Missing my favorite sport and other thoughts

The familiar sound of a good kick to the ball was very soothing and certainly inviting. Too bad I don't have the skill of making new friends for the sake of sports, not even for my fave -soccer. Might be something I have to work on one of these days while I'm still -ehem- young.

The larger group of soccer aficionados in the Sunken Garden was a bunch of Koreans and I opted to watch their game for a while. Regardless on whether the opinion is valid or not, I thought I was actually better than them at the sport. Just some strong kicks and running around, I didn't really see anything impressive or any good ball movement or control. On the left corner part of the field from where I was were a bunch of older men, and by my take were of some middle eastern nationalities. They had a better skill-set but were much older and hence a little more conservative in their efforts in the game. I kept watching the Korean group though; something about the strong kicks, the thuddy sound the ball makes, and maybe how I was reminded of just playing the game when I was younger kept me glued to the spot and jealous.

I wanted to play soccer, plain and simple. I'm not that bad at it yet somehow there I was on the corner watching people play it. I wonder how and why I've allowed myself to be in a life where I am just in the sidelines watching the things I love. And i realize that this has been the case with most other things and not just in sports.

Maybe I do need to make resolutions after all.

....

"To be aware of a single shortcoming in oneself is more useful than to be aware of a thousand in someone else." - Tenzin Gyatso

I take a cab at the corner of Bo's not far from my place. I've got my badminton gear with me and am quite happy with the thought that after a long drought from any sports activity I was finally gonna get some action.

I'm all settled in the cab and tell the driver I'm headed to Timog.

"Sa GMA ka ba?" he asks.

"Banda doon po" I replied.

"Anong show ka? Napanood na ba kita sa tv?"

"Ho?" I'm not sure what he means so repeats his question.

I told him I wasn't going to the station itself and that I wasn't an artista or had any tv projects. Then he told me that I would be one day. Even calling me at one point of the conversation a "magandang lalake". And no, he's not gay. He talks to me about his family and how he still needs to work though he's pushing near sixty, and how he loves movies. To my surprise he did seem to be knowledgeable in the field from the Filipino classics and to even foreign art films. He says he has a knack for things and tells me a story that he also had a passenger long ago way back when he was younger and told her that she too was going to be a star. And she did, and her name was Vina Morales. Haha, yes, quite funny. I dunno if he was pulling my leg but he seemed to narrate from an actual memory.

I told him I had no plans on an acting career, but actually hoped and am working to be a director/filmmaker.

He asked for my name so that one day when he sees my movies he can say that I was in his cab. I also asked for his and told him that if I make it, I'll give him a shout out. Haha!

Only time will tell.

....

"Every man's life lies within the present; for the past is spent and done with, and the future is uncertain." -Marcus Aurelius

I'm probably 9 or 10 and I'm looking for my notebook -the one I've saved for drawing all my crazy characters and superhero plans and gadgets. I couldn't find it until Pabing said she had it and returned it to me not knowing it was used by anyone anymore (there are many discarded half used notebooks lying around the house). I was going to start drawing only to find out as I opened up the pages that she had drawn on several pages some designs for women's clothing. I got so angry and fumed that my notebook was now ruined and tried to express my displeasure by making weird half tantrum type sounds and gestures. I think for a time I even held a grudge, but eventually found a new notebook.

I've recently uncovered that notebook and scanned the pages of her drawings and realized how stupid I was. Looking back now, I wish I realized that it was just a notebook and that I could have gotten another a thousand times better than that one notebook easily. I wish I could have seen past my own selfishness and could have been nicer to her that time.

She didn't particularly get treated well around the house. She was often called slow, which was only true because she was in a house of hurried control freaks. She had served our house for a long time and was already near her fifties if I'm not mistaken though I could not ever remember her having any friends or family visit. Life is tough. Her life must have been tougher. Although I think I was closest to her because we would share stories and jokes, not a common thing with everyone else in the house, I still regret that one incident greatly. Maybe, despite her time passing by, she still dreamed to design clothes and that it was her escape and little joy. And there I was a stupid kid not seeing that.

Had I seen past my own self, I would have given her a thousand notebooks. I would have talked to her and listened a little more seriously when she confided in me that she was afraid she was dying. She would pass away two weeks later from a cancer no one knew she had and I wasn't even there. I tear up at the thought of how lonely she must have been.

These memories remind me why I've tried to be a nicer person in the past. I remember now the more important lessons I need to remember.

....

"Were we fully to understand the reasons for other people's behavior, it would all make sense." -Sigmund Freud