Good morning, Friends.
Today I decided to support people who have experienced narcissistic abuse.
It’s a good goal to have, a worthwhile goal. I hope I can use my blogs to help spread information regarding this societal disease.
May God bless us all.
Thank you so much for all the Likes and the Follows. I really appreciate them. I will take time to visit your blogs. The internet connection where I live is too poor for surfing most of the time, deswegen.
Have a great day!
Have you recently claimed your freedom, in whatever size, shape or form specific to your existence? I celebrate for you, congratulate you, and am very happy for you. The universe rejoices for you. You, indeed, are stuff that stars are made of. You have rightfully taken your place amongst creation. You have finally acknowledged your right to be here—to exist, to flourish, to thrive, to be.
Start to be happy from now on. Start to breathe the healthy breaths of a free creature, the inrushing of air that reaches to the depths and inner recesses of your delicate lungs. The kind that supports the total swoosh of life-providing blood flowing through all the tissues of your delicate body.
Delicate child of the Creator, your life’s blood rejoices at your freedom. You have acknowledged your existence. Existence has acknowledged you. You belong to the general scheme of interrelated things. Take the place reserved for you since the beginning of time. Anything is now possible for you and your lovely soul. You are.
Step out into the open air and let the clear sunshine guide the paths that your thoughts will now take. Let no shadow daunt you again. Let the shadows of fear and insecurities flee from the sound of your approach. Evil intents cannot exist side by side with you. Sinister thoughts will feel shame at being associated with your truths.
You belong to the sun and the moon and the sky of the myriad stars. The howl of the wolves and the roar of the lions welcome you in the vast spaces of privileged movement—you have become true brothers and sisters, children of free provisions, blessed siblings throughout time immemorial.
You are dearly beloved, oh child of the Creator. All that have life in them embrace you. You belong. Take your rightful free space. Congratulations!
I first read this charming little book, called The Gift of Acabar by Og Mandino and Buddy Kaye, some 37 years ago. That’s where The Credenda is found, a packet of wisdom.
If you haven’t read it, you won’t regret if you try and look for a copy. It’s just a short read and I hope you still have the child in you to allow you a tear or two as you get inside the story, of a friendship between a boy and a star.
I post The Credenda now to say THANK YOU to the inspiration and encouragement it has brought me along my journeys. May it also bring you lightness today as you read or re-read it.
Take care!
Turn away from the crowd and its fruitless pursuit of fame and gold.
Never look back as you close your door to the sorry tumult of greed and ambition.
Wipe away your tears of failure and misfortune.
Be at peace. Already it is later than you think, for your earthly life, at best, is only the blink of an eye between two eternities.
Be unafraid. Nothing here can harm you except yourself.
Do that which you dread and cherish those victories with pride.
Concentrate your energy. To be everywhere is to be nowhere.
Be jealous of your time, since it is your greatest treasure.
Reconsider your goals. Before you set your heart too much on anything, examine how happy they are who already possess what you desire.
Love your family and count your blessings. Reflect on how eagerly they would be sought if you did not have them.
Put aside your impossible dreams and complete the task at hand no matter how distasteful. All great achievements come from working and waiting.
Be patient. God’s delays are never God’s denials. Hold on. Hold fast.
What you sow, good or evil, that you will reap.
Never blame your conditions on others. You are what you are through your choice alone.
Learn to live with honest poverty, if you must, and turn to more important matters than transporting gold to your grave.
Anxiety is the rust of life; when you add tomorrow’s burdens to today’s their weight becomes unbearable.
Always learn from others. He who teaches himself has a fool for a master.
Be careful. Do not overload your conscience. Conduct your life as if it were spent in an arena filled with tattlers.
Avoid boasting. If you see anything in you that puffs you up with pride look closer and you will find more than enough to make you humble.
Be wise. Realize that all people are not created equal, for there is no equality in nature, yet no one was ever born whose work was not born with him or her.
Work every day as if it were your first, yet tenderly treat the lives you touch as if they will all end at midnight.
