Monday, October 22, 2012

Journey to Past

These were the things that have had happen to me since the last time I submitted an article. Me and my group mates finished our thesis but failed to qualify for Best Thesis. I graduated college with a bachelor’s degree but no academic award. I planned to stay in Legazpi City rather than chase my dreams in Manila but I found myself later on inside a bus going to Manila. A friend of mine went abroad and I was there to witness his departure. I started to chase my dreams in that city and getting use to life that I never know of but good luck is quite aloof to me. I got no job in that city (uh there’s one but I was pulled out during the training because of anemia so again I became unemployed.) I still never wanted to go home in Legazpi but I found myself again riding that same bus.

I went home emotionally bruised and have a broken soul. Self-esteem almost drained inside me. Frustrations ate me. I was so desperate to find a job at the same time missing the life that I had when I was in school. I felt envy with my friends who got their jobs easily, some may not be their dream job but at least they got one. I frequently asked myself why I was not able to have a job just like them. Was it my fault? Is it all about luck? Or does companies don’t get interested with my resume? What should I do? Questions filled my mind, as pressure keeps pushing hard.

                A day after my arrival, I went back to my high school alma mater. Remembering the good old days of being a teen, that was once very frustrated with my grades in Algebra, scared of calling names for recitation in Physics and Araling Panlipunan, and the excitement I felt with the activities in English and Technology and Livelihood Education (T.L.E). I saw students staying outside their classrooms, some are playing, others going home. Out of the blue I asked myself, with the hundreds of students in this school, how many of these students would continue to college. If they continue in college, how many of them will ever finish it? And will they be successful or at least have good job after schooling? With my experience, I bowed my head, take a deep breath and hoped that they will. I worry for them to get stuck when life show them the cruelties of reality. I worry for those who don’t even graduate in high school or don’t even get a chance to enter school. I worry for their future, their future family’s future. And I worry too much that it makes me feel scared of my future too.

                Two days after, I was asked by my friend and ex-SK officer to meet them at the basketball court with uncertain reason. Out of curiosity, I came and late that I realized they were asking me to take the microphone and be the commentator for the night’s last game. I did though I felt some hesitation. The feeling remains the same; it was a reunion of me, the microphone and my audience, where I gained my confidence as a public speaker, as a public servant and as person, and once again the shattered pieces of my confidence are starting to be rebuilt. I look around me after the game and see how things stayed the same after three years in that basketball court, in that barangay. After the hardships I encounter in Manila, perhaps it is I who changed and see things in different way. I focused more on having high compensation to compete with my batch mates, classmates and friends and I forgot to give my heart in everything that I will be doing. I became irrational. Immature. I focused more on my emotions, what might people and my friends say about me or their criticisms. Pessimism struck me like lightning.

                At first, I was scared of the thought of going home. I was scared of the ghost of the past, of being stuck and contented with what I will get, of being just fine with small things even though I crave for the bigger ones. But when I set a foot at Legazpi, all my worries disappear. Sadness abandoned me. Pessimism melted. It’s weird that by just setting a foot to the soil of my beloved town, all my worries when I was in Manila vanished. Then out of nowhere, I blurted “Que Sera, Sera (whatever will be, will be).”

                I realized something, after visiting my high school alma mater and accepted the invitation of my former SK officers; I journeyed back to my past. My past that made me understand that I wasn’t just growing old anymore neither I am growing up. A year ago, I was having problem with school projects, activities and academics. My goal was to graduate and be the best that I can be. Now that I graduated, I am to face the challenge of being me when critics and situations dictates that I should like be this and that. I am facing the complexities of life now. I still don’t know where it will take me, though I’m sure there is one place that I belong. I remember during our graduation ceremony, the president of our school in her speech stated, “It is the end of your journey as a student of this institution, but it is not the end of everything as a student, in fact it is just the beginning. The world has many lessons for you to learn, some will take you up and some might drag you down. When the world drags you to your knees just remember dear students that life wants you to learn something from it. This institution is freeing you from the four corners of the classroom and now take the world as your new classroom, be not afraid of trying and experimenting because it is part of your learning. Just don’t give up.”

                Now, I came to realize those words.

Friday, October 12, 2012

Sorry for inconvenience

Thank you for dropping by but this blog is currently under improvement.