Light

Light. 9"x12" Pigment ink on Bristol Board

When my First Epsilon was eight years old, he and I decided to make Macy Gray's song "I Try" to be our theme song. Whenever we heard the song, we stopped what we were doing, ran to each other, hugged and danced. Last weekend, we were in the kitchen when the song played on the radio. He exclaimed, "Mom! That's our song!" I did not feel like dancing but I looked at him and he appeared to want so much to dance as if to give it another try. I obliged. Then when he was eight years old, I was taller than him, and I relished brushing my cheeks against his hair. I loved smelling his head. This time around, he is much taller than I am and so, that Saturday morning, I buried my face on his chest. I heard the beating of his heart as I hugged him tightly. My epsilon has vanished.


About the drawing: When I was growing up, I read a legend that the first Filipino man and woman came to this world when two bamboos were split in half. I used this premise to draw the emergence of my beloved friends, just when my light start to flicker, they lift me up and help me light the way. You know who you are. I love you. I thank you. Sisterfriends seem weak a title for how I feel about you. I feel you really are my sixth and seventh sisters. Thank you for your love and helping me keep the path lit.


To all our epsilons, may their paths always be brightly lit.

I Try

Sa Cauayan

Permanent pigment ink on 9"x12" Bristol Board.

In the island of Negros, where I was born, there is a town in the province of Negros Occidental, called Cauayan or Kawayan. The name means two different things depending on the accent. Ca-ua-yan means Bamboo while Caua-yan' means Bamboo grove. The town used to be filled with bamboo groves. I don't know if it is still covered with bamboo groves.

This is a drawing I made for Illustration Friday's acrobat theme but I just finished it yesterday.

When we were children, we played a lot of games inside and outside our homes. We also observed the things that happened in the neighborhood. We knew everyone in our neighborhood, from grandparents to grandchildren. We hardly watched television, first of all because my family did not own a television set until I was in high school. By then, we did not care much for it. So as a kid, we watched television only on Saturdays at five in the afternoon at our friend's house. We had to study during the weekdays. In the summer, we attended catechism classes and advanced English classes or creative writing classes just for fun. We also had yo-yo tournaments. The rest of the time, to entertain ourselves, we read inside our house and under the shade, we caught dragonflies, grasshoppers and beetles; we had spider fighting tournaments; we played with rubber bands, marbles and cowries. We ate fruits, we ran around and sometimes we fought. We climbed trees, a lot of trees; we gathered seashells, we rode on the firewood cart.

The firewood cart (oh I need to draw that) was a wooden cart stacked with firewood and fagots several layers high and pulled by a carabao. Sometimes it was a push cart. The neighborhood's firewood man was Tio Diego Tigulang (Diego the Old man) not Tio Diego Libat (Diego the Cross-eyed man).

Below, is a drawing I did on my Moleskine pocket notebook with a ballpoint pen. You may read the story here. It was the time I confronted Junior, The Bully. Notice the bamboo groves in the background. My younger sister is holding a fried plantain banana, the same type the little boy on the top drawing is doing (third from left, sitting on the rock).

Ballpoint pen on Moleskine 9"x12" notebook centerfold.

Happy Birthday Beloved Arija!!!

Written September 24, 2010
I was taking a beauty rest and then my mobile phone chimed. It was Arija, leaving a comment and telling me that she was on her way to the Farmer's Market (in Australia) for her birthday breakfast. I know her birthday is tomorrow but then I realized that today in Australia is already my tomorrow so I hurried up and got together my Birthday Greeting Crew (Elie, The Elephant, Piggy, The Pig and Beauregard, The Mouse). Oh goodness! I have never squiggled so fast so I can send this birthday greeting on time for Arija. So here it is my beloved sisterfriend, it arrives today on your birthday the day before it becomes today here, so I will pre-date this post so it will look like I sent it on the right day which is actually the day before the real date here and tomorrow, the date will be right but it will be your yesterday...I think, I have successfully managed to confuse myself!

Update: September25, 2010
Okay, okay! So that was confusing. Explanation: Yesterday in Australia was Arija's birthday which is today in Texas. So in essence, Arija's birthday was yesterday when you consider geography, but if you refer to calendar dates, it is today. So Arija celebrated her birthday yesterday and hopefully will continue to do so by celebrating it today. Simple!!! Don't you get it? See, I understand these things because when I first came to the US, I left the Philippines on my 24th birthday and 24 hours later, it was still my birthday in the US! I celebrated it with my twin Gemini sister who only had one birthday cake, unlike me who had two birthday cakes...

