New old skin

I'm making a Steve Jobs Zuckerberg billionaire tech people move. I'll stop worrying about the facade (the way they don't worry about their physical appearance and clothes) to focus on my work.

Let me explain. I am not ignoring how I look, no, I am not above that. Nor will I dismiss aesthetics, which, if you know me, is top priority.

So what is this contradiction I speak of.

As you can see, my blog theme takes you back to the early 2000s. That's because I don't want to bother anymore with slaving over the tiniest detail. It had been a source of pride and excitement for me, but now I am more excited about actual blogging. This straightforward text-oriented theme fulfills my current need.

Who knows, mayble I'll have the itch to tinker with the design sooner than I expected; but for now I aim to also bring back that new-millennium carefree spirit online by having one less thing to unproductively obsess about.

Previous blog design

Let's be friends

HELLO! I've been checking my stats and I notice that I have some regular readers from different parts of the world. You have no idea how happy that makes me.

If it's okay with you, I'd very much like to know you. Please leave a comment, maybe with your name and social media account, so I coult stalk you hahaha. (All my socials are in the side bar, if you're interested.)

Anyway, I wish you a good day ahead and I'll do my best to be a better writer and person.

TikTok thoughts

Dropping by to share a couple of things:

1) I'm alive and coping rather well.

2) I miss going to the theater and concerts and then talking — BLOGGING — about it!

3) I downloaded TikTok start of March because I love watching people dance; it's another way for me to discover music; and the memes are gold. But it's also a medium where I can easily create fun videos. (The user is called a 'creator', which is telling of the community it wants to build.)

My first post was a tacky collage of my photos from the Matilda opening night, set to When I grow up, thinking that the platform could be an extension of my literature and performing arts storytelling. But since the video was so bad and the rest of 2020 events are basically cancelled due to COVID-19, I deleted it and just went on exploring and experimenting with the app.

By the way, I learned that it's the app formerly known as musical.ly, which I also downloaded and enjoyed in the past — as a viewer. Now it makes sense why I'm addicted to TikTok. A criticism against it is repetition or lack of original content. For me, we learn through imitation anyway, and creativity is often sparked by seeing something we love and then seeing how we can make it better.

If you have a TikTok, please let me know! I'd like to see some familiar faces there.

Leaving you with a post that's a bit more creative and on brand, haha!

@r.a.z.e.l

##books ##bookclub ##lonelychair

♬ Here's Where the Story Ends - The Sundays

Why I still blog

The short, straightforward answer: Because I want to feel good about myself.

For an indulgent, self-patting and -absolving explanation:

You give me the pleasure of having an audience

My favorite anecdote about writing is this: A poet friend attended a national writers workshop and his poetry was lambasted. Imagine how painful it must be for him, hearing the critiques, pretending to be fine afterwards. To recover, he wrote a poem.

That’s how you know you’re meant to do something. It’s a reflex.

Among the activities that captured my imagination as child, writing was the easiest to do. I wanted to be a pianist, a carpenter, a teacher, a cashier, a swimmer. We had a piano at home, but I couldn’t make noises at night. Swimming lessons, plus the gears, were expensive. But writing, it's cheap. I can do it anywhere, whenever I want to. In my head, I can be as loud as I like.

Following the bait of Language has led me here. I studied Literature, I took jobs as a communications assistant, an English tutor, a travel and lifestyle writer. In college I was thinking in poetry. In the mid-2000s I was thinking in blogs. In 2008 I started thinking in aphorisms — in 140 characters, that is.

This blog, which I created in 2003 (that period between graduating and signing an employment contract), has been a steady outlet for my writing. What began as a space for well-meaning bullshit became a confluence of my writerly selves, my many voices.

While my byline has appeared in publications in every available platform, most ideas I hold dear are here. Thank heavens for technology — for blogs, really, because I would explode if these thoughts didn’t find expression. And at least here it’s less of a one-way conversation.

I’ll do what I do anyway — it’s a reflex, but I would be lying if I said that I have no need for kind words. Writing is that job where you know you’re a rockstar but you don't get an applause. It’s a solitary occupation. Often it feels like talking to a ghost. But when you see the shares, the likes, when someone surprises you with a message of admiration or gratitude, the ghost becomes human. The weather turns warm.