Seek out those in need. Learn that he or she who delivers with one hand will always gather with two.
Be of good cheer. Above all, remember that very little is needed to make a happy life.
Look up. Reach out. Cling simply to God and journey quietly on your pathway to forever with charity and a smile.
A post about chosing life.
This scene is from Rurouni Kenshin: The Legend Ends (2014).
Kenshin was the best assassin of the past government. He was famously known as Battosai. He had since sworn to not kill anymore, carrying a sword that has the sharp egde at the wrong side.
The new government has asked for his help to kill a rampaging ex-assassin, who is threatening the safety of the nation.
Aware of his weakness after a recent duel, Kenshin asks his teacher (also called “master”) to teach him the ultimate sword tehnique of their school so that he can defeat the enemy.
His teacher agrees. They fight-train —physically, mentally, emotionally— a holistic approach.
Kenshin and I learned something very valuable from Master today.
Domo arigato gozaimashita. (That’s a very respectful ‘thank you very much.’)
Rage is a beautiful thing.
It is all color and explosion and loud clanging and bursts of the imagination.
A frightening outpouring,
of profuse dialogues, diatribes, monologues,
a searing tongue-lashing in the spirit of release,
an action scene inside one’s own inner theater,
a skirmish, a silent movie, shared with nobody.
Like a whiplash, released into the vastness of the forgiving sky.
Right. A smartphone is this unattractive to me.
I had held off getting one because I did not need it. But, at last, the pandemic will render me immobile until I get one. I will find it difficult to transact online with my bank unless I install its Online Banking Application. To my horror, it cannot be installed to my computer. Why? Because the app is a Mobile App.
Because I haven’t owned a smartphone at all, it took me a while to understand that platforms and applications may work for either computers/laptops or smartphones. However, this “or” is non-inclusive for many of these apps, meaning, for only one or the other, and only occasionally for both.
This bothered me considerably because I was used to logging into my bank’s portal using my computer for almost a decade. So, this is my first gripe about having to go online here in the Philippines: that banks here are giving more of their attention to mobile-phone banking versus making it accessible with a regular desktop computer or laptop. Would this be going backwards, a regress, or is this a leap in the dynamics?—in that, since most of the Filipinos who go online do so using their smartphones, this paradigm is more profitable.
Which leads me to my second gripe about going online (that is, being forced to go online because of the pandemic): that, since most who go online use only smartphones, then the implication to online-learning is tremendous. It is so inefficient that it has become detrimental to leading healthy lives.
Now, those who have never used a smartphone, like me, find it horrendous to be forced to do homework and exams using a smartphone only. Navigating webpages using a netbook is quite challenging and stressful when one is after narratives and the big picture. How on earth could this be justifiably done using a narrow screen the size of my tiny palm?
For the sake of survival, I reluctantly give in to the idea of owning a smartphone. Yep, after all these years of holding out. I mourn the loss of my stand. I wonder how my students think of me now, of my advocacy against the indispensability of smartphones for their wellbeing. Yep, I showed to them graphic clips of parading smartphone zombies. And a TEDx talk by a smart young lady who discourages attachment to the smartphone lifestyle.
Because it does stay that way: smartphones are not indispensable in order to stay human, to become human, to thrive. Smartphone abuse, which is today’s norm, is in fact highly detrimental to humanity.
I have to get a smartphone so that I can do online banking and similar essential processes. But I will do my best to keep resisting its deceptive charm. My hope is that someday the smartphone lifestyle becomes downgraded as a result of alternatives developed toward having steady online presence without being caught in the trap of a smartphone’s sugary distractions.
(September 20, 2021. Hello there. How are you today? I have to insert a note here, saying, that I am not “politically motivated” regarding this post. My personal sentiments here is from a person-to-person, or human-to-human, standpoint. That is, I am seeing President Duterte as a person raher than as a politician. Yepper, these are two diferent things where the Philippines (and many other countries) is concerned right now. This post may be polarizing, but I’d rather not remove it because this is true not only for me but for many Filipinos as well, especially those who have experienced the president’s heart ever since he came into the political arena decades ago. Alles gute und viel Spass! Danke!)
