The BOXER and The WRITER (a true story)

....when i look back at the times how I've spent my life, all i could see is a boxer [blood dripping from the edge of my face, blackened corner of my eye, lips burst open, deafening noise from crowd, and sweat (a whole lot of it)]. The funny thing, though, is that it made me feel comfortable and complete.

" I am a boxer", I would tell myself.

To become the best fighter, sometimes I made wrong moves, executed wrong actions, then subconsciously I will find out how big the mess was. And I will find my mind saying a lot of "tsk, tsk,tsk!" But those mess taught me to learn, made me strong, strive harder, and sometimes comforted me.

I do not consider myself as a boxer before. I always regard myself as a writer.

A writer is Silent. Giving. Coward. and a Dreamer.

I'm a huge fan of dreams, of illusions. That, I think, makes me a writer. I'm always in a corner, alone, hoping that life will be solved with illusions. I was wrong.

But becoming a writer gradually made me a fighter.

1996, the year (in my opinion) that introduced me as a writer. An eleven-year-old-boy, like any other boy, would fall in this stupid thing called LOVE. At first I didn't know that I had this thing going on in my heart, like pumping all my blood through my veins as if they wanna explode, until it hit my brain and back to my heart way faster than the light. I felt this when I saw this particular girl at school. She's my friend for so long until I realized she's no ordinary girl for me anymore. She is special to me. Very Special.

I was playing with other kids (who were my classmates) one afternoon (the most memorable afternoon of my life, and I still curse that afternoon for what had happened). We were playing "chase and tag" over the large playground of our town's public elementary school, killing our time before the afternoon class starts, when SHE entered the school premises. She was wearing that usual get-up, the girls' school uniform [laughs]. I don't know what's with her that mesmerized me. Maybe she's a veela or simply hypnotic. Maybe it was her smile. Or her big round eyes like that of Penelope' Cruz, i really don't know.

And then, it slipped out of my mouth: " Ang ganda niya talaga..."

As I was about to absorbed her presence, someone behind me said this: " Crush mo si N@M@?!" (privacy and confidentiality is being observed for the protection of all parties involved)

I was caught off-guard, so I confirmed what he heard. Then I was silent the whole afternoon classes. The next day, I never thought almost every classmates knew about it. After a week or so, they were all
teasing me with her, and it will always makes me blush ( out of shyness or some sort).

That was the start I detached myself from the friendship we carefully preserved for so long.



Year 2005, the worst year of my life. A decision has to be made. I was walking around the four corners of my room. It was raining outside, as if giving me sympathy. Or maybe giving me those "whooshing" sound to comfort me, and clear my mind. The decision involves risk. And a great sum of money ( i will not give details about it,

[to be continued]