i write to believe.

The weekend has ended and I'm about to enter into another week that looks quite hectic and loaded with things that I am not entirely so excited about.  But I have chosen to learn how to be grateful for everything and I will start that by saying thank you.   Thank you for a fruitful ministry during our praise and worship practices. youth praise practice 03.26.11 Thank you for a new handy gadget that is entertaining me right now. (Yes secondary phones are necessary especially where I work.) samsung galaxy mini, the nokia e63 has conked out Thank you for conversations with Mom and Dad which don't really happen as often as I would have wanted but thank you anyway. not a recent picture but one of my favorites Thank you for a renewed faith in community and rejuvenated relationships with friends taken last weekend 03.20.11 after the retreat Thank you for getting the chance to eat another DQ sandwich yesterday. one of my favorite desserts And for those othe...

It is one of those Sundays where I am left pondering on thoughts I haven't entertained during the week because of busyness and other things.  So here I am sifting through these thoughts in an attempt to evolve into someone who is able to sit peacefully with them.   Accepting that they are part of human life and growing from the realizations I stumble upon as I write myself into believing in them. I find myself silenced in my own needs. Almost imprisoned by them. I want to shut them up and just escape them and yet I can't. It almost feels like I am forced to deal with them in this helpless disposition because I have tried everything and still I find myself in a place where I can't change my circumstances. When favorable interactions are present, I am assured. When they are absent, I am stricken with fear. And it is in this fearful place I am trying to learn about love. The discomfort is intense. It gnaws. It scrapes at my insides and yet to escape it is just to p...

I haven't written in days.  The words are all stuck up there somewhere.  In between memories and cluttered thoughts.  The last I wrote was 8 days ago and it feels like so much has happened since.  I don't know why it is so necessary to chronicle every moment or feeling.  Like laughing in the middle of praying or the heaving sobs I released during last weekend's retreat.  Like the queasiness of my stomach awaiting responses to questions posted about the faith or the agony of the journey towards healing.   So much has happened and I haven't begun absorbing it all.   But this much I know, I have felt the calling to serve the Church once again.  I've realized a lot of things while sitting through the 2 day weekend retreat meant to rejuvenate the spirits of community members and save them from falling out or further alienation.  I remember all the moments I've felt alienated in community.  And it was comforting to know that I wasn't th...

Something made me tear up during the quietness of lunch break today.  I was tagging some old photos in Facebook.  Most of them are of my parents.  And my Mom commented on two of them.   the first picture (1) taken when i was 3 years old the second picture (2) taken when i was about a year old in my hometown It has taken a long while before my Mom and I have really improved our mother-daughter relationship.  Mostly, our communication gap has been mainly because of how she often comes off quite unapproachable.  Stern.  Uptight.  Over the years I have realized that there were reasons why she had to stay tough and pull herself together the way she did.  It's one of the things women do when they're trying to keep themselves from falling apart. Mom and I never had a lot of mother-daughter conversations.  We don't know how.  It's always awkward to talk heart to heart when we come face to face.  It's always easier to say ...

Yesterday I was blessed to spend the entire day with the youth. From ministry meetings to hanging out late into the night and talking about the longing to revive the fire in the apostolate. It hasn't been easy for me to come back and take this road again. There were some doubts and fears. But God finds a way to to knit the hearts of His beloved people together. Especially those who fall on their knees in contriteness admitting their vulnerability before all. I always thought that I was only watching from the sidelines. Never quite new my place. Afraid that I am too old enough or too complex to resonate or truly connect with anyone. But there is something about this Apostolate that I've noticed whenever crisis hits it or shakes its very foundation. Love always raises it up. Last night we talked about this love. And how we realize that everybody who is in this apostolate, loves the Youth in so many different ways. We also realized that so many people need the kind of love that ...

I went upstairs to check up on my Mom.  She was sleeping on her new couch with her work clothes still on.  What prompted me was the music playing in the surround system.  Dad's music.  Perhaps from the CDs in their CD player that he left inside the last time he went home for a visit.  My dad's been living away from home for the past 6 years because of work.  He comes every two weeks.  I'm not sure if he's coming home this week because they had a fight.   My parents have been married for 35 years and they have this marital wound that never seems to heal.  This week was one of those weeks in our lives that it got unearthed. I'm not sure what to feel about the whole thing.  My mom just finished her chemotherapy and we're all just trying to get used to everything.  And now this wound.  Resurfacing again.  The burden at home right now is heavy.  The air is thick.  If the walls could talk, they would probably be scre...

There's more to my heart than just romance.   I've typed this sentence 3 times.  In a chat window while talking to Adi this nightmorn.  In my Facebook status and in my Twitter.  I did that because I want to express to everyone I meet and who asks me "am I single?"  or "why aren't you married yet?"  or "how's your love life, dare I ask?"  that something changes when you've had almost 10 relationships gone awry.  When 3 cheated on you.  1 you cheated on.  And 2 where physically violent. And 1 died.   When something in your life never gets calibrated right, you should stop.  I did.  Well, I didn't stop completely but I changed.  I used to think that having  a love life was the "end goal".  I just wanted to leave home, settle down, have kids and grow old with someone.  But that has not been the case.  Life threw me lemons.  And against the expectations of more than half of the people in my life ...

Dear Sylvia, I read your journal today and I wonder what it must have felt to be you during your time. I find it sad that you had to end your life so quickly because people like you are quite hard to find especially in my day. There aren't a lot of people I can relate to like how I relate to you as you talk about yourself in your journal. There aren't a lot of people who are able to articulate themselves like you and remain available to people like me (albeit in paperback form). I was talking to Adi this morning about how you write and how the words just breathe with life. She says your writing sounds timeless like your voice spans many different eras. Well, it has sure reached mine. I know I've put you in the corner of one of my shelves in my room primarily because the picture on your front cover was a little bit scary to me and that time I just watched a movie that they made about you. I didn't want any haunting thoughts to surmise while I was in bed looking at...