Once I shouted “bullshit” to a bunch of kids. That was when I was only a little more than a kid myself, my control on my emotions not as good as expected of adults, and besides my country does not cater to a culture that prevents and frowns on the public display of emotions.
It was actually at a classroom of seventeen or eighteen year-olds, I think, and they have known since they were seven what was expected of them inside the classroom: order, hushed voices if any, and avoidance of chaos MOST ESPECIALLY when a class activity is being conducted. And especially when a person of academic authority is present. They violated the standards of decorum at all counts and I wasn’t able to hold my strong dismay over their lack of respectfulness. So there was silence all at once, they knew that they deserved the strong reproach, they were strongly reminded where the class stands with respect to misbehavior, and they didn’t do it again.
As little kids until adolescents we were taught and expected to stand up and greet a visitor in unison. When a teacher was at our classroom door everything stops in the classroom because we’d all stand up as one and say together, “Good morning, Mrs. Santos.”, or something like that. If we did not know the person’s name we’d say, “Good morning, visitor.” All public primary and secondary schools in the Philippines, and even the private ones, practice this. So when I went to college I felt awkward when we weren’t allowed to do that kind of greeting anymore. I felt that it was disrespectful. But it seems that “adult” education does not expect such standard of respectfulness anymore. I slowly learned to live with the awkwardness and adapted to the non-practice. However, all teachers that I met in campus always got a “good mornig, ma’am” or a “good afternoon, sir” from me and from most of the other students, too.
That was the only time, as far as I can remember, when I spoke a swear word in public. I would remember it because I do not speak swear words at all in the hearing of another person. Not even with my family. Not even with my closest friends. I hardly think with swear words except when I am aggravated and then I can let myself deal with the issue with swear words that are commensurate to the gravity of the disturbance created in me — but all this would be silently and mentally, where only I can hear them being spoken out in my brain. I only “swear to myself”, so to speak.
The complementary set-up to my no-spoken-swearing stand is that I also do not receive swear words from anyone, and that I would take it as a grave insult if anyone swears at me. At home this is easy because nobody speaks swear words in our house. The worst that we would concede to is “gaga” or “gago”, for female or male as the case may be, and this not straight out but instead we modify it to “gagagaga” or to “ogag” to soften the impact to our own ears AND ALL THIS NEVER TO ONE ANOTHER IN THE HOUSE BUT TO SOMEBODY ELSE OF WHOM WE MAY BE ABLE TO CRITICIZE AS SIMPLY A MATTER OF OPINION DUE TO THEIR MANIFESTED ACTIONS AND NEVER DUE TO GOSSIP, AND ABSOLUTELY NEVER TOWARDS A RELATIVE. “Gaga” and “gago” may be best translated as “stupid”. There are families who speak swear words freely to each other, I have friends who use swear words freely, and I have nothing against them. I understand the context of their usage and they don’t swear at me besides. I leave them be and we stay friends. I know many persons who hold similar opinions to mine regarding this matter. There are also many families who are like mine.
However, as it stands now I could hear myself freely speak to my close friends (BUT NOT AT HOME!) this opinion: “Dipuga! Din ka pa kakita prisidente nga parihas sini?!!” This will elicit amused chukles all around because this signals a concession on my part on behalf of a strong conviction as evidenced in the emphatic use of a ‘dirty’ swear word.
Translated into English that will amount to: F**k! Where else can you get a president like this one?!!
Or, that swear word can also be Bu*s*it!
Dipuga is a mellower variant of yudep*ta or of the shorter dep*ta. “Yudep*ta” is the short form of “iho de p*ta”. Those who speak Spanish can see it clearly that it is the adaptation of “hijo de p*ta”, which into English is the common expletive SOB. However, not everyone prefers the length of that expletive even when the end part is modified into “gun!”. Many would ordinarily use the faster-said f**k or b**ch. English speakers know that this expletive, SOB, does not say anything about one’s mother. The expletive is not directed to mothers. The expletive is just an expression that is commensurate to the degree that an emotion is felt. It, or any similar to it (like “damn”), may even be breathed out in times of pleasant surprises.
