Just the other day I overheard three girls talking about dreams. One of them told the other that zinc deficiency can cause people to forget their dreams, and may even hinder people from dreaming. When I opened my email inbox that day, a message my friend had forwarded caught my eye. One sentence read, " Did you know that the more you dream, the higher your IQ?" I thought to myself, "Bloody marvelous. The reason I've had trouble dreaming is due to a dearth of zinc in my diet... But wait. Am I supposed to be stupid because I rarely dream?"And off I went, babbling to myself.
The thing is, I used to think that an absence of dreams was a good thing. Most of my dreams are not the transcendental type that make people euphoric upon waking. My dreams are usually nothing short of terrifying. I dream of dystopic settings, amputated limbs, serial killers, weirdly intelligent crocodiles, and odious monsters. At other times I dream surreal dreams in which impossible things happen which cannot be reconciled to any nascent reality in my consciousness.
However, recent events have made me realize that dreams are important and, although they should sometimes be taken with a grain of salt, their value in showing people the subconscious self should never be discounted. Dreams reveal to us the things we refuse to acknowledge while awake; they show us different perspectives that we would never have thought of in a mundane frame of mind. They also give new insights to who we are, and who we might become presently. Occasionally, for some people, they are prophetic.
I really regret the loss of all those forgotten dreams, never to be retrieved, never to be reconciled with the dreamer, never to be written down, never to be spoken about. There is something about dreams that makes their existence so fragile, like that of mirages that rise and fade in the mind's eye; one never knows if they are material, if one ever saw them at all, or if they were merely a shimmer of light in the intensely arid desert. Sometimes, waking up from a bad dream gives more validity to existence than a dreamless slumber, and the horror of a dream is offset by the inexplicable feeling of being alive. In the end, I will try to keep my dreams intact, if only to alleviate the numbness I get from not dreaming, if only to remove myself from the commonplace demands and drudgeries of the world, if only to make myself a place in a world far removed from what I know.
But please have mercy and don't make me dream of the Brurats Show.
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
Saturday, February 14, 2009
Cerebrity!
Well, as of today I have officially joined the ranks of cerebrities. For those of you who are not yet in on the arcane definition of cerebrity, here's a word from the loony lexicon:
Cerebrity (noun): 1)An ordinary person who becomes famous for a short while due to aberrant behavior or unusual accomplishments, gets high on fame, and invariably topples from stardom in less than 15 seconds;
2) An ordinary person who believes himself or herself to be famous because of all his or her many acquaintances;
3)A person who becomes known by dint of praise or calumny from a person having some degree of renown;
4) A bona fide celebrity ( think superstar) gone insane and on the rampage (think Michael Jackson);
5) An old, aging, bygone celebrity who still thinks that she or he (often enough, it's usually a she) is still famous and venerated; this type will do anything and everything to attract attention, get gigs, or sign autographs.
I happen to fit in the third category. It seems that our school paper has ordered a fatwa against me, written up in the (in)famous flame column for all the world to read. It narrates that I had been so high-and-mighty as to criticize the various parts of their beloved paper and further brands me as a "desperada", and also flagrantly insinuates that I am not in my sound mind, referring to me as a "kuleleng". I know they can't be referring to anyone but me, it's so obvious. I don't deny the fact that I criticized the paper, in public; nor do I impose my views on anyone. I must say that I already had an inkling of suspicion about this. What surprises me is that they waited so long to do it. The incident is already a few months old; it's stale as Tutankhamen's ointment in the news world. It's such a stagy piece of yellow journalism, it's so cheap. However, I believe they included it in the most recent issue because they've just started an anti-opposition campaign. There was one column in which they were castigating a letter to the editor regarding the idiotic "Vote YES" business over a certain office in the university, and it seems that the right to freedom of speech is being violated by one of its alleged guardians. There is nothing more disgusting than an institution excoriating a single individual because of just criticism. It is unprofessional, undignified, immature, ludicrous, and even pitiable. It is like Hitler and the Gestapo all over again. How funny can it get? A paper that pretends to champion freedom of speech yet seeks to suppress the vociferations of anyone who finds fault with it! A paper full of knaves who twist one's words to make a trap for fools! A paper staffed with people full of their own self-glorification, not deigning to admit their faults, their biases, their inadequacies! A paper that forces upon its readers a narrow-minded point of view, with no regard for their free will and intellect! O Judgment, thou art fled to brutish beasts, and men have lost their reason!