Why I love blogging more than ever

In 2012 I wrote:

"9 years ago I dreamed of becoming a writer. 2 years ago I became a professional one: I write; I get paid. Since then I have loved this blog more than I ever did. Because (cheesy as it sounds) this is me.
. . . .
Before, I was aching to get published and I knew that getting published would feel amazing. It does. It did. It does when it matters. Now, having your work and your thoughts printed and disseminated seems to be the easiest occupation. So my dream has changed, or it has at least reverted to my principal dream, and that is to write well."

Making a career out of your passions can bring you to an identity and integrity crisis. When I was hired in the marketing department of a local newspaper five years ago, I thought in advertorials. I understood what “culture shock” meant when I entered the publishing industry. Writers put their names on barely edited press releases and call it a day. You’d be asked to state something you didn’t believe in. Because everyone was doing it, you’d figure it was okay.

There are stuff that are very not okay, however. I still can’t get over seeing my name on heavily revised articles, and articles that are almost entirely written by another. I still sometimes beat myself up for allowing these to happen.

And so this blog has also meant that. I’ve learned a lot, which means a lot must be unlearned. This is my constant attempt to write well and be a person of integrity. This is all me: the good, the bad syntax, the ugly.

*

Today is the blog's 14th birthday. Consider this entry a form of celebration.

Gained

What follows may undermine the pain of loss, of panghihinayang I suffered after seeing termites devour the spines and edges of my treasured books.

I say treasured, but in truth I didn't treat them as such. Those books were gone even before the pests reached them because (it hurts to say this) I abandoned poetry.

Lost Alice Fulton, Lucie Brock-Broido, Elizabeth Bishop, Luise Gluck, and Edna St Vincent Millay to termites. My fault or the world's?
— Razel Estrella (@fishpeep) November 30, 2014

Two days later, when I accepted that some things are filled with the intent to be lost that their loss is no disaster, this happened:

Knowing very well that trolls, bots, and fake identities are everywhere online, I double-checked if it was indeed Alice Fulton. My research showed it was her. So I followed, and in the same day:

*

Dammit I misspelled Louise. Apologies.

Upgrade

Smoothly, successfully downloaded OS X Yosemite

Seize the moment, live to the point of tears, YOLO. And when it is time to let go, let go.

Because nothing lasts. Material things, particularly gadgets, teach me, remind me this.

Recently, my Nokia almost died and I resuscitated it with a hard reset. Meaning I lost all data: contacts, messages, notes, et cetera. I had no backup, since the Nokia suite is not available on Mac—well I researched and there are ways to back up but it was too much of a hassle.

The loss wasn't a big deal. There is only one phone number important to me. Information I need to survive are saved in my brain.

I love my MacBook, I love Blogger. In my wildest fears, my laptop simply refuses to boot and all my blog posts are wiped out. I am both ready and not ready for that.

Doors opening and closing

This witticism made its way through my timeline a couple of days ago:

When one door closes, another opens. Also, you can open the closed door. That’s how doors work. How do you know so little about doors?
— Bill Murray (@BiIIMurray) April 9, 2014

Then thanks to Spotify, which only became available in the Philippines last Tuesday, I discovered Sue Ellen's version of Pet Shop Boy's 'Being Boring'—what I swear to be my 30s anthem.

Along with it is the re-discovery of the lyrics:

I came across a cache of old photos
And invitations to teenage parties.
'Dress in white', one said with quotations
From someone's wife, a famous writer
In the nineteen-twenties.
When you're young you find inspiration
In anyone who's ever gone
And opened up a closing door.
She said, 'We were never feeling bored...'
[...]
When I went I left from the station
With a haversack and some trepidation.
Someone said, 'If you're not careful
You'll have nothing left and nothing to care for
In the nineteen-seventies.'
But I sat back and looking forward,
My shoes were high and I had scored.
I'd bolted through a closing door
And I would never find myself feeling bored.
So I guess that's the week's lesson. Don't be discouraged by closing, closed, and shut doors.

PS: While Frozen is still hot, here's the extremely cute 'Love is an open door' (We finish each other's sandwiches FTW!). Unfortunately, though, in this instance, the door was opened too soon for the wrong person, for the wrong reasons.

So lesson #2? Not all rooms with opening, opened, and wide-open doors are for entering.

Twitter, Blogger, etc

For whatever it has become to different people, I think the magic and essence of Twitter are in its 140-character limit and thoughtfulness in unburdening the user of that automatic connection with people whose thoughts and whereabouts they don't necessarily care for.

Meanwhile, celebrities—and the rest of the deeply status-conscious—value it as a free tool for measuring influence.

