I Never Get Around

We love Booksale, because we're cheapskates. Primarily. More than that, we feel this weird happiness in finding something we greatly value being undervalued by other people. We'd take the secondhand at any time.

I. PIPSISSEWAS
I bought a tiny book about flowers. It was only until I got home that I read the dedication written on the first page. It says, For you Sokng Ioo. I never get around to read any more. What a sad message. The book made me happy, on the other hand, as the flowers were beautifully painted. And look at this description of the Pipsissewas (Pipsissewa, my new favorite flower name): The narrow, leather leaves, 1 to 3 inches long, are strongly toothed.

II. CHOCTAW
There was an English to Choctaw dictionary that found its way to me. When I saw the book, I immediately looked at the words that are important to me:

life - aiokchanya, ilhfiopak, nana okchanya, nana yukpa, okchanya
death - aiilli, illi, illi atukla, nan illi
passion - annushkunna, nuklibishlikachi, nukoa
desire - na banna
desire, a - ahni
desire, to - ahni, anushkunna, banna, chunkash ia
sin - aiashachi, aiashachika, aiyoshoba, ashachi, na yoshoba, nan aiashacheka, nan ashacheka, nan ashachi, yoshoba
sin, to - ashachi, yoshoba

They have a lot of terms synonymous to sin. Interestingly, they have no synonymous term for sex. More interestingly, they have no synonymous term for art, but they have one for "artless," ikhana. Most interesting of all is that ikhana is also their term for "literate."

Normal

The transformations that happen. You like them, you don't like them. You don't know exactly how to feel about them.

Going to Lipa City in Batangas before would take a three-hour drive. It meant anticipating seeing admired relatives. It meant going to a quiet place; sound meant strictly the stories and laughter you share with each other.

Now it's like just any another city in Metro Manila. Not that it's entirely bad. I'm not just in the mood to appreciate it entirely.