GOD SPEAKS

A young and successful executive was traveling down a neighborhood street, going a bit too fast in his new Jaguar. He was watching for kids darting out from between parked cars and slowed down when he thought he saw something. As his car passed, no children appeared. Instead, a brick smashed into the Jag’s side door! He slammed on the brakes and backed the Jag back to the spot where the brick had been thrown. The angry driver then jumped out of the car, grabbed the nearest kid and pushed him up against a parked car shouting, "What was that all about and who are you? Just what the heck are you doing? That’s a new car and that brick you threw is going to cost a lot of money. Why did you do it?" The young boy was apologetic. "Please, mister…please, I’m sorry but I didn’t know what else to do," He pleaded. "I threw the brick because no one else would stop…" With tears dripping down his face and off his chin, the youth pointed to a spot just around a parked car. "It’s my brother, "he said.”He rolled off the curb and fell out of his wheelchair and I can’t lift him up." Now sobbing, the boy asked the stunned executive, "Would you please help me get him back into his wheelchair? He’s hurt and he’s too heavy for me." Moved beyond words, the driver tried to swallow the rapidly swelling lump in his throat. He hurriedly lifted the handicapped boy back into the wheelchair, then took out a linen handkerchief and dabbed at the fresh scrapes and cuts. A quick look told him everything was going to be okay.

"Thank you and May God bless you," the grateful child told the stranger. Too shook up for words, the man simply watched the boy, push his wheelchair-bound brother down the sidewalk to their home.

It was a long, slow walk back to the Jaguar. The damage was very noticeable, but the driver never bothered to repair the dented side door. He kept the dent there to remind him of this message: "Don’t go through life so fast that someone has to throw a brick at you to get your attention!" God whispers in our souls and speaks to our hearts. Sometimes when we don’t have time to listen, He has to throw a brick at us. It’s our choice to listen or not…

(Source unknown)

The Fast Lane

One winter morning on my way to work, in passing I noticed that a weed is growing in a crack by the pavement. I am always in a rush and did not even take a second look. It’s only a weed and it’s no import whether I pay attention or not. Not even minding how a weed could survive in a frigid winter temperature. The pavement is not well kept anyway, a tree may grow there; I could not be bothered because I don’t even have the time to care about it. All I deem to mind about is whether we have enough money to pay for the mortgage, or whether the car payments have been mailed already or most importantly if I have enough money in the bank to cover all our expenses for the month. But the most significant concern I have is how much money I need to make today so that I will have enough in the next five years. If truth be told I want to get a bigger house or maybe buy a two carat diamond ring and buy that Mercedes Benz that I have been dreaming of. I am always in a run because I am trying to catch up with the future. I am too engrossed in worrying about the things that is yet to come rather than pay attention to the significant moments of the present. I am moving too hasty, I don’t have an inclination of what is really happening around me. By spending all my time trying to seize the future, I don’t have time left to recall the name of my friend’s new born or bask in a joy of spending an afternoon with my love ones. Another friend’s birthday came to pass; I hardly remember to make a call at least.

All the people that I care about have come and go and yet I am here wrapped up in my own concerns in spite of the fact that there are more important matters that I should care about. Even when praying, there is always that element of rush to finish and hurry off

God, family, friends, neighbors, people are the true reasons why we exist. Material possessions are the means to get through life but it is not the way. In time, when and if I realized my dreams I hope there is still joy to relish the success when in fact the real joy I missed already on my way.

LA

Pandora’s Hope

When nothing else is left in the box but hope, the next best thing is freedom. As soon as the spirit of hope was released from the box, it followed all the evil intent, disease amongst them. Hope embodies optimism, trust, aspirations, dreams, desires and it also personifies faith. Freedom is all we got to continue on hoping and dreaming for the most prized desires we have in our heart. The spirit of hope will guide as through.

When I got the news about my brother’s health condition, having been recently diagnosed of an organ failure, I could not think of anything at that moment but the fear that this could be the end. My brother is only a year younger than I am. In fact, not even a year because he was born 2 months short of my mom’s due date. We grew up very close in age; indeed, we have the same birth month. According to my mom, when he was born he was so tiny that he could fit in my mom’s palms. By virtue of my parent’s spirit of hope, my brother survived the ordeal of growing through his first years as a preemie. Although, he was sickly, he was never a complainer. As an adult he had his shares of regrets but he always delight in the celebration of life itself irrespective of what the future holds. This could be the reason why he never complains of anything at all. When the family realized he is seriously sick it was too late to reverse the process. It was a choice he made and for whatever reasons he has in choosing that path, I want to think it is a reason worthy of what he had fought for since that day of the celebration of his birth.