Since it is Arija's birthday, I will spread her love and give this coveted award. You may read about the award here.

Shirley Ng Benitez
Julia Christie
Steveroni
Andrew Finnie
Amalia
Lakhsmita Indira
Audrey
Linda Cardina
Jan
Janice
Silke
Tammie Lee
K.H. Whitaker
Martinealison
Jack Foster

My dearest darling sisterfriend Arija,
my Pink Rose;
my beloved sisterfriend;
the giving one;
the one with beautiful seeing eyes;
the one with the healing hands
and green thumbs;
the one with comforting words;
the one with a soothing soul,

Happy Birthday my Beloved Sisterfriend, Arija!

I love you!

I'm Old Fashioned

I'm Old Fashioned
I love hardbound, gilded, leather books.
I love oil paints, turpentine, and linseed oils.
I love fountain pens.
I love lipstick and perfume.
I love linen, silk and cotton.
I love pen and ink.
I love proper vocabulary.
I love stoneware, porcelain and bone china plates.
I love stemmed glasses.
I love silver flatware.
I love polite children.
I love feisty, reasonable teenagers.
I love it when men open doors for me.
I love it when they address me as "ma'am".
I love it when a friend stands up for and by me and fights for me.
I love doing the same.
I love it when someone who loves me calls me "honey".
I hate it when strangers call me "honey".

I believe in love.
I believe in babies.
I believe in father and mother.
I believe in sisterfriends.
I believe in brotherfriends.
I believe in best friend.
I believe in God.
I believe in history.
I believe in earning, work and opportunities.
I do not believe in hand-outs.
I believe in charity.
I don't believe in sanctioned sponging.




I believe in friends.
I don't believe in superstars.
I believe in home and family.
I don't believe in Hollywood.
I believe in the constitution.
I don't believe in politicians.
I believe in simplicity.
I don't believe in designer labels.
I believe in saving.
I don't believe in accumulating debt.
I believe in Texas barbecue
I don't believe in fast foods.
I believe in oatmeal with cinnamon, bananas and wheat germ.
I don't believe in granola bars.

I believe in genuine.
I don't believe in flashy.
I believe in real.
I don't believe in television.
I believe in conversations.
I don't believe in small talks.
I believe in right versus wrong.
I believe in virtues.
I don't believe what is right and virtuous change with the trends.
I don't believe in trends.
I start my own.
I am old fashioned.
And I like it.

The Source Of My Being

Goodbye Summer!

This is it. Such a fitting theme for my exit right now. So, no wonder it stops with my Mother. After all, she is my beginning. I don't know when I shall return. Who knows, maybe tomorrow. I am so tired, I am re-posting a re-post with a re-edit of the introduction. Do you know there are over 20,300 comments on my blog? This is after I have twice deleted my blog. Please be kind to yourself and to one another.

The Source of My Being
The Bamboo Grove. Pigment ink on 12"x9" Bristol Board. Click and re-click on image to enlarge.

The following is a re-publication of a re-publication of a previous post dated April 10, 2009. If you have been following my blog for a while, you may see a correlation of some incidents mentioned below with a comment my eldest sister posted on Moleskinerie.com on November 2009. Several months ago, I went to Facebook to delete my account since I seldom use it. I also do not understand the rationale for strangers asking me to accept them as friends from a mere invitation just because we have common friends. So I set about to discontinue some "friendships" but before doing so, I chatted up someone who asked to be my friend and who I accepted because we had the same surnames. She turned out to be the granddaughter of my Father's cousin, the one I mentioned in the following story. Needless to say, I still have my Facebook account but my visits there are infrequent.

A Summer Afternoon

"I am 10 years old now. I will continue attending E.T.C.S. I am graduating this year, and then I will have to go to Sum-ag. My younger sister will transfer and she will be the only one in our family who will not graduate from E.T.C.S. Inday Ched is going to U.P."

They are my father’s cousins and he is called “Bata Taguy” meaning “Child Taguy” but his wife is “Nanay Maring” meaning “Mother Maring”. They have datiles trees and I am free to climb them any time. Their house is about a 1000 feet from ours.