I do not buy the disdain of the elitists in my country towards the foul mouth of our president. That’s all BS and they can all go to he*l. They can go f**k themselves. If they do not like swear words then so do I. If they have a high standard of abhorrence against swear words then so does my family. They do not even know from what standpoint they are on in their attack against the president’s manner of speaking. If the son of a pastor, and a former pastor, and a friend of a pastor can work closely with our president then I have no problem with their willingness to do so. Their participation speaks volumes about the character of the real Duterte. (If you think that these principled persons surrounding him will condone what is being accused of him (read: “illegal executions”) then there is something wrong with your basis. The head of the Public Attorney’s Office (PAO), Atty. Acosta, can help you be clarified with this issue. )
Those who just keep on harping (without saying anything else analytical, informative, and substantial) that the president “behave himself” are a bunch of gaga and gago. The executive branch of government has a mountain-load of urgent matters to attend to and all they recommend is that the president soaps out his mouth. These misguided elitists have opinions and preferences that are more blind than a bat. More than being blind they are navigating at a wrong course, and in this instance a bat’s non-sight is not a matter for criticism because bats zero in perfectly towards their aims even without sight.
These elitists in my country (I’m describing those who fit in the description; it does not mean ALL ELITISTS; I concede that there are possibly many exceptions), those who are shoot-high-up-to-the-moon-proud about their prowess in manipulating the English language, they generally know nothing about real life and real poverty and real suffering. (They’re the kind who who have the skills to write in opinion columns of newspapers.) All they know is how to keep their faces smooth and white like porcelain and how to keep their car tires mud free. And how to keep smelling like flowers and cologne the entire day. And how to keep dirt from under their fingernails. They know nothing about having to skip a meal because there simply are no means to get one. If ever they’d skip a meal it would be because they wish to subtract from the fat that’s jiggling in their overfed bodies. Being fat is not the issue here: the picture in this context that I speak of points to the indiferrence to human suffering that’s surrounding these elitists.
Today I heard the president reiterating his purpose of keeping friendly relations with all nations, and this without any exception. We are a small nation and we cannot afford to pick fights with anybody, as the president also says so. If his speeches are, again and again, painted out of context and with colors that feature only one or two hues then the richness of his thoughts are wasted. When he gives speeches (this one that I heard today is for the Philippine Air Force at Villamor Air Base) he is like a professor who is giving a lecture on contemporary governance in the Philippine context against the perspective of recent history. His speeches are extemporaneous and are sourced from his own decades-long observations and conviction as a public servant, aside from being an academician himself. His speeches are for the purpose of putting forth the real picture, the more comprehensive picture, the bigger picture, that part of our national reality that does not get talked about in the mainstream media’s just-bits-and-pieces-commercialized-segments. Of course we can hardly demand more from mainstream media. They are running a business, after all. They have to figure out how to have lots of income.
Our president, for the most part of his speeches, is actually expressing his disagreement in his own authentic way of the so-called ‘educated’ Filipino’s lack of capacity to analyze deeper and wider the implications that their dearly held colonialistic views are continuing to disregard the real issues that are right there before their eyes. There is a severe lack of venues for discussing opinions beyond the simple and safe pat labelling. It is a kind of ‘education’ that has not kept up with the global movements and is continuing on its course of mis-educating the young ones. It is in fact preventing our youth from being empowered, keeping them relatively ignorant against the present global situation. If being modernized means having citizens who are capable of thinking out things for themselves and not to simply depend on cooked-up peddled views, then my country is far from modern. However, there are ‘modern’ nations that are suffering because big range media that started out as an institution for the people have digressed from their noble profession. If you are keeping up with the news then you know what this nation is.
Peace. Stay healthy. Thanks for thinking out with me. I wish you the best in life, in whatever area you wish blessings for. May He-Who-Blesses-All bless us all in His and our own good time.