I want to believe hope is eternal. For as long as we allow hope to settle in our hearts, life will continue. There is hope in the modern medicines and technological approaches in the treatment of his condition. There is hope in the doctor’s competence to treat, there is hope in the prayers of people around him and there is always the perpetual hope in my parent’s heart. I dream to see my brother live a longer life, a life that is free of the miseries of going through the treatment process. Although, I don’t have the capacity to decide or even to have a glimpse of what is in store for him, I have in fact the greatest gift to hope and have faith, that whatever will arise is all for his best.

I am thankful that hope was released from the box. Without hope, I don’t know the next best thing there is left for humanity.

Animosity, hatred, jealousy, diffidence and all other slimy, grimy substances that came out from Pandora’s Box will always be a threat to each in every relationship in this world. The world at large is in constant war because of mankind’s thoughtless appetite to be evil. This maybe a strong statement and you may not agree with me but this is what it is, life is a constant battle between good and evil. We have experienced being battered by evil intent and we have seen countless situations where we allow it to happen to ourselves and to other people. Every substance from the Pandora’s Box has shattered numerous homes; it has ruined many relationships, and even killed many lives. The reasons are clear and define but we ignore them. These substances work through our minds and hearts, it creeps slowly, unnoticed, and undisguised at times when our guards are down. The intention is to gore us right there at the core of our beings. They are parasites, like leaches that duel in our weaknesses and suck our good blood until we are dry. If only we can lock them all back in the box and put them away forever, the world will be a better place to be. What happened to love and peace, understanding and forgiving and all other substances that were not in the box but actually were in our hearts? What happened to good intent that was a gift to us all? Where have they all gone? How do we get them back? I have been asking myself these questions and time and again I come with the same answers every time. It has always been there, in our hearts and mind, it never forsaken us. It is us who actually abandoned them. Consequently, we can always take them back and do not let the grimy substance take over control the core of our beings. Depending on how strong our will to confront them, there is always a chance to immerge triumphant. It is a constant fight; you have to be on guard all the time. Every single waking moment of our lives we have to face another day of confrontation and it is hard work….in fact it is the hardest and longest work ever. The work will only end when we take our last breath and meet our maker. LA

Where is Healing?

The storm has passed but the devastation will stay for a while to heal. I don’t know how long the healing process will take but for sure it will take its own course. On the contrary, whenever it is ready to take place, I only wish that it can reinforce into its original condition. In the natural world, it will mend and regenerate, it may take thousand years to get to its form but the certainty is almost real. But for people, the expectation of healing is always almost hard to meet. As it is, the process of the devastation already is hard and painful but in reality it is the process of healing that is most excruciating. When talking about profound, pitiless desolation, as matter of fact there may not even be a promise of healing at all.

People’s emotions are the most delicate part of life there is to surmise with. When we get hurt no matter how shallow and deep it is, by nature, we have the tendency to focus on the pain disregarding why there is pain. Defying reasons of understanding we let that pain guide us to more desolation and more pain to hurt us deeper. To some of us, it runs through our entire life, seemingly we are all right but in the deepest crevice of our emotion, the hurt and pain still lingers. In our lifetime how many people have we encountered that still talk about the past unhappy experience of their childhood?  How many of us still hate our exes or even our teachers in high school?

Is true healing really subsisting?  I asked myself this question time and again and to this point I still don’t have the answer. Whenever we get hurt, how often do we associate our present pain from that of the past? Different pain in a different situation always gets the tendency to be associated to each other and as we do, the past experiences of devastation come rushing back in giving way to doubling the sting of the present pain. Where is healing comes in then? Maybe lessons past are lessons gained but if it reiterates the same pain that wrecked havoc on us in the past, I don’t see where the healing takes place.

Faith in oneself to have the strength to handle the remnants of the devastations in its different shapes and degrees maybe is the only options there is to survive but we can always experiment on where we can attain peace and contentment amidst all the atrocities we have in our lives. Nothing is constant in this world. Everybody is bound to get hurt. Sometimes we recovered, there are times we don’t but there is always a promise of a better healing if not in this lifetime maybe the next.

