Missing My Students

The CEO and CTO of the online school where I used to teach will be flying in from Japan to throw a Christmas gathering for their tutors.  Sincerely, I want to come, and not only for the possibility of free food.

When I got the e-mail inviting tutors from Diliman, LB, Davao and Iloilo to meet up with them, my first reaction was, Ano 'to, mall tour?  But then I realized that I wanted to come, to say that hey, your tech support team in Japan is really nice, your processes are so efficient, your clients are all so polite and warm.  Drat.  I resigned months ago.

Suddenly I missed my students who regularly book my classes and actually tell me how the day went.  I wondered how they were doing, and wanted to give them lessons again. Hmm hmm hmm.

Maybe I should just settle for sending a bunch of ecards sometime before Christmas. :)

Here's My Body. Take Any Part You Will

Something that I dug up and pieced together again:

The soft recesses of our mouths—they will one day wait for someone, and when that someone does not come, desire makes makes the soft recesses feel dry to our own tongues.
The spot between the neck and the bone of the shoulder—it will one day be forever at the ready for the weight of someone else's head.
The arms—they  will seem to grow as long as they do to wrap completely around somebody.  Or at least hope that if they happen to be short, somebody still ends up fitting inside the circle that they make.
The stubborn softness of our bellies and the swell of our own bodies—they will stay to keep hurting those we wrap around and roll with.
Sharp, protuding bones—they resist pads of fat, because there will always be those willing to hurt a bit when skinny people reach out for a hug.

Of all the shapes bodies become, whether through eating, working, or just letting be, isn't it delicious to think that somebody, someday will want and fit with that body of yours?

Sneaky and Seemingly Safe

Please give me an Edward Gorey book for Christmas.  Although preferably not this one, because i've read this already.

Notes to Self While Getting Lost on the Way Home (Again)

I dislike long roads in cities, not because I easily get tired, but because I easily get lost.  Who would think it possible to get disoriented along an avenue?  The path is straight; still I lose my way, because of the derelict houses and dark shops that seem to shift and move ominously as I move forward. I am always compelled to pause, turn the inevitably wrong way, and forget what jeep or bus I should be boarding next.  Five nights of wrong buses and lanes, each one a testimony to strengths I lack.

Once, it was dark when I took the wrong bus. I got off and grasped, as an adult, the fear of the dark for the first time.  I think it feels the same as hearing words from that mouth, and not believing that that beloved mouth can mouth words that sharp and strong.  It can't be, I think, feeling like a child pushed into a van hurtling in the dark, with drivers unknown, no parent to hold my hand.

In moments like these, I want a map, to tell me what bus to board, what word to say, which place holds monsters. Or a promise that eventually I would be found, if I keep feeling my way home.

On Becoming an Adult

A grown-up is a child with layers on, someone said once. I just forget who. Oh, (s)he is so, so right.