Issues

It does recur.

The issue of being single, again and again. People equate happiness to having a partner. And it's such an annoying feeling to question my single-hood. I'm sick of contemplating my state of being single; further, to justify it. I may need affection, I may need "love", but I am not (and perhaps will never be) prepared for the responsibility of commitments ( I know it's redundant). Afraid? To certain degree, yes. Not being too defensive, but fear is not the primary issue. It's just that, I can sense an unexplainable burden when serious relationship is about to sink in at the scenario. Whatever that is, that burden is more burdensome than enduring this so-called loneliness. People who doesn't know me well finds it a given that I have a boyfriend. The time when I insist I am not, they just can't absorb the idea and (perhaps, I assume) silently conclude that something's wrong with me. At times I am seriously considering their 'diagnosis' too. Anyway, I am carefully restraining myself into delving further, lest I would harness this growing depression.

Another myopic thing, I am sick of observing things into bulk. One can condemn a system, a behavior, but to sum it all up into a sweeping generalization of the "identity of a collective" is incomprehensible. True, I hate the system of UP; as I said, I am even willing to make an empirical study with the hypothesis that "UP system is the microcosm of the Philippine bureaucratic system'. But that is it. I dislike the system, and not claim that all UP students (or include faculty) are the airhead activists that many people may label them. Same is true with the study of law. I overtly argue time and again with not just one group of people that law is not for me because the curriculum requires the students to embrace conformity. In fact, I just read a political economy article, stating that "law is the codification of norms." And it's just out of my character. That doesn't mean, moreover, that all lawyers are conformist at all times. And so, going further, I was frustrated to be treated by an Atenean lawyer (which happens to be one of my bosses) a disgust to find out I am taking my master's degree at La Salle, since DLSU students as they say, are not studying anyway. Worst, asking what degree I am specializing, and telling them it's development policy (and consequently explaining to them that it's a polsci thing), they feel it's futile and advised me to shift in MBA instead. In the end, I blame myself of setting this discussion not just only in this corporate environment of the office; but more specifically to the people working at the Corporate Commercial Department. What is a "weird" person like me doing here anyway?

Final thought, I condemn the proliferation of free-riders. I hope I am not sounding too normative, but being in the graduate school, everybody is supposed to be independent to accomplish course requirements. The methodology of the professors itself suggets a very individualistic way of passing the course. Don't argue that independence and selfishness is equivocal here, because I am not talking of moral values. The instance we decided to take a graduate study is a clear indication that we are challenging ourselves to grow further. Supposedly, nobody is counting on the other to provide them a book and further expects to receive the charity of a classmate of paying for them in advance. We are all struggling for our own survival here.

There are more issues I cannot contain any further...

At 22

It was one of the least popular birthdays I ever had as I took charge on the occurences of that entire day and do nothing but normal. What was in store anyway? It was a busy Tuesday; I was literally out of touch to anybody since my time was consumed by the normal office hours and the class I have to attend thirty minutes after that. And not a soul from the people I engaged with that entire day know that it is my birthday, which added the thrill, of course. The 'Birthday of the Month" that is usually posted in the office's intranet was delayed for a week due to the laziness of the Admin Department, which was immensely favorable on my part. I did not find it necessary to inform the people around me about the so-called special day anyway, including my boss. How would I say it anyway, "Hi, you know what, it's my birthday today." Whether I like it or not, however I say it, it will remain pointless especially when the birthday celebrant herself is not the biggest fan of birthday celebrations. And however my officemates curse me once the birthday celebrants are posted in the net, what was done is done.

It may have been my most selfish birthday for nobody gained anything on that day but myself. I just had my little realizations at the end of the day: Birthdays are customarily commemorated out of self-congratulations, which is automatically accompanied with traditional nostalgia of the success/failures undergone and the conscious assessment of growth of the self from the entire year passed. And doing such ritual is most likely dangerous. It is not that people must keep on moving forward without any time offered for self-reflection, but the idea of self-congratulations may undermine the momentum of moving forward. It is not the assessment itself that is dangerous, but the luxury of appreciation of the achievement of the self.

For the twenty-four hours exclusively granted for an individual to remember his or her own existence in the three-hundred and sixty-five days of a year may something be special for him or her, but for the rest of the humankind, it is nothing but an ordinary day when hours are swift and consumed towards the achievement of something beyond the present situation. And to keep oneself on preservering to move forward to achieve something substantial in the long run on the day of your birth is more than just a birthday treat for yourself.