finding lions

I. I wish I could write more about my life. Writing is living, too. I want to write about each day. How today, while preparing for super typhoon Karding (Noru), one of Half Moon’s (a feral cat we feed here in the province) kittens who is named Robin—his brother’s name is Batman—went missing. My mom and I suspect that Robin followed Half Moon to our neighbor’s pick-up truck and that he might have slept somewhere underneath the vehicle. We thought the truck would just be there, but our hearts went into panic when we heard it careen through the street. We think that the truck might have carried little Robin away with the driver not knowing... I honestly don’t know what to feel. Last night, I got to carry Robin in my hands. I saw him sprawled out on a scratching log just outside our door. This afternoon while it was drizzling, I tried looking outside of our home in the empty lot in front of us, afraid of what I might see (or not see). There’s a brewing storm over us, and a homeless kitten is lost somewhere. I don't know what to feel. 

II. We secured what we can, trying trees with straws around steel tables and our gate, feeding the stray and feral cats earlier than usual, filling tumblers with water, cooking rice and food that won't spoil easily, and charging phones, laptops, and the pocket WiFi, in case of emergencies. For the whole day, the sky was overcast, and the rain poured softly. It was calm. We wait for the storm’s arrival later. 

III. Starting from Cagayan to Quezon province, the Sierra Madre is perfectly snug on the eastern coast of the island of Luzon. When you look at the map from a bird’s eye view, you’d get goosebumps with how it’s conveniently placed there as a shield from typhoons and storm surges coming from the Pacific. Sierra Madre means ‘mother mountain range.’ Any child would sleep soundly with a loving and caring mother, and any loving and caring mother, during a storm, would be awake and ready to protect her child. When the child grows, I just pray they care for their mother, too. 

🌌 I Like It Here in the Interim: Short Stories now available for pre-order! ✨ Choose either a softbound or a hardbound copy. 📖

The Interim is the in-between. It is our life sitting comfortably, dangerously on the short thin thread that separates birth and death. My fifth self-published book is a collection of 20 stories & 20 colored illustrations about life and all that inevitably happens in it. There is family, friendship, hope, courage, vocation, and love, and there is pain, regret, loss, grief, and death. 

- - - - -

Of all my books, this one has to be most challenging one, because I tried to write longer short stories this time as opposed to the previous books. (Will share the final word count sometime! But this is the thickest book I've ever made. Haha!)I pray and hope that you will like the Interim!  This is also the book I've written on this year, this month, when I turn 30. I dedicate the stories here for those who have helped me be the person I am today. I'm glad we met in the Interim. 💛

I poured my heart out into this book and squeezed my mind (haha!) to witness the characters become and their lives unfold... A big thank you, too, to my friend KB Meniado who is the incredible editor of this book, my friends Nikka Sulatra, Janelle, and Fay Sebastian for their time, effort, valuable inputs, and constructive criticisms when they beta-read the stories, my patrons on Patreon for supporting me, and for Ms Joy Reovoca Aspa of JMD Copy and Prints!

II. I haven’t ran in more than a month, but I got back again to it this past week. I’m joining a marathon (my first!) on February 2023. I need to build mileage and lose weight and learn to endure. 

III. My friends Denise and Christian and I finished reading Hanya Yanagihara’s A Little Life recently. Dang. I’m still reeling in from everything. I don't know what to write yet about it, but dang. It’s painful, it’s sad, and also, true. The harrowing, depressing, traumatizing things in it do happen in real life, and right now, all I can say, for now, is that the book taught me on how to be a better friend. On how to actually be there for someone. Oh, Jude (that’s the name of the main character). And Willem, Malcolm, and JB. And Harold. And Julia. Andy. I still miss them all even when it’s been a week since I finished the book.

II. If someone doesn’t reply soon to your messages or doesn’t react, it’s okay. Let them be. Sometimes you, too, don’t have the energy to tap on a message and think of something to reply as you read it. There are ‘small’ tasks that can seem gargantuan when you don’t have enough rest (whether that’s rest for your mind, body, or soul) in consecutive days or weeks. 

III. Rest your eyes when you’ve been working by the computer for several minutes or an hour already. 

IV. Don’t overthink things. Sometimes, or most of the time, it’s not about you. And that’s a relief. 

V. Sometimes, I wish I could just open up to friends that I’m sad, and I’d tell them that you don’t need to do anything about it. I guess I just want to sit with my sadness with someone. But of course, we all have our own lives, and there are times when I need to sit with it by myself, with myself. 

VI. “Your worrying will kill you.” My Mom said this to me when I had a health scare two weeks ago when I had chest pains all of a sudden while washing dishes. The doctor said it could just be my muscles. I hope it just is. I told my Mom after the checkup that the night I had the chest pains, I already believed and felt I wouldn’t wake up anymore in the morning after. I thought about my life as I lay in bed, with my Mom sleeping next to me. I silently cried to myself. I regretted not being able to tell my friend something important, so I might have had to pass the message to another friend to relay it, if something did happen to me. I overthink a lot, and maybe it’s because I want certainty. I want things that I could be sure of. Maybe for now, I need myself to be sure, to be reliable, so when things get shaky, I know that I would make it, because I am certain of myself and my ability to spring back up.