Parents - you gotta love'em

The other week I was sick. A slight fever, soar throat, stuffy nose – the usual. Except with the swine flu thing going on – what with posters warning and informing everyone about it all over campus and on the news – my parents were particularly concerned. I didn’t think I had it, mainly because I had injected in myself a little vaccine called denial. So I came home from school Friday night of last week, a sick, pathetic (yes, I must admit it; I am a baby when I’m sick) and cold, but hot at the same time, Bern.

I know this is a kind of implicit thing in my family, or maybe that’s just in my point of view, but whenever someone gets sick, we tend to elongate that period of ill health because we don’t exactly stick to the medicine schedule. At least that’s the case with me. My reason? Because simply I forget to take the medicine or I don’t believe it works sometimes. Perhaps it was the denial I rashly injected again last week.

In any case, last week’s recovery from the common minor flu – or cold – seemed to break the cycle, thanks to my parents’ love and care and fear of the swine flu, and their determination not to bring me to the doctor’s so we wouldn’t have to pay. I had become their experiment. And the baby that crawls out of me during these times of sickness only helped. I was already drowning in sea foam tissues.

I stuck to an oatmeal diet. Not exclusively though; I also had arroz caldo, green tea with honey and hot chocolate milk – to name a few. I stayed in bed and did my homework there (which wasn’t very productive due to the seducing slumber that surrounded and made up the aura of my bed). I often fell asleep with books on my face. Outside of the house, I stopped going to the gym for the whole week – that’s a first.

But what really made my recovery fast and efficient was my parents' forcing me to stick to the medicine schedule. I was on the most comforting and delicious TheraFlu. No complaints there. But see, without my parents I probably would have been too lazy to prepare it or I would have forgotten to drink it every once in a – what’s the dosage and directions for adults ages 12 and over? I had a separate medicine mug for it, propped upside down on a saucer next to a spoon, when it and I were taking a break from its use. My parents were on me with my medicine. They kindly prepared it for me (again, I can be such a baby when I’m sick) when it was time to take it – and saw to it that I did, I might add: If that cup wasn’t empty in ten minutes, rinsed out and propped upside down on the saucer, they would inquire both vehemently and panickingly. They kept asking me if I had a headache or any other body aches and texted me to take my aspirin when I was in school. My mom had put a roll of tissue paper on the dresser next to my bed for the sudden sneezes of the wee hours. At least twice a day, they took my temperature to see my progression. And sometimes, quite randomly, my dad would all of a sudden slap the back of his hand on my face (I don’t think he realized he was still wearing his wedding ring), aiming for my forehead to see if I had a fever. He had turned to my mom once, and then I heard a murmured exchange of words, the result of which was them asking me, as if out of suspicion, if I had taken my medicine. I forgot that time. Oh, that’s what parents are for!

To make a long story short, my recovery time was relatively short compared to the many times I’ve been sick in the past. I would like to thank my parents for their determination to make sure that I got better as fast as possible so as to end the misery the sickness engendered, which was probably from someone who sneezed on me in my world literature class or any of my other English classes. I would like to thank them for driving straight from work to CVS to buy the TheraFlu and I would like to thank them for warming it up in the microwave and cutting the TheraFlu packet filled with its miracle powder to be mixed into the hot water. I would like to thank my mom for putting the aspirin in a zip-bloc bag so I can bring it to school, even when I could have done it, though I was lazy. Thanks, I really do appreciate it.

My Partner in time

What object describes me?

On my tenth birthday, I had wanted a sports watch. I don’t know where the idea came to me to want a sports watch. I just know that I wanted one at the time. So then I got one from Tito Albert and Tita Celia. Tita Celia worked in the jewelry department of Macy’s, I think, so she was able to buy one for me. I was so excited when I got it! I think it still had the price on it. It was 60 dollars! Sixty dollars to make a ten year old girl smile. About a year after that, I lent my watch to someone for one day and that day my watch broke. It wouldn’t say the time or do other functions. Angry? Of course I was. I was furious! Already you can see how much my watch was beginning to mean to me. I didn’t talk to that person for the rest of that day and I blame that person for the breaking of my watch, even to this day. Except that I don’t hate that person anymore. The hate left, but I still point my finger at her.

Anyway, that meant that I had to get a new watch. Who knew that it would be this new watch that I would have for the next 11 years, come this November? My parents bought me a new watch – that new watch I was just talking about – when I was 11. In addition to that, they bought one for Steph and Ate Sherry. I don’t know what they did with their’s buy I kept mine and still have it right now as I speak. I mean write. Technically type.

Therefore I nominate my wrist buddy who has been with me for at least half my life as the object that would describe me.

Watches move on and so do I (and so does mostly everybody else). Over the past few years I’ve changed, chiefly because I had to because it was required for college and chiefly because I was egged on to by other people and chiefly because I wanted to – because my mind changes and as it changes so do my desires. But I’ll save that for another blog. So I’ve changed over the past few years – computer wise. I didn’t used to have an email. But then I got a yahoo email account. And for the first year of college I used that. But then one seemingly ordinary day, as I was on the library computer at school, I was “invited to chat to Ate Sherry on gmail.” I didn’t know what that meant at the time honestly, but I saw Ate Sherry’s name and I got excited. It said that I first had to create a gmail account. Honestly again, I didn’t know what that meant, but I created one anyway. The next thing I knew, I was chatting with Ate Sherry and she was just as surprised as I was that I did that. That was the first change.

Then there was youtube. Simply put, Steph taught me how to create my own account and make playlists. Once I learned of this ability – to create playlists, I started making one of Jason Mraz right away. Eventually that first playlist grew into 17 playlists, with one of them containing 51 videos. My playlists mostly consists of live versions of songs that I love (either of Jason Mraz, The Killers and sometimes Keane), instrumentals to songs I love, as well as tutorials on how to play some songs as well as cover songs by regular people. Thanks Steph for introducing me to this power (as well as to running but that’ll be a different story).

