friends who know how to deal very well... when it comes to clowns.

I feel the need to re-post "happy" entries, so the UGLY and VILE one [ somewhere down below there] can find its ugly and vile [ though its proper place] somewhere in the archives of manila rose.

July 1st 2007

Fast food is bad. Fast food is especially bad if you just finished watching the Hollywood flick " Fast Food Nation". I am special and horrid because I actually ate a Wendy's hamburger after watching Fast Food Nation, suddenly forgetting about the invisible spittle that might be in it.

1.) In the next life, there will be no Wendy's Supervalue Salad, so I will have it as much as I can. I only eat the lettuce and the Jello parts anyway.

2.) In the next life, I will not know the same things that I know in this life. Hence, I will play my music as much as I can, share my music as much as I can, and read all the books that I have not read which are shelved in my library, gathering mottle. And write as as much as I can.

3.) In the next life, we will not know each other, because we already met in this one. Therefore, I will love you as much as I can while I can, whether you care for my love or not.

4.) In the next life, I will be stupid. Ergo, I will be smart, now.

5.) In the next life, I will ask my lover to make love to me, as much as he can, while he can. In this life, I can't ask. And in this life, I can have anyone I want, except the one I want, so there is no one to ask.

I watched " The Weatherman". I agree with the character of Michael Caine.

" In this shit life, there are some things we must chuck."

But don't chuck it 'til you've tried it, yeah?

****

When I write, I fill each page so that I can get all that I want from you and more. I can slip into your bath and know that you know, that I am there in front of you. I am as shy as I want to be amongst others, but with you, I can peel off the white bath towel from my skin on my own. I can touch your face on my own, I am not waiting for you to permit me to do so. I can be as near to you as I possibly can. I can be a part of you as essential as wished for by me. I can take all that I want and offer more than you want, and I know that you want more than what you are aware of. And so I fill each page with all that I can get from you, which I cannot have unless I write that what I can have is everything from you. Everything and anything I want.

****

If I forget the number of years between us, the more years are added to how long it will take for you to know me more. Why can't I write the name of the man I love? I dream so very badly. In one of my dreams, I am sitting by a platform stage and I am trying to listen to your voice while you teach children about strings, and paper and drumbeats and more strings. It seems that I am even more asleep in this dream than on my bed. I can see myself straining to hear your voice, and I press my head against the space of wind before me. This space is a solid space. Even in something which the mind creates in order to discard what is useless, I am walled apart from you. I can see and listen, but only these two functions. If I write and say that you are my love, there are also only two things. I will be punished. You will punish me. I will be punished because it is not for me to act like the truly blessed, those who can write the name of who it is that they love, those who do so and and are not punished.

You will punish me because you cannot understand why there is a need for me to say that you are my love, to say who you are without fearing the way in which you will choose to punish me.

This is where my question came from. Why does heaven allow it, that I dream of you so vividly? Heaven should not allow it. If it happens again, then it can only be a sign that I am not going to be part of His kingdom. If no one is so small as to not be heard as one prays.

I have been praying for an end to these dreams that have respiratory wills. What if there is a "someone so small"?

What if I am someone-so-small?