The prospect of buying a tube of white gouache revived me. The sight of artists making an alley near Maginhawa pretty lifted me (Alley 44). That’s how visual art, music, theater/movies, and literature give me life when the drudgery of everyday existence engulfs me.
But before I could sit down and make art, I needed to run errands.
I didn’t know I was that exhausted yesterday because I slept with my lights and PC still on. It was a terrible way to end the week.
Our CEO had a townhall meeting with us in APAC and I couldn’t help but raise the question about hiring. I told him I have zero reporter in Singapore and it is ridiculous that they are not prioritizing it and are prefering to hire freelancers instead of fulltime reporters.
I got scolded by my APAC boss, like you shouldn’t tell him that we are preferring freelancers over regular hires.
Then we had a call with our cameras on and she said what happened to you? You look terrible! I said yes, I’m so stressed and I really don’t understand your point.
So it seems like they did their own hiring and already submitted their choice for an editor/reporter in Singapore with the management and it has been stuck there for 3 months. And they didn’t tell me. So what’s this all about telling me in January to double down, drop everything to do hiring and replace my colleague who left then all of a sudden they tell me we can only do freelancers?!
This is so fucked up. I’m giving up.
I needed to relax and practice with my heat gun.
I made an impression of the photo I took during one of those lonely bike trips to Eastridge (Binangonan-Antipolo) almost three years ago. I had that photo printed and framed and it still hangs on my bedroom wall, to remind me that despite all that I’ve been through, I still can stand proudly even though I am alone.
So what warranted this stress-busting painting session? Well, I drove south again to check on my tiny house and apply for a new Converge line so by the time we move in, I will already have a 500Mbps internet connection.
This area will be protected by polycarbonate roofing so my patio and grilling area/brick pizza oven will be protected somewhat from the rain. It would look like the one below:
Beyond the stairs up to the perimeter fence/wall will be my laundry/utility area. In the future, I can convert the space under the new stairs (it will be a lot bigger with a deck midway) into a workshop of some sort for my DIYs or it can become art studio if I try my hand at acrylic and oil—the super messy media. I did oil painting twice and I never liked them. It’s too messy and my asthma doesn’t like the fumes from the oil paints and thinners.
Anyway, I will fill this area with potted flowering plants and line the walls with creepers or I can hang orchids on coconut husks. The area on the right beyond the stairs will be my veggie garden and the composting area (which my mom had been doing for 30 years).
This pathway leads to a holding area/screened porch that leads to a front garden and garage. The front garden may be demolished to make way for a three-car garage. This pathway is currently messy because of the construction but this used to be lined with plants. I will revive this with flowering plants and have bougainvillea and yellow bells creep along the perimeter wall. The door on the right is my mom’s studio unit which is currently one giant room with walk-in closet and ensuite but with no kitchenette. Beyond that is the main house.
I’ll go back to painting.
And nope. I cannot push my luck. The second painting is blaaahhh because I’ve exhausted all my creative juices in the first painting (above). I’m pushing myself too far.
I snuggled with my cat, Sushi, before I had that call with my APAC head this afternoon. We leveled off and I told her that I was so close to quitting, among other things that I had to tell her, like I was being poached by another publication and that competitors are also hiring all over for Southeast Asia so there is always a threat that
Anyway, that is that. I just have to struggle with nobody in Singapore office, at least for the next six months or so. That means I would have to travel there frequently.
I relaxed a bit today so stomach acids are less bothersome today so I have no diarrhea. Hopefully, this continues so I won’t be harassed when I travel next week.
Meanwhile, my heat gun finally arrived.
I don’t have to wait overnight for my watercolors to dry completely. The drawback here is that the hot air from the heat gun pushes the liquid too much so it makes the color marks look messy.
I have to practice using the heat gun. It tends to wash out some colors so I need to layer a lot.
More practice. More practice. More practice.
My body was full of knotted muscles so I had booked a two-hour Zennya massage last night. At the end of the session I was already snoring so I just went straight to bed and forgot about everything else.
Today, I was bombarded with edits (which was fine) and hiring chores/issues (which was not fine) that I had suffered through diarrhea the entire day due to too much stomach acids. I think I had been going to the bathroom 10x already. It seems like my proton pump inhibitor (esomeprazole) is not doing its job. If by next week I’ll still be like this (geez I’m in Singapore 🤦♀️), then it seems like I need to have that endoscopy to see whether I already have peptic ulcers.
I think I need to decompress for a bit.
Let’s see what I can come up with later.
I redid this Binangonan sunset that I drew last year. This time, I did not resort to using fine liners to define plants and I am now more light-handed when it comes to sky colors compared to the first drawing. This paper is still very wet so I will just revisit this tomorrow when it’s completely dry.
Why did I do this?
Nothing. Just to track my progress when it comes to technique i.e. showing the opacity and how to do reflections on water. The first time I did this, Laguna Lake didn’t look like a lake at all; it was just a muddy valley. Now at least there’s a semblance of water reflecting the sky. I also mixed cadmium yellow + cobalt violet and cadmium orange + cobalt violet to produce different browns for the lake shore that would go with sunset and the lake. For the other part of the lake, it was a mixture of imperial violet + blue gray deep of varying degrees. Using the pre-mixed browns and grays made my first drawing muddy and it lacked opacity that is needed when sunlight changes every second. Watching other artists on Instagram is helping me to rely less on pre-mixed colors and create my own.
This is still ugly in my eyes so I need to continue improving this. Probably next year.
Today is my uncle’s inurnment, roughly three years after he suddenly died of suspected Covid during the early days of the pandemic. Almost all his surviving siblings came, so a number of my cousins were there, too.
From our departure from my apartment to Christ the King Seminary that is 15 minutes away, I saw the trees shedding their leaves and the branches have become bare. Dried leaves have been floating around, riding the wind. It’s the signal that the long hot and dry season is upon us. The trees have prepared for the dry spell; by late April and May, they will be a riot of colors as they show off their blooms.
“Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return.”
My uncle has become dust while the world around us continues with the cycle of life. Leaves are dying so enough resources can be channeled by the trees into producing flowers and then the seeds may be spread before the rainy season starts, to nurture new life.
We die in different ways. There are times that our bodies have died and given up the ghost, so that the spirit can continue to live. There are times when our bodies continue to live even if our spirits have died. How do we then go on?
We just…go on…and continue with the cycle of life. We have lost our leaves and we can channel our remaining energy into planting seeds so we may live another life.
My time in this apartment is up and I’m closing this chapter in my life. I have loved, lived, and died in this home so I have planted my seeds elsewhere. Like the sturgeon and salmon, I’m going back to where I came from to give new life to my spawns while I…
I don’t know.
Maybe like the salmon, I will go back to where I came from to die. Or be like the sturgeon, I will live to a hundred even after spawning. I have no idea what I will be; all I know is that my 5 years in this apartment are enough and it’s time to leave behind the ghosts of the past. This apartment always reminds me that I was not good enough.
My new home, on the other hand, is a reminder that I am good. That I am enough. No one will treat me like dirt because I am not good enough. In this new life that I have planted, no one is allowed to treat me like dirt again. And before I become dust, I vow that I will live my life with dignity and grace.