WORD NERDS: this is NOT your nanay's blog

Long gone are the days of being carefree
All I have left are the memories and nostaglic t-shirts
This used to be my playground
No more cooties or capture the flag

All I have left are the memories and nostalgic t-shirts
To think I wanted to grow up so fast
No more cooties or capture the flag
What am I gonna do with my life?

To think I wanted to grow up so fast
Life's coming at me fast
What am I gonna do with my life?
Never enough time and energy in a 24-hour day

Life's coming at me fast
Time to take our kids out for an afternoon at the park
Never enough time and energy in a 24-hour day
It's 8PM, gotta check their homework and make sure they brush their teeth

Time to take our kids for an afternoon at the park
This used to be my playground
It's 8PM, gotta check their homework and make sure they brush their teeth
Long gone are the days of being carefree

Labels: poetry, words

Unfinished and broken, still making progress
What happens when "friends" just don't fucking get it?
Justifying words of regression - racism and homophobia
What am I supposed to say? What am I supposed to do?

What happens when "friends" just don't fucking get it?
I'm a female so I'm expected to simply let shit go
What am I supposed to say? What am I supposed to do?
Suddenly, two stubborn souls are at war with one another

I'm a female so I'm expected to simply let shit go
I don't know where to go from here
Suddenly, two stubborn souls are at war with one another
Wounded and weary, the guns need to be dropped

I don't know where to go from here
We've wasted too much time, too much energy
Wounded and weary, the guns need to be dropped
There is comfort in friendship, and peace in understanding

We've wasted too much time, too much energy
Justifying words of regression - racism and homophobia
There is comfort in friendship, and peace in understanding
Unfinished and broken, still making progress

Labels: poetry, words

So it's Lent. I say, "So what? BFD (Big Fucking Deal)."

What's Lent?

"Lent, in most Christian denominations, is the 40-day liturgical season of fasting and prayer before Easter. The 40 days represent the time Jesus spent in the desert, where, according to the Bible, he endured temptation by Satan. Different churches will calculate the 40 days differently.

The purpose of Lent is the preparation of the believer - through prayer, penitence, almsgiving, and self-denial - for the annual commemoration of the Death and Resurrection of Jesus, as celebrated during Holy Week, which recalls the events linked to the Passion of Christ and culminates in Easter, the celebration of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ.

There are traditionally forty days in Lent which are marked by fasting, both from foods and festivities, and by other acts of penance. The three traditional practices to be taken up with renewed vigor during Lent are prayer (justice towards God), fasting (justice towards self), and almsgiving (justice towards neighbor). Today, some people give up a vice of theirs, add something that will bring them closer to God, and often give the time or money spent doing that to charitable purposes or organizations."

- Lent - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I guess I got sick and tired of Catholicism, much to the dismay of my mother. What a quarter's tuition is at the university I'm attending is equivalent to what she paid each year for the first 8 years of my 12-year private Catholic education. When I got to high school that tuition doubled to about $5000-6000/year. When Catholicism is part of your everyday academia for 12 years, it makes you not want to be Catholic. Or maybe that's just me.

Growing up, I was proud to be Catholic. I guess you could say it felt like this special club, going to a Catholic school and all. You want to feel like you belong when you're growing up, right? When junior high rolled around, I started to feel increasingly detached from the religion. I'm not sure why. Adolescence? Menstruation and PMS? Boys as a new religion? Discovering the mall as an escape [Oh, Pinayism.]?

When I was a child, I assumed that everyone in my extended family was Catholic. But I later found out that wasn't the case. Some of my cousins didn't even get married in the Catholic Church. Another cousin and her family converted to nondenominational Christianity. Two of my cousins who are around my age haven't gotten confirmed either. That, and my "father" (I use that term very loosely) didn't fast during Lent. He ate meat on Fridays, too. Maybe it was a matter of consistency, or lack of it.

My cynicism grew when, for one, the Church's scandals started surfacing. If priests and other religious authorities can't resist temptation, then we're screwed! Two, an isolated incident during my senior year of high school. A friend called me out, asking if I was still a "V." I didn't respond back. This was after we had a guest speaker talk to the student body about abstinence and waiting until marriage to have sex. I had already lost my virginity the previous year. Naturally, I felt out of place. A black sheep. I thought Christianity, much less Catholicism, was about being compassionate, forgiving, loving your neighbor as yourself, not judging others, etc. That day, all of that went out the window.

I haven't gone to church every weekend since junior high.
I haven't given up anything for Lent since grade school.
After high school, I stopped fasting and not eating meat on Fridays during Lent.
I haven't been confirmed.
I haven't gone to confession since high school.

When I have children, I would want to let them make their own choices in regards to religion, among other things. To each, their own.

Pray for that.

Labels: religion, storytime, words

This isn't something I've researched (yet) or something that is completely inexplicable. This is something big. Like BIG. Like super unimaginably big. Or BIG. Whatever, you get it, this is important.

Lately, I find myself stumbling and second guessing my words. Not because I don't know what to say or because I'm just so inarticulate or because I may need a moment to think. I have a million things going through my mind at any one moment.

So what happens when what comes out of mouth isn't what's going through mind? (This is the "main point" if you don't take anything else away from this post.)

Sometimes the phrase "words are not enough" definitely holds true, but that's just it! That's it! It. I-T. That's the very thing (ambiguous word) that plagues me about language, communication, etymology, semantics, vocabulary, etc. The way that we communicate and live is un-whatever I think. Because then I find that the physical just can't compete or catch up. You know what, though? This blog doesn't even scratch the surface of the surface of the title of the topic that is bothering me. Bothering isn't even the word I'm looking for, yet it comes close to this struggle (also not the word I'm looking for) that

(left unfinished on purpose)

Language is not a definite thing. I-T's not. We attach meanings to make sense and make patterns to form comfort. SO if you ask me why something is or why it exists expecting to fRom-ulate expectations and purpose foRm my words, then I really can't relay the UTMOST confusion I experience/go through/process/live/create/interpret/see. Synonyms are another story. And stories are another paradigm.

I'm about to pull my hair out over this. And please don't think "Oh, I know what you mean" because you really, REALLY, real-ly, re-ally don't.

x_magsalita.

Labels: words