What's in the bag?

27 November 2008

Thursday tomorrow. Another day at work and I've decided it will be fun. The day after isn't going to be another Ice Age as long as I'm alive. Friday - cannot damn wait.

I always bring my backpack when I head to work on Fridays.

Unlike gym-goers or those who grew up right about two hours outside the city, I don't bring my backpack because I spend my weekends at home where Mom is. Home is wherever my apartment is and I've had a few since I was 16. Right now that happens to be Makati. I bring my backpack every Friday because I expect to be back two days after. That's weekend. A roller-spaceship ride to everywhere, away from home for a couple of nights. That compartmentalizes my weekend.

This here is my Saturday, that over there is work, this little locked box is for feelings whatever that means, this sling bag is where I keep ammunition, and that caricature over there is who I am to others. This is who I am when I'm writing and that guy on the 26th floor office by the window this afternoon is who I am during work.

Someone asked me once if I was angry after some office bull!shit. It was a Saturday. I said I haven't decided on feeling angry yet. Or feeling anything at all. Which is mostly the case. Unlike with office tactics, I do not decide to be angry or to be romantic or to be volatile or to be mental. I'm mostly too lazy to exert that kind of effort. And I'm mostly lazy to answer questions honestly anyhow - so don't ask. If you think I'm making this up then call it fiction. What isn't?

But don't call me a liar. If this is what you see now, then this is my truth now. If this is what you hear me say, then this is what there is. If I'm hiding something from you, whatever it is is not me when you're around. Don't go searching because then, when you find whatever the fcuk it is, it will not be the me you're dealing with now. No matter how you convince yourself that's the hidden truth, it will be the lie you asked to see.

So what's in the bag? Apart from a change of undies, a couple of packs of Marlboros, my cellphones, some music, gum, a pack of condoms and crumpled paper towels, what else is in there? Do not take a look. Take my word for it. If the bag's gonna tell you who I am, you will be disappointed. Blink twice, hit your head hard here's a brown bottle, then snap out of it.

There is nothing else in there.