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!good morning
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(click to enlarge)
It is my birthright: not to be “used”.
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I didn’t know that “Just the Way You Are” is Billy Joel’s song, back in 1977. I have liked that song ever since I can remember. But I knew Billy Joel only from his 1983 “Uptown Girl”, a fast song, and hence I associated him with such. Well, better late (at finding out of his range of musical prowess) than never.
Among the song’s lines (these have) fascinated me the most:
I don’t want clever conversation
I never want to work that hard, mmm
(I just want someone that I can talk to
I want you just the way you are)
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I was prompted to write this post when I discovered, upon seeing a video of him singing the song, live and on the keys, that this stanza is the refrain in that it’s the one he repeats before he ends.
At first I could hardly believe that I was looking at Billy Joel in a formal suit. Then I noticed that he was sweating profusely. That, itself, was fascinating to me because it seemed he was not bothered by all this liquid on his face. Then I noticed, while the camera was focused on his right profile, that a trickle of liquid is highlighted on a path on his cheek that does not seem to be on the continuity from his forehead. I would have loved to have turned to someone sitting beside me and ask, “Is he crying?”
I have always highly regarded this song. Since this is the first time I have seen somebody singing it live then I wanted to believe that Billy Joel was singing it straight from his heart. Maybe he was singing it to a specific somebody. I liked his “cool” performance because I thought he did not “try hard” at “acting out” at sincerity. He came out as simply sincere.
Recently this song’s “I don’t want clever conversation; I never want to work that hard” has become even more significant to me as I continue to circulate among people who “have lots to say” <– which exactly is what I, many a time, catch my own self doing 😀 😀 !!!
I can’t remember when was the first time I practiced putting my cerebral goods out into the open for those in conversation with me to see that I have managed to save lots on my tabula not-so-anymore rasa. If I did not know much about the subject then I would resort to expressing interest on it, using inquiries, by way of relating it to something else I would know more of.
So I was saying, that recently I realized what I was doing, and what the game everybody else seem to be playing. Clever conversations. Gak. It’s draining on the, um, I don’t know… nerves? … qi? … soul? 😀 whatever 😀
Did you know that for the Inuits they traditionally believe that too much thinking insults the spirit? And have you heard of the story about Africans who were hired as luggage carriers by some foreigners (or was it to guide in the hunting??) that one day, after hiking non-stop for days, they simply stopped and sat down and refused to move from the spot until, they said, their souls have caught up with them. I love both of these expressions against “thinking too much.” ❤
I guess I’m starting to really grow old now. Heheh. I feel like I have tried to participate at the parade of peacocks, have tried to compete, and then I only discovered that unless one comes out as “simply sincere” then all the sashaying is an insubstantial game. Hollow. A babel of sounds that fall on deaf ears. Poor overworked brain cells 🙂
Suddenly I am reminded of C. S. Lewis’ explanation on the thin line between pride (in association with being “good”) that is okay and pride that is foul. The parade of peacocks was how he illustrated one of those. With their feather-fans all out in proud display. (This is in his book Mere Christianity. This is among my favorites because it was one of those that started opening windows to me.)
Okay. Now my blah blah blah is complete for the moment ❤ Take care! And if ever one of these days you find yourself sitting down on your haunches ruminating on this supposedly God’s-love-for-you thing, then I hope you’ll recall this song’s lovely line, “I love you just the way you are.”
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When I first came to Fangorn I didn’t know what kind of folks Fangornians are. Though I could have consulted the web or the prints still there simply was no time to even think about doing so. At that time I had to function like a crazed morph, having to sprout extra limbs and cerebral lobes. I had to prepare for the take off yet my feet was at a work place that screamed for organization. I’ve been alone on the road plodding for decades already and I’ve built a facade so camouflaged that my family and so-called friends couldn’t see how my internal gauges have been showing erratic fluctuations.
