Shattered

You have been dreading this day to come, but you knew all along that it was looming up ahead. No matter how much you’ve tried to avoid for you two to be in this situation, current circumstances had pushed you forward, unprepared. So, you approach her as she waits for you in your favorite bench, and gives you an unnerving smile; you shudder at the thought of what you are about to do.

You hold her hand and finally say: “I’m sorry to end this relationship, but I don’t want to hurt you in the long run.” You stop and wait for her to react violently; she blinks and stares back at you. And so you continued. “You will meet someone better than me.”

She sighs, taps your hand, and says, “I know.”

You don't have to burn books to destroy a culture

This week (24 Sept – 01 Oct) is Banned Books Week; it’s mission is to emphasize the freedom to choose or the freedom to express one's opinion even if that opinion might be considered unorthodox or unpopular and the importance of ensuring the availability of those unorthodox or unpopular viewpoints to all who wish to read them. Banned Books Week is observed during the last week of September every year since 1982, and was started by the American Library Association, the oldest and largest library organization in the world.

Most books featured during this week aren’t really “banned” but merely “challenged”. They were target for attempted bannings, but most of them were not banned, due to the efforts of librarians. Books are challenged with the intention to protect others – mostly children – from difficult ideas and information; these are the top three reasons for challenging materials are that they tend to be sexually explicit, contain offensive language, or unsuited to a certain age group.

Frequently challenged books includes:

1. Scary Stories (Series) by Alvin Schwartz
2. Daddy’s Roommate by Michael Willhoite
3. I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou
4. The Chocolate War by Robert Cormier
5. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
6. Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck
7. Harry Potter (Series) by J.K. Rowling
8. Forever by Judy Blume
9. Bridge to Terabithia by Katherine Paterson
10. Alice (Series) by Phyllis Reynolds Naylor
11. The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood
12. The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison
13. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
14. Lord of the Flies by William Golding
15. Carrie by Stephen King

Censorship ends in logical completeness when nobody is allowed to read any books except the books that nobody reads. – George Bernard Shaw

Tripping on a rock while walking down the memory lane

I had a huge smile on my face this morning after I opened an email from an old classmate; okay it wasn’t just a huge smile, I was practically crying from too much laughing. My good friend took the time to scan through an old slumbook (or autograph book), and picked-up the best definitions of what love is for a sixth grader (copied word-for-word).

Here’s my very own entry: "Love exist in our heart." I can’t believe that I am that clueless back then. Here are a few more, but I’m going to withhold their names. If you are an alumnus or alumna (just to be safe for those who object to masculine forms) of Divine Word College – San Jose, Occ Mindoro, you’d get to know who they are if you join our yahoo group and you will also be directed to our forum.

Aaa said:
"Love is surrounded by water, which no one can enter except your lover"

Jjj said:
"The measure of love is love without measure"

Rrr said:
"Love is part of your life"

Ddd said:
"Love is an imitating of two person, two heart enchange"

Vvv said:
"Love is like an hamburger that has everything on it"

Ooo said:
"Love is the way to be married and the hearts are tied together"

Ttt said:
"Love is a feeling when you eat a banana"

Now, don’t come to me asking why you didn’t felt anything anywhere near being in-love after eating a banana, because I will simply tell you that it all depends whether it’s a Filipina banana or a Filipino banana.

How I wish now that I had a slumbook of my own then, and asked my classmates to write on it, too. That piece of ragtag notebook could be priceless today! One thing I do remember is that my favorite motto was “What is beauty if the brain is empty?”

Now come to think of it, isn’t that a maxim of a nerdy girl who isn’t pretty?

Blowing butterfly kisses to the wind

My little son, Josh, would accompany me every morning of a workday to the bus stop near our condominium. I would normally give him a kiss on his chubby cheeks before I go, but yesterday morning he did something he has never done before. He tugged my hand and told me, “Mommy, kiss.” So I obliged by hunching forward to his level and let him give a kiss on my cheek. I melted into a puddle of goo. Not that he hasn’t kissed me before, but it was because that’s the first time he initiated one in public.