LA

Breathtaking Buhi

I have traveled far and wide. I have seen captivating terrain, splendid mountains and magnificent bodies of water, but never was I mesmerized by awe-inspiring wonder such as Buhi Lake.  Buhi Lake is one of the prides of Camarines Sur in Bicol. To see it, is to experience a moment of serenity. The water that dances softly to the rhythm of the wind can be mistaken for a lady in her purest form. During full moon, the reflections give the water an illusion of whitish grandeur.  In its early years, Buhi Lake’s underwater was filled with “Tabios”, a unique little fish that became the famous “Pandaca Pigmia”, the smallest fish in the world. One clear day, I had the privilege to go around the lake on a boat, and from a different vantage point, I could see all the mountains around it, towering and hovering as if they were soldiers guarding a prized jewel. The famous majestic mountain of  Bicol, Mt.Mayon, is on the far right and on the left, the modest Mt.Asog towers over the pristine lake. The town of Buhi is a beauty as it is, but as the saying goes, there’s more to it than meets the eye; Deeper into the mountain is yet another pride of the Buhinons.  “Itbog” falls, as the locals fondly refer to it, is sanctuary to tropical flora and fauna, a real paradise to outdoor loving souls. Boulders and stones thus creating rivulets break down the water that cascades from the top down to the spring. It is about 90 kilometer in diameter. The water that emanates from the spring is as therapeutic as just staring at the rivulets formed in between the stones and boulders. According to the olden tales the water can cure diseases ranging from skin and body pains. Itbog falls is about I km from the lakeshore line. About 20 to 35 minutes walk. On the right side of the lake is another falls. About a kilometer far from the lakeshore line, deep into the woods is a Twin Falls called “Baybay”. The equally tantalizing natural beauty of this Twin Falls can be accessed by foot from the lake by about 40 to 50 minutes walk. “Baybay” falls is another virtual paradise that magnifies the beseeching appeal of the town of Buhi.

The town encapsulates the lake. It has a population of 68 thousand people, 27 thousand of which consist the voting populace.   Its main livelihood is fishing from the lake. “Tabios” used to be the main source of income for most families, but now Tilapia has gained popularity due to the commercial demand from the neighboring towns and cities.

I can’t wait to come back to this town and once again enjoy and bask in its beauty.

LA

A Fight for Life

It was a regular trip to the dentist, an ordinary weekend that was turned to be a frightful day in the emergency room. On October 14, 2006 at 9:00 in the morning I started my day quiet upbeat and excited to what the day will bring. The sun was out and the breeze was pleasant rather than a little bit chilly but the air in general was affable. As I walked from the parking lot to the dental office I saw birds and squirrels busy dodging for food. I thought to myself, alas! Another eventful day beginning.

The dentist wanted to perform an oral surgery to correct a job gone bad from previous procedures. As she preps me, the sensation that tingles from the needle that pricks my gums was nothing out of the ordinary. It was a very familiar sensation which I have been through all my life, being subjected to certain dental procedures since I was 4 years old. The sounds of the metals from the dental equipments and the stench of the meds they used are all but too familiar and typical. As I relax to wait for the local anesthetic to do its job, the news about the New York Yankee player that was killed in a flying accident on his mid thirties, young and beautiful, and at the height of his career, flashed to the TV screen. I had to deliberately close my eyes and tried not to listen to the news and deny myself to the realities around me. The reality that life is not ours to hold, it’s only but a loaner from someone who has a better view of our destiny. No matter how careful and sure we are of our actions, decisions and choices we make, the chance of getting hit to the end is never illusive. Perhaps it’s always best to be prepared all the time,  ready to go and to let go, perhaps this way is much easier, pleasant and painless. As rational beings it’s so easy to analyze and reason out and espouse our thoughts in a circumstances which our minds can function lucidly, but given in a situation that your mind can’t function coherently and your body is limp and you are scared, the irrational component of our beings as human wins over and that’s where our human impulse takes charge.

As soon as the anesthetic set in, my world changes. My blood pressure shoot up to the level I did not imagine It could, my visions became blurry, my body shook as the blood rushed to my head, my breathing was hard and my heart was raising. My human instinct thought I was having a heart attack. I could not breathe and my legs could not move. The only thing I could think of is to cling to my life and made sure I was still breathing. My hands were clammy and I knew it will be worst. I was in and out for three minutes but it seemed felt it was forever. As I was rushed to the emergency room I thought about my children, my husband and all the people I loved so dearly. For their sake and for my sake I decided I was not ready to go, not yet…not ever. As I thought about my sins and trespasses, undeniably I was not ready to go as yet…

It was nothing worst than a case of premature ventricular contraction that was induced by the ingestion of stimulant brought about by the Lidocaine and penapharin, a local anesthetic.  Some people may die form this kind of allergic reaction some may not… I was lucky that my heart was strong and it stuck it out for me. I would still have episodes for the next few hours but the worst was not over yet.  Few hours later, the heart monitor indicated that my breathing and my heart rate was normal and all the vital signs looked just promising, in my mind and in my feelings the nightmare of that few minutes fight for life will be forever embedded in my psyche. Now, I am forever scared, every little change in my heart rate would make me nervous and paranoid.