The little bird turns 8 and looks back at the very beginning:

Thanks to all of you who have come along in our first 8 years. Take a look at where we—and you—started. https://t.co/N0KQ85TJDs #FirstTweet
— Twitter (@twitter) March 20, 2014

My not-first #FirstTweet:

There you go! I've deleted all my twitter updates! Ha. Ha-ha-ha-hu-hu. *developing technofear* (or more of twitterfear)
— Razel Estrella (@fishpeep) June 17, 2009

So I can't really remember my actual first tweet, but the above is proof that I, like everybody else, didn't know what to do with the new platform—but eventually did. A couple of years ago I discussed why I blog and recently I discovered another reason that I'm into Blogger, Twitter, and other similar sites.

Because good listeners are becoming harder and harder to come by. Nowadays you will be cut, misinterpreted, dismissed. At least in these online spaces you have a bit of control. Here, you are allowed to finish your sentence. Here you get to frame your story.

We're stuck in heavy noise traffic. Everyone is busy and has no patience to dwell on another's complexity. As a result, we adapt the strategies we have mastered in our attempts to make a living: make a brand out of ourselves. Be known in one clear dimension.

If there's something I dislike about Twitter (and its visual counterpart Instagram), it's that it pushes us to project an image. Twittersphere for me is— cold. What I miss about the old blogging days are the sincerity, vulnerability, and sheer openness in telling the cyberworld what's going on with you, with little regard to being judged. In fact there used to be a generous curiosity about strangers (bloggers who don't know but follow—and converse with—each other).

There was an excitement in sharing an experience more than an eagerness to show how great you are (which is fine if not excessive).

All this is to say I miss sharing a table with my friends. I also miss the ordinary story-tellers.

Useful things unused

Now too common to desire

Perks aren't always perks, oftentimes they are additional things to worry about. Like the gadget freebies I recently got: one a cellphone, the other a tablet. You do not want to discard them, because they don't come cheaply in the first place. The next option is to sell, which is stressful, for it'll take a while for you to find a buyer and negotiating prices is a hassle (why I am not an account executive). Of course you can also recycle and give them away as gifts—but to whom? Knowing my friends, they don't fancy these as well.

I realize problematising this may make me appear ungrateful. I am grateful, only a tad critical. It is the thought that counts, and without a doubt the quality of thinking and sincerity involved in giving will manifest in the chosen token of regard. Sometimes a simple, personalized card will do.

On a related note, this is the reason why I still love flowers, the symbolic gesture of giving flowers. It is truthful: flowers fade, so do feelings; but you have to honor the emotion before it expires. Affections need to be sustained and must be constantly expressed.

Before I let go of the gadgets, I'm extracting a cute memory from one of them. The following screenshots were taken from the tab when I was still playing with its settings:

Funny how you put it

So yeah, how would I pick between the 01/01/2010 and the 01/01/2010 date format? And with my appreciation for honest criticism and distaste for the rude, I opted for a modest auto-correction.

A decade

The blog's first icon

Engrossed in the moment, which traveler ever takes his camera or notebook out to record the moment? I feel the same way about this online journal's 10th anniversary. There's no compulsion to talk about it, the goal has been reached: there's no more need to blog about blogging.

Maybe just this: Here's to ten more years of not taking things for granted— of bothering about life and living.

9 years later

I started this blog in August 2003 with so much urgency. I was less conscious of the idea that things don't last, hence every design detail, every post, I crafted with regard to eternity. That a wandering man will someday find his way to this digital island, therefore it must be found clean and dainty; that decades from now I will have a lot to enjoy re-reading (and instantly delete).

Years later technology (however lovely and useful) and life (however riveting) prove that nothing lasts. Gadgets, software, the internet are faulty. Relationships, desires, beauty fade. But then all the more do I do things deliberately and with caution; all the more do I believe that one act, one word, is subject to perpetual responsibility.

Talking about going for a totally different look,
which eventually happened.

9 years ago I dreamed of becoming a writer. 2 years ago I became a professional one: I write; I get paid. Since then I have loved this blog more than I ever did. Because (cheesy as it sounds) this is me.

Here I don't follow another's guidelines and say something nice when I don't intend to. Here there are no strings of words that are not mine.

Selfish, self-important, yes, but that's fine. I blog not because I want the world to know what's on my mind; I blog because I want to tell an imagined audience what's on my mind.

Before, I was aching to get published and I knew that getting published would feel amazing. It does. It did. It does when it matters. Now, having your work and your thoughts printed and disseminated seems to be the easiest occupation. So my dream has changed, or it has at least reverted to my principal dream, and that is to write well.