We moved here on my ninth summer. There was nothing around us except flat empty lots and rice fields in the horizon that blanket the foot of the mountain and the volcano, and giant bamboo groves. My bedroom window directly faces the cone. It’s dusty because the roads are not paved. I am too sophisticated for this place I think, but Mother easily brings my reality down to earth with a curt reminder of who I am.

In the summer afternoons after all the chores are done, we walk with her to visit Nanay Maring where they talk about their ancestors and their past and dreams, hopes and plans. I climb the trees pretending not to listen but I am eavesdropping. They say nice things about me and my younger sister and then they compare us. She is well behaved and I am full of mischief but Mother always tells them we are both good. We walk back home before dusk so we can tend to the garden and the ducks and chickens.

My younger sister and I follow our Mother or we walk along side with her. Sometimes I run ahead of them and pick up stones and throw them in the air and into the bamboo groves. "TOK!" I like the sound of the rock hitting the bamboo and the bamboo responds with "CREEEAAAHK", CREEEEEAAAHK" as they sway like old women with their backs bent. "CRACK" "SWISSH". There goes a broken dried up branch we called "kagingking". Mother used them as trellis for the climbing vines in her garden. We can hear the giant bamboos creaking as we walk. It's a beautiful melody with the wind blowing the upper leafy branches and the trunks creaking rhythmically filling the hot summer afternoon with what I called the bamboo grove orchestra.
The roads were lined with giant bamboo groves soaring up to a hundred feet or more up into the sky. They sway and bend and Mother mentions the bamboo’s ability to sway and not break and she uses it as a metaphor for an extemporaneous lecture on virtues. I sometimes just listen but most often say something irreverent or construct something illogical for argument's sake. Yet deep down I listened to every word she said and took them to heart. My younger sister who is the smarter and wiser of the two of us just looks at me and says my name “Ay Inday Ces” she would say, meaning that I sound too foolish and impertinent but being that she is younger she cannot admonish an elder since I am two years older than her! So she keeps quiet. Mother gazes at me and I see her smile. She has the gentlest of smiles and she stiffens her upper lip and narrows her eyes and raises her right eyebrow. She has not said anything at all and I keep quiet and smile with embarrassment. That gaze of hers, so strict and firm yet gentle and full of love, always kept me in check.

I can’t recall Mother ever screaming at me, I can only recall her laughter, her smile and her gentle voice. Many years later as she lay dying on her hospital bed, I sat beside her and rested my head on her lap. She gently ran her fingers through my hair and she murmured, “Why are you here?” I replied “Because I want to take care of you.” She smiled and asked “Who is taking care of your children and husband?” I told her they were okay and my husband was taking care of the children. “You flew here all the way from Texas?” “Yes” I said, and she smiled. “You and your sister came all the way from the US?” “Yes, I said” and added that all eight of us sisters and brothers did. She smiled. “You must really love me. I feel so loved.” So I told her that every one of us loved her from the moment we laid eyes on her when we were children until forever. She did not cry, neither did I. We were just talking.
My Mother had the ability to talk about deep emotions without the maudlin sentimentality. As philosophical as she was she believed a lot of time was wasted on words, she believed in deeds. So that evening was not yet her last, she ended the conversation with a command and advice. “Go home to your husband and your children. You belong to your family.” I opened my mouth to say something and she cut me short with a gentle shake of her head, and added “You have a different family now, still part of mine but for you to take care.” Mother asked for the date then she said, “It will be your sister’s birthday in four days, you must celebrate it”.

Two days after she died my sisters, brothers and I were mourning as we went to the dining room of the house where I spent my youth. My sister blew her candles and cut her cake. We celebrated my sister’s birthday just as Mother would have wanted it.

3/21/2010. 8:55 AM: Thank you for reading this very long post. I know your time is valuable and if you read this, I take it only to mean that you like me or love me, either way, I appreciate you very much. Now, did you find the five lizards, one spider, two butterflies and one bird? Just asking.

9/20/2010. 6:00 AM: Ditto!

My Viking, My Home and My Refuge

Refuge. Clumping Bamboo. 9"x12" Permanent micro pigment ink on Bristol board.

