Nothing GOLD can STAY

Custom Search

MAY'S JOURNAL

July 30th, 2008

Living a Solitary Life...
POSTED AT 08:58 AM in My Life and what's left of it... as a favorite post

Merriam-Webster came up with a great definition of the word when it published that Solitary means (1) being or living without companions, (2) going alone, (3) saddened by isolation, and (4) being a prisoner apart from others.

As I contemplated on the word last night, I realized this must have been how it feels to live a solitary life. I live by myself with no one to accompany me in this journey. I am alone and yes, lonely. I've been enduring this kind of life since then, since I discovered that to get love, you should beg for it. I'm not much of a beggar, so I'm not getting much.

I'm desolated and deserted, I live in a reclusive world... and I brought it all to myself.

When I was a child, I cannot imagine a life without someone else by my side. Growing in a tight and loving family, I was contented that Mama and Papa are always there, that my sisters are there as well. Life was glorious back then.

When I was given the chance to study in a very prestigious school for free, I didn't. Even if it took almost all of my compound knowledge to pass the examination, I still didn't. Even if I belong to the "Top 50" out of thousands examinees around the country, I didn't. Even if the school's gonna shoulder everything, tuition, books, acommodation, allowance, I still didn't. Even if Papa wants me to go, I didn't. Why? All because I don't wanna be alone.

Then something snapped in me. I'm not really sure when and how it started but I saw myself doing things alone. I started watching a movie alone, dine alone. I never even liked group studies then as much as I never liked group activities. I thought, the academic part of me was just trying to be disciplined. That I was just thinking that being alone in schoolworks would achieve greater results. Well, I wasn't wrong in my assumption then, as I graduated with the highest honors in the Engineering class, batch 2002. But then, I felt alone when I was up there, accepting my award.

Don't get me wrong, I have friends then. I've had people around me all my life -- in school, in church, in family activities, I'm pretty popular as a matter of fact. But then, I decided I can only handle one close person at a time, so I have a close friend, just one. Maybe I'm selfish? Maybe. If it's selfish to share everything I have to that one close friend, even the knowledge that I sweat up all my life to get, then maybe I am. If it's selfish to give my all to my studies because I love my parents so much, then maybe I am. If it's selfish to budget my time so intellectually so as to have enough time for my studies and my choir duties in the church as well, then maybe I am. If it's selfish to do all these things while making sure that my family is well taken care of in the little ways that I can, being a nanny to my niece while my sister party her night out, then maybe I am.

I just realized, I'm always accompanied with other people then, but at the end of the day, I felt so alone and that I've never done anything good at all to everybody. Why?

When my marriage crumbled right in front of me, when it went to the drain, I started doing things alone again. Without my Papa to help me with this one at all. It's alright, I have Mama, I have my sisters and my cousins, right? But I lived an isolated life, away from the people who loves me. For the first time in my life, I learned to live alone, totally solitary.

It was a lonely life, and it still is. For 5 years, I'm alone, not just physically, as well as emotionally and spiritually. I'm sure I've done something really awful, the reason why God left me alone as well. And now, in the moment when I badly needed someone's company, I was hoping to have someone to turn to. In my condition wherein taking my life seems to be a good idea, a better idea than living death, I have no one to turn to. Friends are still out there, but of course, they have their own lives to deal with. I'm not welcome back home. Papa doesn't want me back home. Maybe I'm such a bad person to be rejected by my own father right? Maybe.

Then I said to myself the other night, oh there's Mama, everybody will abandon me, but Mama will never ever hurt me that way. I love Mama so much, and I know she loves me just as much. But last night, I realized I've been such a selfish person all right. I've been burdening Mama with my problems when I know she's got problems of her own as well. It's not fair. This is my life. When she told me on the telephone last night that I should find a way to get through all these because it's all my fault anyway, I felt cold inside. I felt my heart bursting with pain. She was all I have and now it seems she's abandoning me as well. Of course she's right. This is all my fault. I should find a way to get through this alone. I chanted "I love you Mama" more than a hundred times last night so I'll never feel angry at her and also to remind me that Mama will never hurt me and that she just wants the best for me. I calmed down.

But then, after all the crying and the laughing combined, after acting like a crazy woman, talking to myself and such, last night's event made me realized a very important thing: somehow I am meant to live a solitary life.