The Difference Between Then and Now

The Greeks have two words for time. The first is "chronos", which refers to the chronological time or sequential time - the time which passes our watches when we look into it. It's also the time when we look on our calendars and see Monday through Sunday.

The second is "kairos", which is the time in between - a time of indefinite period in which something special happens. I think our teachers back in the church days called it "the opportune time" - the right time for something to happen, the God-given time.

While chronos describes quantity of time, kairos refers to the quality of how time is spent.

I'm mentioning this because people around me wonder why I changed. Why what worked ten years ago may not work the same way today. Why I, who never complained ten years ago, suddenly became fierce at this point in my life.

I used to be meek and peaceful. Most of the time, I still am. But I am at this point in my life where I'd like to be able to say: I learned something in the last ten years. And the things I learned had taught me what works for me and the people around me and what does not. It has also taught me that I can change things and that in my own small capacity, I can effect change for the better - for others and for myself.

Yes, I've become more talkative than before - maybe because I know more than before. I have formed more opinions. I now know what I like and what I don't like. I know who I love and who I hate. If I happen to say it out loud now, it just means: (1) I no longer want to keep my silence, and (2) that I now know what I believe and (3) that it's time for me to say it.

E.C. White describes kairos as "a passing instant when an opening appears which must be driven through with force if success is to be achieved".

 I no longer want to be meek, quiet and pretend I know nothing. I don't know everything. But I know enough. I no longer want to wait for change if I know change is inevitable. I just want to be heard.


It's kairos. It's time.

Too early

It's too early to get up on a Sunday morning. I can hear baduy 80's music blasting from somewhere. A more muffled Christian music is playing from my sister's room. She's organizing a Fund-raising concert and sleeps with that music day and night. And Binoy is screaming like Freddie Mercury - probably from the medicines he has to take for his cold. That baby doesn't like the sight of a medicine dropper and belts his way to Kingdom come.

I'm on my bed typing this. For the life of me, I can't bring myself to get up even to pee. Good thing that I slept with Atticus (that's the laptop's name) beside me and I have a very thick blanket around me.

A mental checklist of things I have to do flashed before me. Let's see. I have a website mock-up to finish, a concert logo to design (my sister's project), two tarp layouts for the YE event, a birthday caricature for a friend - if she emailed those pics, and a campaign poster for a friend for the Barangay elections. All that in a day. Phew! Just thinking about it tires me.

It's cold -er. I have my curtains drawn and the fan off but I still feel cold.

My friends came by last night and again invited me to go to mass today. The bell is not tolling yet. But I don't know. I still don't feel like it. I don't think a priest's sermon will rouse me enough to do good today. I need a more deeper inspiration. I think I need Freddie Mercury. Or maybe a bit of  classical music. It will take more than Sunday mass to get me out of bed in this cold.

By the way, I just killed two mice with two separate mousetraps last night. You know, those white gel-like traps where the mouse sticks to and cannot move. Have to buy more of those. I'm running out of names to call those rodents invading my peace.

My nephew's room got flooded again last night too. When rain started getting stronger - maybe the typhoon passing - the roof in that side of the room burst and created a waterfall. Flooded the dining room and my nephew's bedroom. Sigh. I really need a new house. I need to win the lotto. I need to buy a ticket to win the lotto.

But alas, I cannot bring myself to get up today. Too early on a cold -er Sunday.

But wait, I have to pee now.

I Pray For You

My sisters and I are all single. Maybe for good reason. You will need to ask our ex-es for references LOL. Our friends sometimes call us the Wicked Witches - not because we are wicked just to be wicked. But we can be really hateful to people who have done us wrong. We tend to say what we think for starters, and can be very harsh with words. Or sometimes we can just be very quite - too quite to the point that the other person becomes dead to us that we can no longer hear them. I think being brutally frank is the best weapon against a clueless boyfriend. We hate being nice when we are hurting. We don't think it's healthy.

It's normal to be bitter after a break-up. I keep telling my friends that they can never be kind to partners who did something terrible to them and took advantage of their being "too nice". Sometimes you need to be evil to be kind ;)

So we were teaching this particular friend how to be evil, because she has a good heart - sometimes too good for her own good, if you know what I mean. Anyway, we might have gone a little bit too far with Evil 101. She's now singing this song. LOL.



Or maybe we have just prepared her for someone much much better for her?

Bygones to the partner. As they say, all is fair in love and war. Haha.