Day 45 (Recall) Up and Down

I managed to hang out with quite a few people on this day.

Prior to leaving for work, my mother insisted that we have a late lunch/early dinner with some people who had helped her out while she was in California a few years ago. So, I sat at a table with my mom and an assortment of people who spoke varying degrees of Tagalog and Visaya, neither of which I’m particularly fluent in. One thing I will say about Olive Garden, the bread makes me happy enough to the point that I often forget that I ordered anything to begin with.

The conversation was largely stretched between my Tita’s recent trip up north, passing by a winery and swinging by Orlando, our recent Sinulog festival, and my Tita’s nephew and niece-in-law inviting us to stay with them if we found ourselves in California. Along the line, I found out that, on top of being born in the Middle East while my parents were working abroad, I actually spent time in the country of Jordan.

Shocker, for sure.

Apparently, when my family had to be evacuated during the Gulf War, we were relocated out in the desert in some tent with other evacuated people. Around the same time, there were these awful desert storms that’d make sure sand found its way into your lungs somehow. So, when the UN descended upon these tents, they figured that because my sister and I were mere toddlers, there was no way we’d be able to put up with all the sand health-wise, and subsequently gave us priority and moved my family out of Kuwait and into Jordan.

Yup. You learn something new every day…even if it’s about your own life apparently haha.

All in all, a nice meal with pleasant people, and it got followed up by a call from Ricky, who wanted me to come over and hang out with some friends. Turns out, a friend of ours, Zeke*, was returning to [the] Ukraine the following day and some friends were gathering to eat, gossip, and share our respective knowledge. Over sushi, we laughed over Zeke’s identification card that asserted that he was due a Marine guard if things got shitty abroad, and discussed how it was almost five years since we’d all graduated from high school.

Later, we relocated to Ricky’s home and launched into another set of interesting conversations and showcasing certain videos like “Fried or Fertilized” (My friend Clarice* and I literally winched watching it) and the “grown up” live-action video for Duck Tales (One word: Horrifying. Don’t even try to look it up).  I showed Clarice the pole-dancing competition video that I watched after Sinulog last week and we marveled over how well the woman in the Youtube video could twirl around a pole and make it look so damn effortless. Gotta say, it was a little bit inspiring…albeit painful-looking.

At some point, I got roped into a puzzle game that captivated my attention for the remainder of the evening until everyone left and I was alone with Ricky. Once I stopped being hypnotized by the screen, we spoke for a while about our heartaches, and our attempts to move forward. Per usual when I talk to him about such things, I got caught up, leading to me curled up and sobbing into his shoulder the things that I hate to have to say aloud.

He set me down on the ground and assured me that, like him, I was doing better than I thought. I laughed and thanked him, all the while hoping he was right and that me bawling like a child could be blamed on my menstruation cycle.

*Yet another friend with a thinly-veiled pseudonym :)

Written 1/12/11