It is so paltry an act to hurl petty insults at people of whom the public has no knowledge . One of the lessons in The Art of War is the principle of inscrutability, of veiling one's weaknesses. The paper has gone against it entirely by acknowledging the presence of people who disagree with it and making it public. The paper is staffed (and stuffed) with inept peacocks who showcase their errors to the world without any apology. If they are as competent as they say they are, why do they need to harp on the people whose views differ from their own? If they are really convinced of the worth of their newspaper, why do they need the approval of each bystander to affirm its value, and why do they need to blatantly humiliate the people who notice the errors they have committed themselves? By pointing out people who find fault with their work, they only prove their inanity and bigotry to the rest of the world. An exemplary writer, be he journalist, novelist, poet, or blogger, must always consider that his views may not be acceptable to all his readers, and that reaffirmation of the value of his work can come from him alone. He cannot force an idea into an unwilling reader's mind, nor can he tell people to recant any criticism they might have made against him. In short, he must take things realistically and dispassionately, at least in public.
I write this post, not only because I wish to proclaim the injustice of my accusers, but because I want to show where I stand, and what I stand for. Of that, the reader is the judge. My last words are these: an institution which upholds the highest virtues in human existence, truth, justice, reason, rectitude, and dignity, would not abase itself in the mud of controversy, nor would it exalt itself by vilifying others. An institution which declares its allegiance to truth, moreover, cannot sow the seeds of dissent and deception and stay true to its innate purpose.
Cerebrity (noun): 1)An ordinary person who becomes famous for a short while due to aberrant behavior or unusual accomplishments, gets high on fame, and invariably topples from stardom in less than 15 seconds;
2) An ordinary person who believes himself or herself to be famous because of all his or her many acquaintances;
3)A person who becomes known by dint of praise or calumny from a person having some degree of renown;
4) A bona fide celebrity ( think superstar) gone insane and on the rampage (think Michael Jackson);
5) An old, aging, bygone celebrity who still thinks that she or he (often enough, it's usually a she) is still famous and venerated; this type will do anything and everything to attract attention, get gigs, or sign autographs.
I happen to fit in the third category. It seems that our school paper has ordered a fatwa against me, written up in the (in)famous flame column for all the world to read. It narrates that I had been so high-and-mighty as to criticize the various parts of their beloved paper and further brands me as a "desperada", and also flagrantly insinuates that I am not in my sound mind, referring to me as a "kuleleng". I know they can't be referring to anyone but me, it's so obvious. I don't deny the fact that I criticized the paper, in public; nor do I impose my views on anyone. I must say that I already had an inkling of suspicion about this. What surprises me is that they waited so long to do it. The incident is already a few months old; it's stale as Tutankhamen's ointment in the news world. It's such a stagy piece of yellow journalism, it's so cheap. However, I believe they included it in the most recent issue because they've just started an anti-opposition campaign. There was one column in which they were castigating a letter to the editor regarding the idiotic "Vote YES" business over a certain office in the university, and it seems that the right to freedom of speech is being violated by one of its alleged guardians. There is nothing more disgusting than an institution excoriating a single individual because of just criticism. It is unprofessional, undignified, immature, ludicrous, and even pitiable. It is like Hitler and the Gestapo all over again. How funny can it get? A paper that pretends to champion freedom of speech yet seeks to suppress the vociferations of anyone who finds fault with it! A paper full of knaves who twist one's words to make a trap for fools! A paper staffed with people full of their own self-glorification, not deigning to admit their faults, their biases, their inadequacies! A paper that forces upon its readers a narrow-minded point of view, with no regard for their free will and intellect! O Judgment, thou art fled to brutish beasts, and men have lost their reason!
It is so paltry an act to hurl petty insults at people of whom the public has no knowledge . One of the lessons in The Art of War is the principle of inscrutability, of veiling one's weaknesses. The paper has gone against it entirely by acknowledging the presence of people who disagree with it and making it public. The paper is staffed (and stuffed) with inept peacocks who showcase their errors to the world without any apology. If they are as competent as they say they are, why do they need to harp on the people whose views differ from their own? If they are really convinced of the worth of their newspaper, why do they need the approval of each bystander to affirm its value, and why do they need to blatantly humiliate the people who notice the errors they have committed themselves? By pointing out people who find fault with their work, they only prove their inanity and bigotry to the rest of the world. An exemplary writer, be he journalist, novelist, poet, or blogger, must always consider that his views may not be acceptable to all his readers, and that reaffirmation of the value of his work can come from him alone. He cannot force an idea into an unwilling reader's mind, nor can he tell people to recant any criticism they might have made against him. In short, he must take things realistically and dispassionately, at least in public.
I write this post, not only because I wish to proclaim the injustice of my accusers, but because I want to show where I stand, and what I stand for. Of that, the reader is the judge. My last words are these: an institution which upholds the highest virtues in human existence, truth, justice, reason, rectitude, and dignity, would not abase itself in the mud of controversy, nor would it exalt itself by vilifying others. An institution which declares its allegiance to truth, moreover, cannot sow the seeds of dissent and deception and stay true to its innate purpose.
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