Technofear & technojoy

We had a good run, you and I

My record still holds: I've yet to buy my own cell phone. I said good-bye to that beautiful copper Palm Treo that had grown too old to use and hello to a new handset, again courtesy of my sister.

The gift did not come with a ribbon but a headache. Before I could fully use the phone:

1. I had to have it unlocked. I did and it cost me.

2. I had to have my SIM card upgraded. I did, eventually—

a. I had to go to the nearest wireless center. I did and they told me they ran out of the type of SIM card I needed. But they were kind enough to look for the next nearest wireless center and reserve the SIM for me.

b. I had to go to wireless center #2 to claim my upgraded SIM. I did, for a few pesos more.

Now I'm trying to activate my new phone's MMS settings, but I keep getting 'Phone model not compatible'. These machines do tend to be like humans, you can't simply figure them out, and they already come with a manual, so they're worse.

What Eddie Izzard so perfectly sums up in his sketch on technology—I do love it, but I can hate it really big time. But as I've later on recognized, when you say you have a love-hate relationship with someone or something, chances are love is the foothold of the entire affair. Therefore hassle and all, I, in the end, love technology (and humans).

Dear ladies and jellyspoons,

I imagined a long, compelling, touching yet dignified and in parts light-hearted speech about finally overhauling this blog after—1, 2, 3, 4, 5 [...] xx—months. But I lost the impulse.

So you do the imagining for now (of how that speech might have turned out) and I'll make it up to you by being more disciplined and kind in 2012.

New Year in a few hours. Cheers!

Blistering at the head of September

I had a bad August. Which is my way of completely ignoring the delectable things I had, because they'd somehow fallen to the ease of habit.

The life thus went: late night meals at Sinangag Express with my brother, online chats with K, watching entire seasons of Heroes, The Office and Arrested Development, shopping, saving, keeping secrets and sharing them.

I began dancing again and did it almost every day, almost like I'm doing another routine at the gym.

The things listed above were things I was imagining years ago: a laid-back lifestyle that can be open to spontaneity—intimate friendships, big ambitions, complex puzzles, modest pleasures, intimate puzzles, complex friendships, modest ambitions.

I want to acknowledge this blog's existence for the past four years. This serves me: pleasure, puzzle and friend.

"We can never find ten people in one person." Makes sense as we can never be our many selves to only one person.

This is at least one place where I can squeeze as many mes as I can, like my public closet.

April fool's smile

There, I've done it. I mean, here, I've done it.

Due to my OC-ness, I'd been itching to alter, make more functional this blog's template. And for the longest time, I badly desired to have the codes cleaned. Now I can breathe. Now my chest is light.

As you can see, people change, but not really. I moved to a different house, but virtually retained all the furniture. I would've gone for a totally different look, but with lack of technical skills (or money to hire a webpage designer) and time, I'd have to settle with this skin. All that I need is here: labels, hierarchical display of archives, recent comments feed, selective expandable posts, and you.

This weblog is important to me, if it's not obvious yet. And so dear Blogger, I hope you continue to improve your services. I shall remain loyal to you.

*

Anyway, with this online journal's overhaul, I've just completed another item on my birthday to-do list and it really feels good! (I can't believe I'm using an exclamation point in a tone such as this! Now there're three exclamation points! [including that one], so you should understand that it indeed feels good).

And speaking of my birthday, I thank Mich for the personalized birthday cake. I usually get furious when my name's misspelled or mispronounced, but that time, I just smiled and thought, ang jologs.

Now let me get dirty. The truth is this is just a test post. I want to see if I got the codes right. I believe I did, since there should be no other way.

A special mention to Alts, because I envied some of the features in her personal blog; that if it wasn't for her, I wouldn't know there were such features and it was also in that blog where I got the links to the hacks.

As for Diwata Nakpil, don't ever think that I killed her, or will. She's very much alive and active, and she's currently writing under the pseudonym, Razel.

Good Intentions

I guess it's an old idea that in the end (or at the core?) of all acquaintances and relationships, what we really want and need to know of another is what they think of us. With the knowledge of how the other perceives you, suddenly s/he becomes complete, or suddenly uninteresting.