I’ll still have, probably, two years of those unabashed kisses, then it’ll be, “Not here, Mom!” or “I’m a big boy now.”

On second note, international posters of the latest Harry Potter film are out now and they look awesome!

And suddenly one cow, out of so many, received the gift of immortality

“I want love, Diary. I want to feel my heart melt, want to see my stalactites shatter and plunge into a river of passion and beauty.”



One Hundred Strokes of the Brush Before Bed (Cento Colpi di Spazzola Prima di Andare a Dormire) by Melissa P. was originally published anonymously in 2003 and became a bestseller in Italy; the translated version in English by Lawrence Venuti was first published in 2004. This diary of a Sicilian teenager in search for love and experienced a series of promiscuous sexual adventures was assumed to be the work of an older writer, because of the sophistication and eroticism of its prose. And when an 18-year old Melissa Panarello came out of the shadows to reveal herself to the Catholic-filled Italy, everyone was in shock as well as the late Pope John Paul II.

For a beauty such as her, love may be hard to find, but sex awaits at every turn, and to this Melissa hardly ever says no. In this book spanning two years of her life from the age of fourteen to sixteen, the reader goes through her state of virginity to her introduction to self sex, oral sex, sex with older men, sex with women, sadomasochistic sex and group sex.

"He said he would do it with me only if nothing came of it, if there'd be nothing between us but sex."

The erotica in this book isn’t as titillating as what it promised to be, for the writer does not dwell on sexual descriptions. Or could it be that callowness in style was lost in the translation – for the genital euphemisms: “my fireplace”, “his lance”? For a girl as young as her who cannot possibly understand the depths of what she was doing is trite. I could sympathize in some moments when her nebulous sexual relations leave her feeling used and humiliated, but then again the thought that there are instances wherein she could have said no but didn’t; for sex to her is some kind of an addiction, even if she doesn’t admit to it. She was basically a teenage whore who got screwed but wasn’t paid – generally a convenient orifice, a fulfillment for men’s Lolita-fantasies, a dress-up doll to play with, or a dominatrix to obey.

"I search for excitement born from humiliation. I search for annihilation."

This is a touching tale of a girl who went inside the forest of uncertainty in search of something deep, defining love, but found ogres who debased her humanity and later discovered that the sensibility of it all is buried deep within her. I like the reckless confidence, isolated angst, pretentious convictions of the youth pictured in this book.

"I entered the bathroom, looked at myself in the mirror, and no longer saw the image of that girl who took such delight in examining herself..."

So if you like reading diaries and interested to get into the psyche of the modern teenage girl, pick this up and spend probably two or three hours of your time reading this on a lazy Sunday afternoon.


Just a tidbit:
Melissa left the manuscript of this book carelessly one day and was discovered by her parents; they were in shock, of course, to learn of their daughter’s secret life from its pages. They didn’t even want it to be published, but Melissa told them that it was just a work of her imaginative mind, so they relented. They later on learned the truth when Melissa finally came out in the open and admitted that everything in the book happened to her. She said, "All of the experiences are mine. I experienced all of these things. In the book, I described it all in a more dramatic way, but I didn't make anything up."


Further comments by the author from interviews:

"I showed the hypocrisy of Italian society, things like adult men having sex with young girls, and the illusions of internet sex."

"I was always aware of what I was doing and this awareness gave these actions dignity. I did it in a dignified way because I was aware of what I was doing. It doesn't make any difference that I was just fifteen. You can have self-awareness at any age. A young girl of the age that I was doesn't usually go looking for adventures, but for real experiences. For me, it wasn't just having sex to pass the time, as older women do. I was searching for a true experience."

"It's very easy to hide things like this. Married women have affairs and they can hide it without a problem. I was also able to hide things."

"No one else knew anything. In the morning, I went to school like every other girl and in the evening I met men. Sometimes I would stay out until six in the morning and I had to be in school by seven thirty."