The latest computer feat I grew onto is facebook. Two people I know urged me to get facebook. I remember when people asked if I had facebook and I told them no – and they couldn’t believe it. Well now I have one and it’s not too bad.

So back to my watch. I’ve kept the same watch for 11 years. The actual watch (that tells the time) stayed the same. And so do I, well sort of. I’ve noticed that my body frame changed as I started playing sports. That’s as much as I’d like to say about that . . .

I don’t think I told you yet about the time I lost and retrieved my watch. It was mother’s day, 2006. My family and I ate out at a Chinese restaurant in Queens called Silver Pond. I remember clearly the condition of my watch during that time period of my life. The strap of the watch would come off sometimes because it was kind of broken at the junction where it met the part of the watch that tells the time. This rendered my watch a risky partner in time to wear because it could fall off if I’m not too careful with it. With that said, that mother’s day, my watch had accidentally fallen off of my wrist and onto the red-carpeted floor of the restaurant. The car ride home was average, only because I didn’t realize I had left my watch at the restaurant. It was only when we got home that my heart started racing and I started worrying about it. I didn’t know back then that it was in the restaurant. I checked and double checked the mini van and the drive way. Nothing. I had to find my watch because I had kept it for so long, I didn’t want to all of a sudden lose it. It now (and then) has intrinsic (sentimental) value to me. My dad decided to call the restaurant to see if they had found it. I don’t know if it was my dad’s love for my happiness of keeping that watch or if he just wanted to play a trick on me, but he said that the restaurant people couldn’t find it, when really they did. I lived for about a month without a watch. Oh, it was horrible! Ol’ reliable wasn’t reliable and I missed it a lot. It felt like loosing a pet – not that I would know how that would feel like, although I like to say I’m at least above average in sympathizing. So that went on for about a month, and then came father’s day. For father’s day we went to the same restaurant. My dad was a bit more giddy than usual, but again ambiguity asserted itself. Was it because it was father’s day or was it because he had a surprise for me? When we entered and as our waiter came to the table, they presented before me, my watch!! And they were smiling too! I don’t know what my dad told them on the phone that day, mother’s day, but they obviously knew how much my watch meant to me and were so happy to re-unite watch with girl. I love my dad. Not a bad tennis partner either!

Therefore, I conclude that my watch and I, - well, we go back. We got history. I want to make this on-going affair with my watch as long as possible. And with each passing birthday, I will not only be thinking about me, and how I’ve lived another year. I will also be thinking about how my watch has endured another year. How we went through it together. We’ll sing Happy Birthday to each other!


It's a handsome type of digital Armitron watch by the way.

Affair with the morning and night

Each day is brand new. That’s how I see it. So even if everything is routine to me, there’s something different despite of that. I’m not thinking the same exact thing as yesterday or what I will be thinking of the next day, right after I wake up. Some days I’m more determined to get something done and some days, I just want to sleep it off and lie victoriously and rebelliously in my bed. Either way, the day facing me is still brand new and I can see it in my word-of-the-day calendar.

Here’s a new scenario. Every night is brand new. I may sleep in the same bed each night, but the thought in my head before I surrender myself to the kingdom of dreams may be different. Some nights I feel reluctant to sleep because I’m still energized, even though I know I need to sleep because I’m going to wake up early the next day. Other nights I just drop on my bed and let myself fall into the rescuing arms of the dream world. And sometimes, I go to sleep just because I fancy a dream. Either way, the night approaching me is still brand new and I can see just a glimpse of it as my eyelids begin to fall.

I have just told you my two favorite parts of the day: when I wake up and when I go to sleep. There’s something about those times that lures me into their rituals and subtleties. One of the seductive factors that pulls me literally and figuratively so swiftly off my feet is its being done in solitude and in darkness or semi-darkness. And the unknown lying within the darkness reflects the unknown scheduled program that’ll show up in our dreams. We don’t know what we will dream about and often times we don’t remember them (although some salient dreams never fade away). So why have them? To entertain us as our bodies perform maintenance – like a movie going on in a traveling coach bus or ferry. They’re there to distract us and keep us company in the dark and lovely lonely hours. Well then, what about nightmares? Maybe your body’s just trying to teach you a lesson wherever and whenever it can squeeze one in. I love waking up because I have the freedom feeling that I can do anything that day. I could skip class and decide to pack up and leave town for a life on the road. Of course I would consider consequences and probably would reject that idea, but still the feeling that I can do that is still uplifting – and it uplifts me into the start of my day. I’m just saying I like the feeling that I could decide whatever I want to decide, with each passing morning.

Often when I have to write something such as a short story or ideas for blogs or thoughts of interpretation for papers, I rely on the interim between wakefulness and sleep and between sleep and wakefulness. It is during those times that I think of the most telling and elusive thoughts. It is also during those times that I get out of bed to jot it down in a note pad before I forget it.

I remember a period of time in my life, I think I was just starting high school. I couldn’t sleep. I kept having trouble with falling asleep. And I knew what the problem was too! It was just that I kept thinking. All these thoughts right when my head hit the pillow. What was I thinking of? I don’t know. I think playlists of day dreams or fantasies. My dad tells me I daydream a lot and that that’s why I’m never focused when he’s telling me directions on how to get somewhere. Anyway, that was just a phase, I guess. Or, who knows, it might pop up again. It didn’t so far though.

Each time I go to bed, or wake up still lying in bed, I just let my mind wander. Kind of reminds me of when dog owners take off the leash from their dogs and let them (the dogs) run around in the park. There’s a place for the imagination to play and I kind of like that.

What’s your favorite part of the day?