the last three years...

this morning, while i am standing on the aisle of a Pasay-bound bus on my way to the office, a thought just crossed my mind: how was my life for the last three years?

one may ask what's so significant with those years? you see, of my almost 10 years of working (and thereby living) here in Manila, eight years of those were spent on four different apartments, all in Sampaloc, with my cousins and some kababayans from Quezon. the last apartment that i/we stayed on was actually good, it has three rooms, a spacious living room and kitchen, a big laundry area and it's gated. the best thing about that apartment was, it's just a step away from everything: wet market, the church, grocery, drugstore, the LRT 2, you can call a taxi anytime, there's fastfood, ATM's, it's even near a bus terminal that service the Manila-Quezon-Bicol routes! so what's more can i ask for?

privacy.

not that i/we don't have it there, it's just that i always have this "craving" to live alone, to mind my own self (the loner in me), and does not have to worry about my roommate or housemates. maybe i just want a certain freedom to do things my way like what tv show/s to see (ang babaw no?), how i want the toilet to look and smell at, you know the little conveniences that you have in your life in the province that you simply do not enjoy here in Manila. it's not really about comfort, it's, uhm, well, it's really is about comfort! hehehe. but don't get me wrong, i have no problem and did not have any problem with my housemates, i just wanted a space and more importantly, a future to look at.

then one time, a school mate invited me to see their house and another schoolmate's house in cavite, and that was it, the wake up call, the right timing, the opportunity, this is it! i asked for their agent for an appointment, an orientation, a tour of the area, a background of the developer and anything that my little brain can think of.

and after thinking and weighing down (and up) all the pros and cons of moving to cavite, like giving up or lessening or cutting on some of my yuppie life's fixtures like night-outs, movie marathons (i watch movies almost on a daily basis), cd's, gadgets, magazines (ok, fhm and pulp) and books, and considering the finances and how hard (my own term is madugo/bloody) it would be on my wallet and my little savings in the bank, i was a bit scared, i was like a drug-dependent individual doing some rehabilitation and the withdrawal is just so tough!

thankfully, the accountant in me prevailed! initially, i just think of it as in investment but later on I looked at it as the foundation for my future, for my own family to build, for me to look onto later that, hey, i accomplished something in my life.

the last two or three years, as i expected, has never been smooth sailing, there were initially equity and then become monthly amortizations to attend to and there are also some bumps on the road that made my confidence and faith a little shaken.

the year 2005 has been somewhat a tumultuous year for our family, it was then that my father suffered from a stroke and his lifetime savings has been drained from it and it was also then that i almost give up on my little house and close to selling it to add in to the finances because my savings was also dried up, but my mother strongly told me not to. "we'll get through without resorting to selling things, have faith and everything will be alright in God's time", those were her words and we hold onto it.

my dad has now fully recovered (though he's no longer as strong as before, he's healthy and that's all that matters), and somehow with the help of friends and prayers, we made it. i learned that we should never lose hope, we should always hold onto our faith and our family and just like my mother's word, everything will be alright in God's time.

and my house? that's where i live now. i am still living alone there and sometimes having too much space for myself can be boring and saddening.

but the boredom and sadness will be gone, soooon.