f0r gRanTed..

"Take Care" is probably the most taken-for-granted two-word phrase.

When I say it, I mean it.  'Please take care.' 

iT's a sHoeLace-tYing CoNtesT!

Just this morning I overheard two neighborhood kids talking.
The first asked, "Do you know how to tie your shoelace?"
"Yes", answered the second kid.
"How fast could you tie your shoes? C'mon lets race! I'll race you in tying your shoelace!"

Believe it or not, the conversation stuck in my mind and I kept thinking about it that it made me break the silence in my blog to write about it!


Yey!


I always thought it felt intrusive when others try to question the things I do everyday that I think I do quite well such as tying my shoelaces. Like, C'mon! I do it everyday that I don't even think about it!
Have you ever thought of the details of tying your shoes? Could you write the directions down without  retying your shoes and taking down every loop or the lace?

Which arm goes into a sleeve first when you wear a shirt?

Do you think of which sock you wear first?
What shoe you put on first?

Such details don't need thinking about.  It's what makes life simpler and happier.! Think of the amount of stress you'll get when you have to analyze these things!

True.  Life's greatest joys are found in the simpler things. Life is full of no-need-to-think-about Shoelace-tying Contests that bring you joy although you haven't really thought of why.

So, are you confident with your shoelace-tying skills?

anY w0rse?

"The suppression of the desire to express"

When you know it's possible to express but you also know that not expressing is "the right thing to do."

THAT is probably the worst feeling in the whole world.

Not being able to move.
Not being able to speak.
Not being able to touch.
Not being able to express.


CAN ANYTHING FEEL WORSE?

Coty's iDea no.4

I was curious about what ideas my friend Coty would come up with when she started her 100 Ideas project.
Yesterday, in her post 100 Ideas: 4 I got really curious coz it contained a secret message, cut into several pieces and pasted back randomly. It definitely caught me. So I decided to "decrypt" this code. Using my limited knowledge in image manipulation, I managed to reassemble the message. So, ladies and gentlemen, here's Coty's secret:

(Drum roll)...

I'm secretly mad at my roomates right now because they got up early and woke me up before 6:00 a.m. I was so upset I had to go to the bathroom and quietly cry there because I can no longer take this noise and lack of sleep. I have a test today and I'm afraid I will fall asleep while I take it!

Well, Coty, I hope you did well on your test. :)

..go0d 'ol training days..

After some time of strength and conditioning, a long weekend seemed like a good time to try out and work on the practical. So, me and my friend Francis went on a training day on Maundy Thurday. We started with some drills and then went on to explore the new AIIAS Auditorium. The building has some good architecture. Meaning, it allowed for parkour training. We went around and over the building. And at the end of the day...

..and I try to remember, when was the last time I trained and wounded my hands?

It has been a while.

pedaling again..

About 60 kilometers under sun & rain,

to a hotspring to soothe my way-worn legs,

from pedaling a bike for near 3 hours o' strain

for but to sit for bout an hour long,

in a pool of hot water in a bowl of stone...

The trip took nearly 3 hours, beginning at 8 am and ending 11 am. Rain caused mud from the road to transfer to my cogs & chain. It got so dirty that it started making disturbing noises. I had to stop once in a while to wash the dirt off the chain. Water I used was from my water bottle.

Taking stops at 7-11 in Tagaytay, the AUP Gate, Paseo de Sta. Rosa, Burger King in Calamba, and finally, Dona Jovita Garden resort.

oh.. this was for a company retreat. I just decided to bike there..

..who will I meet in heaven.?

One day, my brother brought home this book by Mitch Albom entitled "The Five People You Meet in Heaven."

Since I didn't have any other book available to read, I started on this book not knowing the amount of wisdom packed in this book.  Once I encountered the first quote: "All endings are beginnings. We just don't know it at the time...", I started taking down certain points that I want to keep.

Although, I don't believe in the books picture of heaven, the idea and the concept just captivated me.  It constantly reminded me of my own life and how I've lived it.

Below are several quotes from the book.  Not all, since I want to tease you into reading the book.  Know more about the book here.

"No story sits by itself. Sometimes stories meet at corners and sometimes they cover one another completely, like stones beneath a river." p.10

"Each of us was in your life for a reason. You may not have known the reason at the time, and that is what heaven is for. For understanding your life on earth." p.35

"That there are no random acts. That we are all connected. That you can no more separate one life from another than you can separate a breeze from the wind." p.48

"Strangers are just family you have yet to come to know." p.49

"Sometimes when you sacrifice something precious, you're not really losing it. You're just passing it on to someone else."  p.94

"Holding anger is a poison. It eats you from inside. We think that hating is a weapon that attacks the person who harmed us. But hatred is a curved blade. And the harm we do, we do to ourselves." p.141

"Lost love is still love, [Eddie]. It takes a different form, that's all. You can't see their smile or bring them food or tousle their hair or move them around a dance floor. But when those senses weaken, another heightens. Memory. Memory becomes your partner. You nurture it. You hold it. You dance with it." p.173

I'm converted.  I'm on the search to collecting several of Mitch Albom's books: Tuesdays With Morrie, For One More Day, Have a Little Faith, and my own copy of The Five People You Meet in Heaven.

..fRaGiLe..

The active person that I am, I have been through several experiences that live reminders on my body. For those who are not familiar with these -- these are called wounds, scars.  My experiences, mostly as a child, include bicycle crashes that have left scars on my forehead, knees, elbows. The most painful, I would say, happened recently.. about 3 years ago when I broke my arm (insights-fr0m-my-broken-arm).

I've found out that breaks in the body never heal 100%.  They always end up weaker than they originally were.  I don't play volleyball and sometimes, intercepting a pass during a game of basketball reminds me of this.  They are marked by scars and scar tissues always seem to break more easily the second time around.

After ages of not blogging, this seems like a proper post for this "Month of Love."  Nothing mushy or that sort of thing in this post though.  Similar to physical wounds, emotional wounds will never recover 100%.  And as a result the victim takes care of this wound, scared because it is now more fragile - more easily to break again.

No matter how much time it takes, coz people say "time heals all hurt", time can never heal anything 100%. Not physical wounds.  Not emotional wounds.  It just is not the way it works.  Once you've been scarred, the scar - the reminder - is always there and gets more fragile every time it breaks.


So, have a care for the people around you.  You may be handling a fragile, emotionally broken soul.  Have a care.  Be sensitive.  They may have trusted you enough to expose their 'weaknesses' to you.  Have a care.  You may not be able to heal them 100% but you may be able to help protect that scar and better yet, help soothe it.