You have not known what you are.
You have slumbered upon yourself all your life.
Your eyes have been as much as closed most of the time.
What you have done is already in mockeries.

The mockeries are not you.
Underneath them
And within them,
I see you lurk...


-Walt Whitman



29.10.09

the wrong choice


''If you could be anywhere? Where would you be?
Answer: It doesn’t matter, because wherever you go, you’re still falling.''

-- Paul Harris, The Rule of Four


HE WAS SITTING ON A BENCH by the bus stop. He wore his faith, faded like the rugged jeans on him while waiting for a bus to arrive. Behind him was a vast open space of golden fields of barley. Facing him was a dark patch of concrete highway stretching to the both ends of the earth. And beyond it was another bare and wide space of uncertainties extending towards a horizon that married the endless ocean of the azure blue skies over his head. He felt like he was in the middle of nowhere; almost insignificant against the billowing possibilities surrounding him, taunting him. But in that moment he couldn’t do anything but feel small and wait. The bus wouldn’t arrive fast enough.

For a moment he watched his hands, and traced the lines that ran across his palms. Fate was written all over their skins, ready to be realized. He closed his hands tight and it felt good. For a fleeting moment he was in control of his destiny and the person he wanted to be was in his grasp, etched deep and unfading. Cotton clouds occasionally stained the sky above sometimes forming into familiar faces he knew—his face included. And he watched them all traverse the wide spread of the air eventually disintegrating into wisps until he couldn’t recognize them anymore. The wind had swept away his face.

Very slowly, he opened his closed fists in way like there were fragile-winged butterflies in them he wanted to set free. And then a muted noise reached his ears. It grew louder and louder. He could hear the crunch of loose asphalt against rubber. There was a hiss of an opening door and a booming sound of a horn that shattered the calm silence. The bus had arrived. But he didn’t expect that climbing aboard was far more difficult than waiting for it.
He stood by the bus door—ajar and inviting, his hands on the frame, and unable to find the courage to lift himself up. Seconds flew, awkward and pressure-filled. His eyes brimming with confusion met the bus driver’s.

Are you coming, son?


With head on a bow, he filled his lungs with air and let go of the frame. He stepped back and gazed back into the driver’s fatherly eyes, ever wondering if he would regret the next words from his mouth.


No. I think I will take the next bus.


The door closed with another hiss. The large tires started to move. And he watched the bus vanish into the horizon. He looked up to the heavens and look for familiar faces. There weren’t any. He imagined himself sitting on the bus, watching hills roll, grass-scented air caressing his weary face. Could he have risked everything and rode the bus till the end? He looked up again and there it was—the face he longed to see, smiling at him.


And then he ran as fast as he could, his shoes biting good on the rough surface of the road with the wind crashing brutally against his face. He closed his eyes as he sprinted towards the horizon, praying the opposing air could blow away the ghosts in his head and the cramps in his legs. But it was too late. Because like a snail in a race against all the fastest creatures of the world—he just couldn’t outrun himself. He couldn’t outrun gravity. And in that moment he realized that horizontal motion is an illusion—that he needed to move just to convince himself he’s not on a free fall.



12 comments:

ShatterShards said...

Wrong choice or not, we should be able to accept the repercussions of our actions. We should live with it, and not dwell in the past, for that road would only lead to misery.

After you've achieved this process, please tell me how you did it. I need to accomplish this task more urgently than I could express it.

Anonymous said...

"Because like a snail in a race against all the fastest creatures of the world—he just couldn’t outrun himself. He couldn’t outrun gravity. And in that moment he realized that horizontal motion is an illusion—that he needed to move just to convince himself he’s not on a free fall."

this is also how it feels when your life lacks purpose and meaning. tipong quarter-life crisis. grabe, nararamdaman ko ang hopelessness..

i love how you articulated that last part in your entry. galing!

pusangkalye said...

as always--love your new banner---pagawa kaya ako su mate?

pusangkalye said...

''If you could be anywhere? Where would you be? Answer: It doesn’t matter, because wherever you go, you’re still falling"----gusto ko to.


before I thought I have to leave my hometown coz it's a lonely place. then I realized that it was me. Wherever I go, same lang coz I AM THE ONE who is lonely. In short, wlang malungkot na lugar, malungkot na tao---meron.


So if you want to change your world. change yourself, change your thoughts.

and abou making mistakes, I think it's a mark of a matura man to be ready to suffer the consequences of the wrong choices he makes.

RJ said...

Wow! The Physics of Love!

o",) Brilliant!

fjordz said...

ron, bakit di mo itry na sumulat ng isang book? tingin mo?

Theo Martin said...

:) i love this.

Yas Jayson said...

rule of four. haha. savonarola!

seriously, i thought of priesthood and mission on this post. yay!

i can't make a formal comment, sorry. your post absorbed all my guts. heavy and thoughtful.

make me think again,. hmmmm.

rheiboy17 said...

ang tagal kong hindinakabisita, pero ang ganda ng site mo. kewl!

eliment said...

ron, its another great article.

sometimes the thing we consider a mistake is a blessing in disguise...

fufu said...

wow... wrong choice? hmn... we will never know if it's going to be right or wrong when we make the decision right? or no??

Anonymous said...

sad.

we should be ready to make bold decisions and stand up for it..not for anybody but ourselves.

musta na pareng ron?