Winning

At 14, I lost my mom and stopped celebrating my birthday. It was the time of the great downswing. Parties were nonexistent in the pecking order and hooverizing was the all-encompassing virtue. As if a consolation, the greetings were rather forced and devoid of affection. The day passed uneventful. Adolescence was a tough passage of rite and the idea of outgrowing it was fanciful.

At 16, in a Scarlet O'Hara panache, I was willful: As God is my witness, I shall never be hungry again. It was the year of reconstruction, of overhauling - engineering my world domination plans. But something blotted the perfect landscape: family tension was growing. Had I been a weakling, my mind could have burst and turned me into a complete psycho. It was almost reminiscent of Prozac Nation, only I was so cool at handling it than Elizabeth.

At 18, I have mastered the art of desperation and making up appearances. You simply can not be powerless, you stir some sort of a je ne sais quoi air. You don't become a wallflower, you go to the dancefloor and shock the crowd. You embody Lady Gaga's bravura and Woody Allen's wit. In hindsight, I wasn't faking it, just making the most out of the mess.

At 20, the world was my oyster (or so I thought). Driven by knowledge and savoring my ivory-tower confinement, I decided to pursue my masters degree. It was the time of romanticism and Ayn Rand was my Deity. Manila, with all its beauty and viciousness, was a delectable maze to wander.

At 22, I was hit by the first love bug. I was naïve and just like a virulent virus, I led the relationship to its rather early demise. In a eureka fashion, I discovered I was stoic. Unmoved and unperturbed, life progressed on seamlessly sans any tinge of heartbreak. Stoicism, unbeknownst to me, would come handy in a series of love bugs to hit.

At 24, I became a citizen of the world. I had my first trip abroad and my longest plane ride to date. In the corporate jungle, I belonged to the Scythian tribe. Voracious and dominating, I hoarded Employee of the Quarter awards and squashed a pesky officemate’s dream. But the dog-eat-dog corporate world is not to be relished forever. So I quit.

At 26, the imposing zeitgeist was Bureaucracy. Suddenly, red tape and office gossip became staple, in-your-face occurrences. I felt my growth stunted, degenerated. Bureaucracy regressed my corporate citizenship. The Great Ennui was short-lived, though, until SO came into my life.

At 28? I know it will be only grand and victorious. And I have Charlie Sheen-crafted buzzword as my mantra: Winning!

Rants and Raves

Buh-Bye, John - Outlandish wunderkind John Galliano is in hot water. After his anti-Semitic slurs, the House of Dior abruptly dismissed him followed by strong indignation and utter disgust by Natalie Portman and Daphne Guinness. Quick to defend, Patricia Field (Sex and the City, anyone?) downgraded the bashing to just a “farce.” Apparently, the History-challenged Patricia has ignorance written all over her face. Funny how one’s genius could be easily whittled down by just some random inebriations! Heidi Klum can not be more clairvoyant enough: In fashion, one day you’re in; the next day you’re out. Isaac Mizrahi has two syllables for John, though: “Buh-Bye!”



Elle Woods Elevated – Supermodels and Harvard are two incongruous, unmarriageable variables. Since time immemorial, their association has always been zilch. A deviation sometimes happens, though, and sometimes, in the name of Tyra Banks. A TV mogul whose value is estimated at $30 million, Tyra is enrolled in a three-year course entitled the Harvard Owner/President Management Program. Inevitable questions persist, naturally: Did she ace her SAT? Was her GMAT impressive? Either way, Tyra will definitely be the chicest and the most fashion-forward in campus. Now move over, Elle Woods!



Vogue Italia, Check – ANTM’s 6’2 wonder Ann Ward’s Vogue Italia spread has already leaked on the internet. It’s playful, festive, imaginative and artistic; her expressions flawless and mesmerizing. The long-limbed and shy mannequin from Texas was crowned last cycle’s champ after enduring a fashion show on a moving platform, a photoshoot on rollerblades, catwalk faux pas and other crazy and gay challenges masterminded by an equally crazy and gay Tyra Banks. In a span of months, Ann has metamorphosized into a pro building a niche in the fashion world sans the too ominous ANTM tag. Next on the checklist: a Prada or Chanel campaign, perhaps? Werk it, Ann!

Arizona Muse, Who?

Fashion, just like my temper, is a volatile industry. A mega-billion dollar industry with Anna Wintour as its dominatrix, its ins and outs are at the behest of its rather ephemeral, episodic seasons. Ditto for models. Their existence is somehow summed up based on Heidi Klum’s mantra (with her sleep-inducing delivery): One day you’re in, the next day you’re out. Charisma, exoticism, it factor – there is really no invariably definitive trait to being the Face of the Moment. But one thing is sure, though: someone always stands out from the rest.

Meet Arizona Muse.

The fascination starts with her rather peculiar name. An uninitiated's calculable reaction: “Did the state of Arizona declare its own muse?” Then her face veers your attention, an amalgam of Linda Evangelista and Natalia Vodianova. Androgynous yet soft. Her sharp and killer eyebrows even add to her growing enigma. And the cut of her hair couldn’t be cleverer! Unpretentiously short, it is quite a welcoming relief when everyone is donning the conventional long hair.

