Tag Archives: grief

Just keep swimming

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As Dory the Blue Tang in Finding Nemo said, you just keep swimming. When shit hits the fan, just keep swimming. When the sky collapses on you, just keep swimming. Because you need to live. Because the world will not stop.

So to keep me from dwelling on the past, I just have to keep busy. Use my hands, occupy my brain, prevent myself from thinking.

Growing food from food scraps and seedlings. Photo by CallMeCreation.com

I revived my derelict container garden that is growing vegetables from food scraps and seedlings.

Growing lettuce seedlings. Photo by CallMeCreation.com

I had been recycling egg crates, Coke bottles, and milk cartons to grow vegetables. Because they require more work, I embraced recycling to the hilt. To keep me occupied.

My sad bird of paradise. Photo by CallMeCreation.com

I neglected this bird of paradise the past month–because you know, I was hardly a nurturing creature that time. Good thing it didn’t completely die. Just half of its leaves dried out; good thing there’s a new leaf bud there and the sucker below isn’t completely dead and hollowed out.

Breakfast. Photo by CallMeCreation.com

I still get to cook on weekends. Weekday is just packed and I don’t have the strength to do it since I try to bike to UP every other day. Need to keep fit and lose weight. A lot of weight. To prove to the world I am so worth it and he is a fucking idiot. I may no longer be young but I am still so worth it.

So I just keep swimming. Just keep swimming. I need to drown out memories.

Bittersweet

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National Science Complex, UP Diliman. Photo by CallMeCreation.com

This is the first time I’ve been here for months. We used to have our daily walks here during the lockdown. Most of the time it was just the two of us here. We walked around past Math, Chem (where we rescued the cats), around the observatory. We used to see sheep roaming around and sometimes when we passed by them, we could smell the stench of those animals.

Another angle. Photo by CallMeCreation.com

It was at this same hour we would be having those walks. To have a bit of “fresh” air. We used to watch the birds flit from branches. There were colorful birds that hopped on the grass, enjoying the absence of humans. Dogs past Math used to bark at us savagely. We still used to hold hands then… Before everything went south. Or was he pretending then because he didn’t have a choice since he was stuck because of the lockdown?

And if I would erase memories, I would be conflicted about erasing those memories here in Science Complex. Just like Joel in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, he suddenly didn’t want those memories erased. But the process has begun to wipe out Clementine.

How do we live with memories? I don’t know… I have this uncanny ability of wiping out memories. I have done it many times, especially when it hurt so bad. My cousin and my sis-in-law had to remind me of a very important but painful memory that was the biggest warning sign that I shouldn’t have gotten married 13 years ago. It was completely blocked out of my mind; I had no recollection of it but they told it was real and that it happened.

In the movie Eternal Sunshine, the one doing the erasing is a laboratory. In real life, I am the Lacuna Inc, I can do it on my own. The question is, do I want everything wiped out?

Erasing memories

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Studies about memories suggest that false memories can be implanted. What I am doing right now is I’m doing the reverse. I am erasing memories, especially the painful ones, by supplanting it with new ones until the original memory fades away.

Marikina River park. Photo by CallMeCreation.com

The last time I was at the Marikina River Park was so painful. He wanted to bike and I served as a chauffer. During the entire time, he didn’t want to talk to me, hold my hand or anything. He just wanted to ride his bike, be over and done with it. I felt so abandoned and lonely. I was confused why I felt that way.

Then later that night in his condo, while I was cleaning, he was testy, like he couldn’t wait to get rid of me. I asked him why was he treating me that way. He probably felt guilty so he tried to console me. But it was hollow. Driving home, I felt really sad and lonely. I knew something was really wrong. Later that week we broke up.

Marikina River Park. Photo by CallMeCreation.com

I am now erasing that memory of Marikina River Park. It was just too painful. Like I didn’t amount to anything.

I will supplant it with memories of me and my girls. Today we just went there to do just that.

If only I could do that to every painful memory I have of him. Which was quite a lot.

Come to think of it, it’s quite unfair that I get to suffer like this while he is happy and free when I was the one who sacrificed the world for us. For him.

I wish I could do an Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and just erase memories. To the point that he never existed. To spare me of this anger and pain. I hope I won’t be like Joel in the movie, who fought to keep the memories and the pain rather than lose them while the erasing process was being done.

Maybe it’s better to have memories of having loved but in pain than not have loved at all? I don’t know. Come back to me in 10 years and ask me that again.

Jim Carrey and Kate Winslet in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

Plod along

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Sunken Garden viewed from School of Economics. Photo by CallMeCreation.com

I biked the other day from the house to UP and around UP then came back home. I wanted to stay here longer to listen to music while I catch my breath. But no, UP Police is guarding the entire academic oval, making sure people don’t linger. The UP admin’s reason for closing the oval was that COVID-19 cases are rising so they’re getting people off the campus for two weeks.

Photo by Callmecreation.com

They still kept College of Science closed. Well, understandable since the Philippine Genome Center is there.

This is the first time I’ve been here without him. Well, as my friend said, there will be a lot of firsts like this in the coming days…until I stop noticing.

A colleague told me to have a completely new hobby. “Time and energy are best spent on yourself and your girls and not something unworthy.”

He is unworthy. Better spend the effort of harboring this anger into something more productive.

F*ck you

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I wish I can say this to you right now. I wish you can feel my angst. It’s what keeps me alive these days. Otherwise I would have fallen apart.

F*ck you.

That feels so much better.