YGRT
as soon as i could bore the littlest hole in my strenuous schedule, i will tell you why this is such an awesome book. in the meantime, the suggestion is disguised as an entry title.
You Gotta Read This
casting the spell of life and literature
My friend Mark, a Eucharistic Minister from Church, had given the Host to hundreds, if not thousands, of communicants but this credential did not prepare him for the occasion. It happened one gorgeous Saturday morning in May when little girls and boys in white attires beamed in their quest to fulfill the next Sacrament in their young lives. Little Andrew stood before Mark, his shy tongue sticking out for the grace, but Mark just looked at him and appeared lost. The truth is, he wasn't; he was just hoping for intercession that his knees did not turn to jelly which would have folded him like a piece of cardboard. Mark was so joyfully overwhelmed by what he was seeing - little Andrew as virtue personified - that it took some prodding from the Minister standing next for him to give the host to the waiting tongue of little boy already. But everyone understood. It was Andrew's First Communion, and he was Mark's 12-year old son.
...in their order of greatness.
Sinusulat ko itong post naaalala ko ang pamangkin kong si Ann. Bata pa si Ann pero super-organized na, wehehe, siguradong di nagmana sa Tito nyang disorganized ang buhay. Tuwing mag a-out of town si Ann (halimbawa maga-attend ng summer camp), hindi sya basta basta mag-eempake. Kung ako yun, ganto ang plataporma ko sa pagta-travel: ano man ang maispatan ng mga mata kong bored, isasaksak ko na lang sa maleta, quesehodang wala syang paggagamitan sa aking lakarin; syete, magtatagal lang talaga ako sa pagpili kung anong libro ang bibitbitin ko (mga kalahating oras na pagninilay-nilay!)
nung Christmas party namin last year sa departamento ng mga insekto, bukod sa kainan at tsismisan ay meron pang pa-raffle chuvachuchu. 20 kami sa department, 5 ang premyos. ang tanong: ilang katao ang babalik sa kanilang desks ng luhaan?
richard and cara are husband and wife, both thirty-four years old, in love with each other, and childless despite years of trying. notwithstanding this seeming void, they remain faithful to each other and their married life is as normal as any other's. then something happens. she is raped by a popular math teacher - a serial criminal who, prior to his capture, was only identified as the reservoir rapist - and with this violent act against her person she gets pregnant.
Imitation of Christ
...and just like that, the greatest living literary critic my generation had known is living no more.
1. In an instant I was awake. The moments of my sleep and wakefulness proceed with the same fidelity as an accessory to his principal. My consciousness and sub, in certain areas, are peas of the same pod. Friday night I dreamt I was with my brother in a mall, and out of the blue a man and woman forced him to join them in posing foolish and making faces before the mall's security camera. I reacted by taking my own slr and zoomed in to the face of the man. The dude saw me and apparently didn't like being papped, so he walked towards me while drawing something from his waist which I figured to be a gun. Before the plot - if not the blood - could thicken, I programmed myself to figure out, pffft, it's only a dream! This, my friend, was what I was saying at the outset. In reality as in subconscious, from the harshness of the streets to the comforts of my bed, my rule of thumb is to shy away from squabbles and arguments where I could not become a better person. I simply step out. I go away. I wake up.
It was 7am of Christmas Day and I was driving home, all roads empty and all skies gray. The car stereo was playing my favorite Christmas song, What Child is This, sung by Third Day, but my mind was drawn more to the city that was damp and quiet and absolutely deserted. I wanted to scream, Hello!, Hello!, Is this a joke!, Uncle Frank!, Is this a joke! - like the little Kevin who woke up one morning finding himself home alone and of no family, but of course I can't be a big Little Kevin; I had never dreamed of my family to vanish even by way of a joke... and I will not want the scenario of a post-apocalyptic Miami either; the place was just a little too methodical to be apt for doomsday.