I even told an elder that I just came from shingles and he thought I was telling him that I’m single. If it wasn’t for my semi-‘conservative’ friend Netz I could have gone vegetable over those viral remnants of childhood chicken pox. The presence of persons such as Netz in my life make me think twice about labelling either my own self or other people.
Whether a person is from my gene pool or not the laws of biology and psychology are the same.
When I first came to Fangorn I was not so wistful of my different gene pool nor was I apprehensive of faces that I used to see only on screen. I was actually busy trying to figure out how the heck could I stay standing on the pavement without my brains freezing out before the coziness of the bus comes. I was preoccupied trying to figure out if the room lighting’s luminousity is up to my system’s survival threshold. I was foraging for sources of nourishment, the ones that would make my stomach aware that I have already put some into it.
Later, after having seen for myself that I could survive here, my brain started to grow out calmer dendrites. I started reflecting outside the context of immediate survival. I explored new turf.
I looked at the Fangornians. I couldn’t see much. That was a culture shock that I had seen coming. Even until today I still couldn’t see of them as much as I wanted to although a few have already welcomed me into their homes. I looked at the Flip-Flops. I saw more than I expected. I looked at the Zirconians as well as my fellow Zaps. Then I looked at the entire pulsating planet.
I
arrived at the conclusion that it is greed that has to do with all our woes. But when I talked about this to my classmate Moira he said that he thinks greed isn’t inherent in us humans, but that it’s a function of the environment. We’ve been brought up, he told me, to be greedy.
I still have to take the time to reflect on that. I have to look at original-sin side by side with tabula-rasa, too. I honestly don’t know from which angle to approach the topic with new eyes. I may have to go back to Moira, to pick up where we left it off because we had ran out of walking space.
In this picture are my new friends JDG, RK, and TCD.
Since two years ago when JDG heard me call a colleague “manong” (older brother) he told me that he, too, was my manong. So I started to call him that using the equivalent word in his mother speech, orabeoni. We started to relate to each other more freely than before but calling him manong didn’t take our friendship into a quantum leap, to that manong level. So I think next time I see him it would be more appopriate to substitute “sunbaenim” (respected senior) for orabeoni. I sense old and newly erected fences, all invisible to me, around which I should maneuver and in which in the end I’d possibly be left with a bye-bye to a friendship that could have been really great.
Shikataganai. East Zapians are of a machismo worldview and even fellow Zapians can’t do anything about that, lowering the gaze and clipping the arms by their sides upon meeting the so-called strong ones. But it is the East Zapians who taught me to reflect on loyalty and steadfastness, on endurance and single-mindedness. On appreciating the fullness of silence. Just as Treebeard said I shoudn’t be hasty at my conclusions.
Again, on the picture are RK and TCD, who are Zirconians. When I first came to Fangorn and was just learning to walk on snow, mustering the fear of my feet being singed through the soles of my shoes, I had thought of how to get out of the thinking that Zirconians, collectively, are responsible for the many woes of the Flip-Flops and of the pulsating planet. The peaceable consequence that I reached at was that whoever was responsible for the mess should be the one to clean it up. Whoever tipped the balance must do something to restore it.
I needed to see at least one Zirconian who was exactly doing this, innocently and with integrity, without even being aware that there are Flips who think the way I do. Honestly I am vaguely aware that there are many Flips out there who echo my sentiments but that they are faceless to me. I do not personally know of one, and thought trains like these are, well, what can I say, camouflaged among thick forest undergrowths.
Not long after I met CN, a huge Zirconian with clear shining eyes. He and his friends have an ongoing program for ending world hunger. It’s a blatantly naive and gigantic ambition. It’s hopelessly lovable. He has tried to describe how the church could be functioning in our present context.
Like RK he has tried to talk in terms that would welcome anyone who’s eager to participate. Many would call it a post-modern paradigm, similar to several, both named and yet obscure, that are groping in the unchartered multiple-contexts we now find ourselves bewildered in.
Now I know that I shouldn’t take Zirconians as a “people”, a generalized collective, but as “persons”, one individual at a time. There are Zirconians who, like RK and CN, are neither threatened nor limited by labeling.