This is dedicated to My Viking. He's the only man I ever loved, love and will love. He is the only man with whom I feel at ease and at peace. I don't care for any other. He is my refuge, my anchor, my protector. In football, he would be my quarterback, my linebacker, and my safety. We are celebrating our 25th marriage anniversary next year. He loves history and math. Here is something I wrote about The Viking on his birthday.

In the place where I grew up, there were many giant clumping bamboo groves. I will never forget the picture of that place in my mind. They are all gone now. They cut them down for lumber and built homes that were easily converted into slum-like dwellings by their inhabitants. Gone are the paradise scenes of my youth.

On the left is a drawing I made depicting my Mother, younger sister and myself, in one of the bamboo groves. My Mother used the giant clumping bamboo grove as a stage to teach us a lesson about virtues. It is an old post but it is one of my favorite drawings because it has an "insane level of detail" according to one of my blog visitors. Hah!

My Viking never saw this place, when we went for a visit. It was not far from my childhood home. They were gone then and replaced by a sore and painful sight of crowded dwellings.

My Best Friend, My White Space

White Space. Pigment ink on 9"x12" Bristol board.

My best friend,

You are the white space
when the blackness is overwhelming,
You are the shadow that helps define me
when the sun is blinding,
You are the reason that sustains me
when madness overtakes me,
You are the comfort and the smile
when I am awash in tears,
You are the rope I cling to
when I slip into the deep end.
You ask nothing in turn.
You nudge me back to my proper place
when I stray,
Always reminding me
who I am.
You never take anything
away.
I cannot thank you enough.
I love you.

I embarked yet on a new drawing series, perhaps, serendipitously? The bamboo has been such an important part of my life since I was a little girl. Many lessons were learned from it. Many horror stories were heard too. I have always loved that beautiful grass. It bears the brunt of being loved and scorned. It provides beauty and utility, yet also overtakes the plain and destroys other plants and trees on its path. It is a weed after all. Sometime ago, I declared on this blog that I would like to own land in the country where I was born and on it plant trees and bamboo of my youth. I still hope to do that. I am on the lookout for a piece of land where giant clumping bamboos grow. It will be their refuge. This new series I am starting, and hope to continue for a long time will be different. For every drawing I make I will dedicate it to someone very dear to me, people in my personal life, my work, my sisterfriends... even acquaintances who have left lasting impressions on me. I will also experiment with different drawing styles, though still clinging to my signature squiggle and lines. This is my first dedication.

More than a year ago, my best friend and I were talking across the miles. As she looked out her window, she described to me the bamboo grove she saw outside her patio. She told me that one particular stalk was growing so fast right before her very eyes, it seems, when she looked away and looked back it has grown a foot long. I still recall how I imagined that scene. She told me she was sitting at the dining table, looking out. I felt a closeness to that scene. I never had a friend like her before. I doubt I ever will have. She is best.

Quercus kelloggii, California Native

Quercus kelloggii, pigment ink on 9"x12" Bristol Board

Thank you very much dear friends for your concern. I am fine, thank you. I am well. I just thought of my previous post as a narrative of something extraordinary, I did not mean to worry anyone. I forgot to mention, that while I was in the ER, I saw several nurses with whom I worked many years ago, so, actually during a part of my stay, we had a sort of reunion party while I waited for test results.

Here's another big nut drawing. I would like to do as many as I can of these. I started so many drawing projects, sometimes I overwhelm myself. I still have the 200 Plus acorn and Leaves project and The Fiesta Series oil paintings. The other day, thanks to Jan, I decided to start a new project - The Bamboo Series. Here's a glimpse:

I decided that I draw so fast. I want to change my ways and be deliberate. I can't do it. I tried so hard to work very slowly but I don't know how. I just did what I always do, draw and then stop and stared at it. Sometimes when things are going well, I make stupid rules. I want to be the best I can be in drawing bamboos with pen and ink that I thought drawing slowly will make me a better illustrator. The experience irritated and annoyed me to the point that I did not like drawing, it sickened me. Drawing, to me, is a soothing repetitive exercise, sometimes almost brainless, I mean absent-minded activity as far as the technical aspect is concerned. I usually think of something else while I squiggle away. Most of my thought processes are seated on happy events and memories, people I love, my childhood. I feel like a child when I am drawing. I just squiggle and squiggle and line absentmindedly. I thought that was not proper. I decided to change. Alas, it only made me hate the activity.