I never¹ reject a Friendster testimonial, for I would like to believe those things are written with urgency, thus sincerity.²

And you are, of course, excited about what people would like to say about you, excited even at the craft of it--how they say it (your friends, after all, are reflective of you.) And you, of course, can't help but wait for that adjective you want to hear.³

And, of course, the time when I overanalyze. I get a bit crazy when people throw away a description like "she's a good writer," when they haven't read anything I've written, nor are they interested in writing at all. I get crazier when they write their testimonials as if they're texting you. But I will never reject, because again, the theory that it's done in the highest sense of spontaneity.⁴ Plus, I am of the mythological conditioning that I get along well with all kinds of people: elitists and others; text-conscious and not; homophobic and alcoholic; Ann, Anne, Ana and Anna.

This source of blind trust is what intrigues and bothers me, because I cannot figure anything but ignorance. Not that I'm being hard on my self and them, but pleasure and pain are accurate when their source is real. And real things are hard to come by.--Or that it must agree to what I opine?⁵

I wonder what those friendsters of mine think of me now. Now, at this very moment, that I look at some special ones: each of them surfacing constantly from memory, since their pictures have never been complete in my mind.


1) Well, not entirely true, since I do not approve those graphic stuff that you don't really think of.
2) There are two instances, though, when my friends blatantly told me they're writing me a testimonial, so I should write them one too! Eww.
3) For the longest time, I've been waiting for someone to say I'm sexy; I can't understand why no one has written that yet. Leche.
4) And hey, it's just Friendster. And hey, who among us is perfect anyway?
5) To make it easier, what I only mean by "real" is "intelligent." What I always mean by real is intelligent.

Oh how we manage

This day marks the second anniversary of this little online journal.

What I've figured? That despite my efforts in going against it, this—just like any other blog—is no more than a mere chronicling of angsts and quirks.

Tekkie Me

I am not one to believe the best things are for free. But I'd take what's free any time.

It was in my senior year in high school when cellular phones became so fashionably necessary, and in the blink of an eye, the cell phone had been as ordinary as a pen and a hanky. Everyone had them. I didn't have one then. Until my sophomore year in college. I had my first authentic gimik. I hung out with new-found friends at the Remedios Circle in Malate till 4 AM. Going home, I expected a full hour or two of reprimand from my parents, but I received the silent treatment instead. The next night, I became the new owner of a Nokia 3210.

I'm not crazy about cell phones. Nokia features such as games are wasted on me. My average text messages sent per day is roughly 1. I have never—ever!—consumed my P300 load in two months. I hardly make calls. If I need to call someone, I look for the nearest pay phone. For 5 years, my Nokia 3210 has stayed with me—till its backlight's dysfunctional, till it can already be considered vintage, Jurassic. I would still hold on to it, if not for my Ate.

From out of the blue, she gave me a very old model of a Handspring Treo. The display's still in black and white, but it doesn't matter; a part of me can endure without color. It's a nice toy and it's once again for free. I appreciate it because it functions as a palmtop and cell phone and you can access the internet through it.

With this new gadget comes one of my most favorite activities in the world: organizing, personalizing.

My phone book's a bit of a revelation, there's so much space. My date book's no surprise, there are no dates. The only game I enjoy from the 5 games available is Hardball (which is really a version of Arkanoid, which reminds me of yesteryears with Nintendo).

Now this is the part where I'm supposed to be wrapping up this entry and express some sort of epiphany. There is none. I don't know. Call me. Gift me with a laptop.

Theeling

For the third time, my family's personal computer has been reformatted. What does that mean? I've lost yet again a gajillion mp3 files. I haven't learned. I should've saved them in a CD. But as how I would usually console myself, I have listened to these, ok those, songs for how many times until I tire of them. I shouldn't be this sad.

How about my other files? They're fine. My Word documents (CV, theses, papers, creative writing) are saved in my Gmail account. (On a side note, I don't know about you other Gmail users, but that "2000 megabytes (and counting) of storage" is starting to get scary. It's like they're up for world domination. Oh well, that's tomorrow's problem.) My jpeg files and other pictures are stored in Flickr and PhotoBucket.

I always brag about how I can live without a cell phone. But my gulay, I have become slave to the internet instead of the other way around.

By the way, Merriam-Webster Asks: What's Your Favorite Word (That's Not in the Dictionary)? Here are some of the responses:

accordionated (adj): being able to drive and refold a road map at the same time

elbonics (n): the actions of two people maneuvering for one armrest in a movie theater

fendicle (n): junk that hangs from fenders in winter

helixophile (n): corkscrew collector

petrophobic (adj): one who is embarrassed to undress in front of a household pet

theeling (n) thinking and feeling blended state

That's one of the reasons why I love the internet. Oh, I still can't get over those music.