The storm drain where we rescued my cats. Photo by CallMeCreation.com
It will soon be the first anniversary of COVID-19 quarantine. I don’t know how long I can take it anymore. One year. We’re now experiencing a second wave, with daily new cases reaching 3000 3,500. But this stupid government still doesn’t have a clear vaccination on program. 🤦🏻♀️
Anyway, this also meant that my cats will be almost 1 year old. We found them late April or early May at the back of Institute of Chemistry. I visited today on my bike that storm drain where we found them trapped. It was so overgrown with weeds and other debris.
My cats are so lucky we found them before they died of hunger and dehydration in this storm drain. Photo by CallMeCreation.com
I went around the Science Complex before proceeding to the vegetable shop for our weekly supplies. My bike now sports a new detachable handlebar bag from Decathlon so that my green leafy veggies will not get crushed in the other bag tied to my pannier. I’m so happy with it. I no longer have to carry a backpack (which is annoying when I bike).
I love my bike. Photo by CallMeCreation.com
This coming Holy Week I will be bringing the girls and our bikes to my hometown. Let’s see if I can reach other towns in Laguna with just my pedaling power. Maybe I’ll ride with some high school classmates. It’ll be a whole new adventure going around Laguna on a bike.
Academic oval, UP Diliman. Photo by CallMeCreation.com
My girls and I rode our bikes to UP campus yesterday (we had to walk with our bikes along some roads that had a lot of cars passing through though) and cycled around the campus. So yey, I don’t have to bring the car and fold and unfold bikes when we go to the university campus.
Riding from the apartment to UP and around no longer exhausts me–that’s a major concern. So maybe I need to do cross-training to supplement my exercise with walking two laps around the academic oval…
I need to exhaust myself to be able to sleep. Either I need to be spent or super busy so my brain no longer has the energy or capacity to think about him or the past and my heart needs to be the same as well so it wouldn’t spend its waking hours angry.
I made a cat tower by stacking up two sets of plastic shoe racks that I spray-painted gold. I hot glued abaca twine on the posts so my cats can climb. Cat towers in Tiendesitas cost PhP 8,000 and I simply refuse to spend that much on something as frivolous as a cat tower. The reason why I needed a cat tower is because my cat, Kimchi, keeps on clawing her way up on my curtains, destroying a number of them.
However, my DIY cat tower was a failure since they’re not that enticed to climb on it. Probably it was too high or it was unstable. So I demoted it into what it really was, a shoe rack.
Photo by CallMeCreation.com
Now they’re more willing to use this when it’s propped up against the sofa that they use as a launch pad when sunning themselves on this shoe rach/cat tower failure.
I removed two levels to use as another sleeping loft for them by the stairs as they got too big for their carrying crate that I initially used as their hiding/sleeping cave.
Photo by CallMeCreation.com
Now I’m darning all the curtains that Kimchi has ruined. I don’t want to throw them away just because of a tear. They’ll just end up in a landfill. I’m an ok seamstress anyway and my darning stitches are decent enough that they could disappear into the folds of the curtains.
Cats have this habit of lying on the things you’re working on like sewing projects or computer keyboards. They’re like petulant children constantly wanting your attention. Photo by CallMeCreation.com
My cats’ claws are destructive, alright. I got scratched a number of times when I gave them a bath last week. I gave it a rest this week but sometime this week I will have another round with them.
Photo by CallMeCreation.com
Oh my children, the four-legged and the two-legged ones, have been keeping me occupied. The two-legged species have been pestering me about bicycling now that they learned how to. I have to make time for that since I can’t just leave then cycling around the village by themselves with cars all over.
Bought another second-hand folding bike so my other daughter won’t have to hostage mine when we go out. Photo by CallMeCreation.com
So now we have four bikes at home, which includes my purple Japanese-style commuter single speed bike that I would bring to my mom to give to her househelp.
So yesterday we cycled around the village along the streets with less cars. Cycled for at least an hour. It was good exercise and that took my other daughter away from the computer screen. Now that her twin has her own bike, we three may have another go tomorrow if I finish work early.