Seeing

This was a draft post I intended to publish on August 12, 2010 which I never did. Now that summer is over, here it is. Of course, I did more than these and had a blast with my family. I also forgot to bring a camera in the emergency room where the doctors worked on me for 17 hours to rule out a sub arachnoid bleed in my brain. I am serious. It was not a joking matter. They thought I had bleeding in my brain. I had a computed tomography (CT) scan of my brain, a lumbar puncture or spinal tap (they missed three times and stuck my spine 4 times!!!) By the fourth time, my puncture was traumatic and therefore bloody, so I had to endure a 45 minute magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) of my brain. What an experience that was. The next time, I will asked to be sedated. All the time, The Viking stayed with me. My best friend and my sister sent me uplifting messages and prayers. Epsilon I watched over Epsilon II and Daisy watched over them. Thank you!!! In the end, they sent me home and the following day I went to work but not before making a pact with my doctor who agreed to withhold all medications while I straighten out my body holistically. I am grateful. and resolve never to neglect my health again.We'll see on my next visit if I am successful in undoing the neglect and purging the toxins I fed my body and for a while, my soul. I am feeling better already.

What I Did On My Summer Vacation:

Looked straight

Trunks of oak trees in the Blue Ridge Mountains

Looked down

Different types of tiny mushrooms on the ground, albeit poisonous!

Looked up

Oak and evergreen canopy

You Win, I Lose, I Still Win

1000th Comment Winner's Certificate, awarded to Bella Sinclair - Mental Ninja, Dux Literarum, Musa bella; Top Banana
One night in blogland, two friends decided to have a race to the 1,000th comment. Here's the deal:
If Bella won, I will draw a certificate for her. (I had so much fun drawing this!)
If I won, she will give me a red spatula. (She gave me two spatulas, nevertheless!)
Bella won this race by a wide margin.

Bella's certificate boasts two elephants , inconspicuously racing to the 1000th comment, in the background. The drawing contains ten smiley faces and one frowning face, eight lizards, one frog, one snake, three butterflies, a mental ninja head, two girls, five birds, five hearts, one carafe, one lipstick, one F-pot, a spider, one spoon one spatula, my oo5 pen and Bella's pencil. where's my signature? Double click on image.

****

Ah! What could happen? You meet someone truly wonderful, so you keep assuring yourself it is real and you are not dreaming. I knew it was real and I was not dreaming but I prayed and hope that somehow, it is going to last a little longer...

When I was a little girl, my Mother told me that it is better to be alone than be friends with someone who is not a good person. So I grew up with my sisters and brothers as my friends, for I did not find a good friend, or perhaps, I was not looking. Does one really look for a friend? It seems to me that all of the really good persons who are my good friends just "happened" and then we worked on forging a good friendship. Serendipity or is it fate? Who knew Bella Sinclair would visit my blog and like my experimental squiggled drawings of the leaves I collected from my vacation in South Carolina, in August of 2008. What an auspicious day that was, especially since I did not really enjoy drawing. I always considered drawing as a preliminary study for painting. Drawing is portable, and quick, unlike my favorite medium, oil paints and activity, oil painting. So I joined Illustration Friday and it is through Illustration Friday that I met Bella Sinclair. What do I get - joy, laughter, intellectual stimulation, emotional support, caring, love, to name a few... and the most beautiful wonderful illustrations in blogland.

You win, my beloved sisterfriend, Top Banana, Mental Ninja, Dux Literarum, but I have to tell you, I win too!

Bella Sinclair said...

ARMS WIDE OPEN, HEAD THROWN BACK AND SHE DASHES ACROSS THAT FINISH LINE. AND THE CROWD GOES WILD! AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH SHE'S DONE IT, FOLKS! YAAAAAAAAAAAA!

September 04, 2010 2:28 AM

«Oldest ‹Older 1001 – 1001 of 1001 Newer› Newest»

Bella Sinclair said...

I LOVE YOU!!!!!

September 04, 2010 3:16 AM

«Oldest ‹Older 1001 – 1006 of 1006 Newer› Newest»

Ces said...

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!

September 4, 2010 1:13 AM

Ces said...

I love you Bella Sinclair. Thank you for a most wonderful time. Thank you for your beautiful, precious, loving friendship. Goodnight! TSUP! TSUP!!!

September 4, 2010 1:36 AM