Now on her second venture on modeling (the great German photographer Peter Lindbergh couldn’t help but reckon: “It feels like she’s been around for quite a while. You’re not looking at her and saying, ‘Wow, that’s the new girl.’ You say, ‘Why don’t I know her?”), Arizona is rightfully vindicated. With so many shows she opened and closed, The Cut has hailed her as the Face of Fall 2011.

Oh, did I mention that she reads Gabriel Garcia Marquez? Talk about beauty with substance.

Currently Listening To: On The Floor (Jennifer Lopez feat Pitbull)

Jennifer Lopez suddenly becomes, on a clever comeback maneuver, ubiquitous: from the glossies to the boob tube and now on the radio. Her latest hit? On The Floor, a dance anthem covering a sample of Kaoma's 1989 single "Lambada". And smart-aleck as she is, she partnered with Pitbull whose every collaboration enters the Billboard Hot 100 Top 10. The offshoot? An infectious dance track infused with a little bit of Latin, electro and pop beats. JLo’s voice is sexy, classy and she is clearly the Commandeer on the dance floor with her minions in tow. Slowly, it is climbing its way up in Billboard Hot 100. Oh well, everybody loves happy endings, right?

LOSER

Rejection is a bitter pill to swallow. It is demoralizing and soul-crushing. It makes you feel sub-standard, like a poor fellow who misses the target.

A couple of weeks ago, I learned that I did not make it to an esteemed institution. Shock was my initial reaction. I could barely move. I triple checked The List if an error has been made. Null. I felt like Karofsky threw a mug-ful of guzzler on my face with him demonstrating an L sign on his forehead. Ouch, totally excruciating!

It totally sucks that all the sleepless nights you’ve endured to master logic and algebra would go in vain. It even hurts more that the ones who got in could not even measure up to you in terms of grammar. Sure this sounds sour-graping but I am telling it matter-of-factly.

Such is life: You win some, you lose some. A little blow on your ego is healthy according to HuffingtonPost. I felt slightly vindicated.

And maybe three bottles of beer is good for my bleeding heart. Cheers to that freakin’ result! I’ll drink to that, dammit!

THE L WORD

Whoa, it’s been more than a year of non-blogging! After my creative juices had been sucked up, I surrendered to the urge of prosaic, uneventful tell-taling. Humdrum moments, life’s snippets too uninspiring to reveal: a typical writer’s block, I reckon.

In between Blogger’s hiatus and now, though, the vicissitudes are overpowering: 1) I was hit by the Love Bug amidst the madding crowd; 2) I visited Singapore again (only after being held in the detention room at the Changi Airport for an hour when my passport acted up on the verification machine); and 3) Surprise, surprise: I am contemplating of going to law school. Yes, law school! And as hasty as it is, I am already inundated with horror stories: the dreadful Socratic Method, the incessant discomfiture brought about by the meanest professors, digesting pile of pile of cases and memorizing tongue-twisting Latin legal jargon! Though unfazed, I badly need an Elle Woods intervention right now!

But Love Bug is too grand an affair to be not highlighted. It marks a glorious, life-altering feeling that if true, would prove indelible. In terms of importance, I would rank it after getting to UP. Slap me for being squishy but it’s as if all the angels in heaven conspire for that fateful meet-up. It was an instantaneous mutualism, an aberration of the natural order of things. Love at first sight, bizarrely, is an idea I used to debunk. Now, I’m gushing over it.

SO is beyond the person I ever dreamed of: charming, religious, gifted in the humor department, giving and loving. Never mind if SO is not into the not-so-offbeat stuff, haunting music and Oscarish films, I will definitely dig Jesus, Tangled, a few grammatical slips over Oprah, a Clint Eastwood flick or an annalistic grammar police in a heartbeat.

The future is still uncertain for the two of us. I hate picturing it with happy-endings. It has almost become, as past experiences would bear out, a terrible writing on the wall. My new mantra, hence, is: Carpi diem!

For the record, my saturation point in a relationship, akin to premature ejaculation (forgive the pun!), rather comes too soon. After the spark and spontaneity had fizzled out, it gets bleak and nonchalant. Enter saturation point. And it also doesn’t help that I am dramatic, moody, reasonably possessive and a wee bit paranoid. Thankfully, SO is a bit of fresh air: SO’s flair for the dramatics is not as ostentatious as mine.

So after seven months of togetherness, the threat of saturation remains at bay. And it will be so for eternity. I shall, in all solidity and stolidity that I could muster, defend the threat of saturation for this beautiful, albeit crazy, thing called

LOVE.

Frivolity 2.0

I crept by the windows
of your stillness.

Unchange the melody now.

Smoked.
Inhaled.

You, lover and loather of
chaos,

Enchanter of mysteries,

Unfold me now.

Skin.
Dip.

Death is bliss.