UP Observatory. We never had a chance to check out the telescope there. Photo by CallMeCreation.com
During my bike ride last week, I was able to slip through some back entrance to the Science Complex to bike in peace and to catch a glimpse of the place. I was wondering why the place still had a special meaning to me, despite all that was said and done. I went cycling around the amphitheater and then it dawned on me: Our daily walks there during the strict lockdown in April and May last year was like a simulation of what it feels like if we were the only ones left in the world. It was like just the two of us against the world. Just the two of us. Walking hand-in-hand, stealing kisses, being free from the restrictions that were imposed on us by the lockdown, by our responsibilities, and by circumstances. It was just being in that moment, the “now” that was enveloping us, and the feeling of owning the place at that moment we were there. And the feeling that there will be tomorrow to look forward to, like scheduling a viewing of the telescope/through the telescope at the Observatory and rescuing cats from the storm drain and seeing them through adulthood.
But all that has come to an end. It is all a memory.
There was still a lump in my throat the second time I cycled around there. But at least I didn’t shed a tear like the first time I visited the place after so many months.
Maybe I’m getting better? I fervently hope so. I had a crappy weekend, feeling down and textversations with friends exacerbated the heaviness because these led to opening the wounds that I try to bury but they were just festering in the dark, not really healing.
But I am surviving. He did not break me.
You did not break me I’m still fighting for peace I’ve got thick skin and an elastic heart But your blade it might be too sharp I’m like a rubber band until you pull too hard I may snap and I move fast But you won’t see me fall apart Cos I’ve got an elastic heart
Sunset over Laguna de Bay. Photo by CallMeCreation.com
The urge to get out was so strong that I endured one hour of driving just to see this sunset (and a little bit of bicycling) in Eastridge yesterday. During last year’s Lunar new year holiday, we went to have lunch at Balaw-balaw in Angono, went to see the Petroglyphs, Morong Church, and then the Tanay Lighthouse until the sun had set.
I promised myself that I will show the girls this place and will watch the sunset with them here. Which we did yesterday.
The last time I was here trying to appreciate the sunset, he didn’t pay attention to it, to me, or to our surroundings. It was as if he didn’t want to be there with me and just wanted to ride his bike and be done with it. He didn’t talk to me. He only did talk to me when he wanted to buy the orchid being sold along the main road in Eastridge.
I want to bury those memories. I am supplanting it with better ones that didn’t stab me like a thousand knives.
I’m letting this all out so I don’t suffer in silence. I wanted to tell the world about this but of course I can’t. Where is the dignity in that? Unlike some of my friends in social media, I don’t air my dirty linen in public. But I’m looking for ways how to air this out because keeping it all in is killing me.
That sunset was so beautiful and yet fleeting. It only lasted about 10 to 15 mins then we were enveloped by darkness. It was like that episode in my life.
The best revenge is to live my life to the fullest. To be better than I was when I was with him. To be a kickass journalist. To be a better photographer. To be a better homemaker and parent. To be a better human being.
The clock doesn’t move backwards, so I shouldn’t.
Never struggle to chase love, affection, or attention. If it isn’t given freely by another person, it isn’t worth having.
Love is not just about the person. It is about the shared time, space, and memories of two people meshed together. Accept the impermanence, cherish the moments that may be our last. Enjoy it.
So no, I will not erase the memories because I said before, if I would be given a chance to go back in time, I will do it over and over, with no regrets. I think I have no regrets. I would just have to suffer the memories until the scars hurt no more.
There is beauty in impermanence, like the sakura. It only blooms for a short time and you hold on to it until it fades away. While it’s there, you enjoy it because you know it will soon be gone and it’s the memory of the sakura that you hold, that stays with you.
I did ask myself several times before, how long will this stay like this? Because he was very impulsive like Clementine in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and I told him that several times that his impulsiveness is sometimes his undoing. He comes and goes. I did write several times in the past, asked myself how long will I be able to hold on to him before he goes away again because I knew he will be bored. I think my only error in this entire story is that I deluded myself into thinking that he will stay even though I knew in the deep recesses of my mind he won’t.