To this writing, the symptoms would come and go and as expected it will last for three more days but milder and milder as the days go by. My body was worn from the fight. My chest and back hurts I would still throw up every now and then but the worst of it is not gone yet, the unsecured feeling that our life is truly not ours to keep. Anytime, anywhere we can go forever and no returning back is the worst painful feeling there is.

LA

Compromises of Relationships

As always, there is a component of sacrifice to every relationship, be it personal or impersonal, no matter how blissful or harmonious it may be. When you choose somebody for a particular kind of relationship, you choose to be unchoosing - or giving up - your option to choose all others for a time at least, in that same particular way.

But this choosing, grand as it is, and willing as we are to make it, is also symbolic of many choices, little and big renunciations and revisions of our priorities that we need to come to make as walk the path of relationship successfully. There’s a great deal we do (or discontinue doing) precisely and only because we choose to have to carry the responsibility that is attached to every relationship we adhere to. In love, friendship, parenthood, profession, just to name a few kinds, a component of sacrifices and considerations to each and every choice has to be laid out responsibly. Each day, as we live our life, in any relationship we have. We will be faced with decisions and choices, invited to make compromises that represent a willingness to meet each person halfway on the playing field of life. Thus, we may find ourselves adapting to uncomfortable schedules or meticulous (or sloppy) habits we have to deal with in order to accommodate each and every choices we made.

A compromise-what you do for living-needs to be just that: a conscious revision of our preferences. As such, it becomes a creative, imaginative act, an opportunity to expand, to experience life in a new and surprisingly beautiful frame. But above all, it shows you the depth of life’s true meaning. For when we smooth off the corners of our own dogmatic priorities, we reach toward one another. In so doing we see that relationship, the deep recognition of the soul of our equal human being-and not all the endless particulars of life-is truly the important thing there is.

LA

Voices of My Heart

There are hundreds of different voices in my heart. It can be soft. It can shout. It can scream. It can whisper. It can rip, tear, and with one scream darken many lives.

You hear it roaring through me like thunder as the angry voice in my heart murmurs for your understanding. Then, there is this subtle force that only you can bring, to set the hearty-fire to dancing.

There are times when this voice seemingly came from the deepest crevice of my heart in the frigid depths of anger. Most often this is the voice of late daybreak, in the half-light that is neither day or night, then, your force that barely trembles me, can rattle no window sash, creeps around corners, yet could hold back the coming day it so minded. You listen and you sense, waiting for its blow to strike, then the day brighten in the east, and you know the wind has relaxed even as the stars from which it came, grow dim. Alas! Another bright day to reckon, and another day to hope and love to give.

LA

It’s all about forgiving

It goes against my grain to be negative. I don’t think we are born to denigrate others, to look the bad side of life all the time. I have got detractors, but I remain joyful about my prospects. In some ways, my predicament now has allowed me to focus on things that actually matter: my husband, my children, my siblings, my parents, my loyal friends and ….the smell of the flowers. Whether I live in peace amidst atrocities or I live in my detractor’s midst, I know that I have been given much in this life and, while I still have it, I’m going to continue enjoying it.

I am stressed out from all that’s happening, but I am strong enough to shovel it out when it’s full. Life is supposed to be a gift, a blessing, but some people do not know how to live by this blessing.  What a poor, impoverished world it would be, that had no weeds to defy man’s narrow idea of order or to suggest even new possibilities to our too-limited minds. Who can calculate the strength and blessings we received when we see and identify them with a dandelion growing from crack in the sidewalk blooming brightly amid adversity? It makes me feel that I should be capable to a bit more, when I see what weeds accomplish on what little they receive. If a dandelion survives in a crack, I would survive in a poodle of sharks with only my heart and my mind to thrust them all away…. Or could my heart be strong enough to heal each one’s sickness? I think I am being stressed out because I am just too blest to be given this chance to heal other’s pain. 

Forgiveness shall heal all wounds.

LA