Back home there was a Fangornian with whom I’d started to befriend. Of the extremely short time I spent with her I was able to ask her of whom did she thought we women should be modelling ourselves after. Her answer was startling to me then: after no-one. It is only now that I’m starting to understand her. It is only now that I’m starting to she what she meant when she said that first and foremost it is my own individuality that I must be looking out for.
As per the conversation I had with Moira, about greed, I tried to put it into a logical diagram and see what I can come up with:
Without bothering with defining the Universal Set, these four Venn diagrams show the possible relationships between all people and all greedy entities. My musings led me nearer to the idea pictured by Figure 4. Moira’s counter-arguments tend towards Figure 1, although not as how things are but rather as a starting point, when conditioning is taken out of the picture. Moira seemed to be telling me that humans do not have greediness as a necessary attribute, although he did say that he’d be needing all the evidences that he can get his hands on before being sure of this.
For me I just based my conclusion (Moira did tease me, that I have “concluded” already) on the historical events. Empires rising and falling. Countries getting richer and poorer. Parents in a frenzy about giving the A-class education to their children. Young professionals eager to show off the brands of their possessions. I have wanted to look into the machinery that fuels the global dynamics and if I start at the grass roots, at the level of an individual’s needs and wants, then I would pinpoint to the human’s propensity to get hold onto and retain something, incorporate it into the personal space. Of course some can readily recognize when the level of this “acquisition process” is becoming toxic and so it is readily called off. Bastante. This situation may be pictured by either Figure 2 or 3, above. Not everyone is helpless against greediness.
Still there’s something about my Venn diagrams that bother me. I’d like to replace “people”, a faceless mass, with “persons” — attributing now the sense of responsibility to individuals. Yet either way something still doesn’t quite fit. I feel like I’m figuring things out by ossifying phenomena with labels. It’s the same dynamics as when I talk of Fangonians, Zirconians, Zaps, and Flips as groups. Not all Zirconians are alike and I have yet to find a Flip who resonates in my frequency. Perhaps I never will. 
TCD, a Zirconian whose personaliy I would zig-zag away from back home (chatty, readily friendly, flashy smile) surprisingly has become the first Zirconian I can relate to with ease, without being conscious of the cerebral gap. Because of him, CN, and RK, I now have little use of the label “Zircon”.
I had a Rilkan penfriend for eight years. I’m looking for her whereabouts now and I’m sure she does think of me sometimes. But, alas, we both cannot be found among the social media websites. I had a Shtoi dormmate. Her brother became my student and so we three have become friends. I will search for her home address among my files so that when I go to their country I will be able to visit them, as she invited me to. Now I have Moira a Milesian, and Benga a Huzz. We call ourselves “the three idiots” after that hilarious but enlightening Indian movie. There’s Peth the Fangornian lady back home, happily married to a fellow Flip of whom I am more at awe than friendly.
These non-Flips became friends because we related with expressions that connected persons, not peoples. We did not pre-define each other. We didn’t bring labels into our relationships. We simply faced each other, talked openly, and became one human being to another human being.
I had thought that it is only the word “race” that we should be doing away with. Now there’s national-classification as well. A wo/man’s context does not ‘define’ her/him. Honesty, trust, and thankfulness speak in a language that have nothing to do with culture, nationality, or genes.
Benga & Moira
Many Zirconians will continue to be jerks. Many Flips will continue to be clueless. Many Zaps will continue to be mesmerized by anything Zirconian or Deltan. Many Fangornians will remain cold and rude. This, however, is not the only lens with which to view humanity. Any human can equally be a jerk, clueless, impressionable, cold, or rude.
For purposes of conversations Moira and I could still use the Venn diagrams but now it has become clearer to me how all persons are configured by the tracks that they had to run on. Each landmark we pass by morphs us. Had I not found myself abruptly shoved into Fangorn I wouldn’t have started to trust a Zirconian for a long time yet. I relate to TCD as TCD, as himself, and not as someone with a Zircon-labeling.
Now I’m happier.
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