Madness and Expectations

(my journal entry dated February 24, 2012, a Friday)

I have no idea what to write today, but I begin anyway. It’s one of those days when you just let the openness of your mind and your circumstances (assuming they affect the writing) have their influence on your writing. And that’s it. I take comfort in the fact that while I may not have anything to say worthwhile, I am privileged to have my say anyway. I’m “voiced.” Or “voice-enabled.”

Now, how shall I use the privilege? Hmmm…

Now, why is that? All these bits and pieces of everything, “voice-enabled” in their own big and small ways, some make sense, most seemingly don’t, yet all are privileged to be here, to be happening now.

I’m wondering if each one shouts, “Happy to serve!” from time to time (just like what SM employees do at their groceries). Okay, so maybe not everyone’s that “happy” to be of service. But they serve anyway. A common purpose.

Like these marble slabs that make up this floor I’m sitting on. So faithfully they are cemented to each other, so faithfully they don’t move to make up the floor that they are supposed to be. But then if people are as dead as these marble slabs, they’d be faithful too. I guess. Somehow when you stick yourself to a routine, you have to “die” a little. Or “die” little by little.

Kaya nga, there’s this notion about belonging to the rat race. Those who belong there are “zombies” daw. From my own experience, you have to be a zombie or a robot to take on, or to be able to take on, boring routine crap other people impose on you everyday.

But I’m not putting down people who find happiness and contentment in routine labor. When people say there is dignity and fulfillment in that, I agree. Kahit naman yata the most “alive” geniuses on the planet have to stick to a routine in order to be productive. Or prolific. The difference, I think, is whether you do things for yourself or for others, and secondly, if it fulfills you. The second condition, I think, is what makes our labors worthwhile.

Just now, I’m thinking of this lovebird we keep as a pet. His (or her?) partner died many years ago. People say lovebirds ought to live in pairs and if not, they die. Well, our lovebird has survived many years already—without a partner at that. Is there a Guinness Book of World Record for that?

With just him (or her?) living all by itself all this time, just where is the “love” in “lovebirds”? Perhaps it’s just us humans who insist on calling them lovebirds. And with such labels come expectations, and sometimes these expectations tend to be limiting and unfair.

If the bird knew it was a “lovebird” (with all the expectations associated with being one), would it have survived all these years? Perhaps, it’s all a misconception. Maybe they’re like the Philippine Eagle who finds just one mate for life. Perhaps I have to change my pet’s name/classification into “widowbird” or whatever. Which I’m not about to do.

Or perhaps I should just set it free. Except that I don’t know if it will be safe out there. Or maybe I should just leave the cage door open so that it’s free to come and go as it pleases.

All these years, living in a cage day in and day out without a partner, if it has not lost its sanity yet (bird sanity, that is), maybe it’s already on its way there. To cuckoo land. Ahehe. A lovebird turning into a cuckoo. Gets?

Or maybe it has already turned into a zombie bird, having “died” a long time ago, and now trapped in an “un-asked for” routine existence. Perhaps it’s just like Gollum or those nine Ringwraiths in "The Lord of the Rings." They’ve become content in the care of a master, one who tells them what to do, or at least confined in set perimeters of what they can do. I don’t know.

We also have a pet rooster in the backyard. It’s over a year old now (in human years) and people around here have been asking me when I’d have it slaughtered and cooked into Tinola. Well, firstly, it’s the family’s mascot. Secondly, and on a personal level, I’d like to see a chicken die of old age for once. In most parts of the world, chickens are either slaughtered for cooking or “killed” in cockfights.

He’s still feisty. With just a cord tied around its leg, that rooster is not “insane” yet, I guess. If not for the little children around the house, I’d set it loose. But if I give him freedom, would that turn him into a mad chicken on the loose? Some people are that way. Too much of this, too much of that, they go crazy. I guess madness reigns when the right conditions warrant it.