Thank God for friends. I can't thank God enough for showering me with friends who love and care for me while I am away from home. Mommy Jorge just sent me a proxy link so I can check my friendster and go to websites that were banned from the office. They say that they're concerned about security, I think more than security, some agents on the floor are very abusive that they surf or 'friendster-stalk' while taking a call. I don't have any problems at all since friendster is not work-related. Anyways, I'm glad I can friendster-stalk all I want for as long as IT will not find out about it. Hahaha take that! but of course I will only do it during down times or on saturdays when there is no queue. My shift just ended and this is the first time I had worked on a Saturday. Since I started working, I've always had my rest days on a Saturday and a Sunday. This has been the first week that I have worked on an 11x4 shift. MG the hours are looong but the days are so fast. I can't believe that I survived this shift. I had always thought that I wouldn't like working on such a sched. I have 3 rest days and 4 work days. Finally, I can read all the books I want to read and go home anytime every week cause my rest days allow me to board on a boat for CDO and come back in time for shift. Cool aint? I think so.

For the meantime, I have been missing my old team. They made work so much easier to deal with. Not that I don't like my new team or my new sup jan ranny. He's very cool and the reason I'm not resigning. hehehe I seriously thought of resigning. I could no longer bear waking up another night to go to work and endure another shift. I am very flexible with sched, my teammates, if I don't like them then 'kebs nalang' but this time, I am favored that mommy Jorge is my teammate and my sup is as kind and as considerate as my old sup. Only this time, he's wacky and enjoys a lot of good laughs! heck, he even taught me how to update my friendster account at the office, while waiting for a call. I am someone you can never motivate if you deal with me harshly. As my teammate krishna would put it, I am most of the time a softee.

As for my family in CDO, mi papa is now a school administrator. Wow! I have great confidence in my papa. Well, he's one of the smartest guy I know. He's been through so many things in his lifetime and in all those times, I have seen him endure even life's worse experiences with bravery and in silence. Not once did I ever hear him complain about the hardships we have gone through as a family. I admire his strong determination and I owe him more than my life. I miss my papa and I have always considered him my hero and there will be no other. In everything we had to go through, the pleasures and the pain, we all stuck together. I never heard my brothers complain or rebel. As patiently and as lovingly as we can, we have endured days that we don't have food on our table and those times when we do not know where to get money to pay for tuition. Yes, I never thought we would come to that. I guess it started when we lost our major source of income, followed when my mom decided to quit her job in Del Monte where she worked as an executive for almost 30 years. I don't know whether it was a good or bad idea but those experiences made me strong and made me humble. It made me compassionate and more enduring to life's problems. I do not blame anyone, especially not God. I lived a smooth life before and I never had to endure a bumpy ride. My parents were always there to shield us from the storm, but they can only do so much. As we got older, my brothers and I got stung by the harsh realities of life. I never had to experience being hungry before, there was always at least a hot meal on the table and more. I remember nights when I would sleep on an empty stomach praying for a miracle the next day. I envied my classmates who were set to go to med school, who could afford new books and new outfit for the semester. I avoided them cause I know I can never afford books, I could never afford new outfits. I'm just glad that I had a friend who was the same size as me and who gave me a bulk of her old clothes. Nobody knew the clothes I wore were hand-me-downs. I was just glad that I had something to wear. Whenever my mom had extra, she would secretly give me money so I can buy me a new pair of shoes or sandals. How I love my mama. I had thought then that maybe by knowing someone or having a relationship with someone for more than 5 years is enough to marry him someday. But I was wrong. DAMN wrong. The relationship only lasted for a year and it made my situation worse than not having a bf at all. Not that I blame my ex-bf, I blame the fact that if we were only friends, my life wouldn't have been so entangled, I would have been more focused and maybe I would have graduated on time. I didn't listen to advices, I allowed my emotion to rule over reason. I'm just glad that the worse that happened to me was extending one more sem so I can just wrap up my course in bio. I didn't graduate with flying colors and until now, I haven't applied for graduation. I haven't officially graduated yet. I escaped college after I finished my last sem. I felt miserable that while my batchmates were already wearing med uniform, I was still wearing the regular school uniform. I was on top of the class when I started, I am one of those we call half-baked, people who start well who don't finish or don't finish well. I had to work part-time in order to finish school and then I was on a rebound. We were both on a rebound, while he was nursing pain from his first love, I was in the process of recovering from a broken heart. He had a lovechild, we built our dreams on sand. I thought I was in love, I thought I was healing, but I was wrong. DAMN wrong. The pain only grew and healing was not a reality. We were living a lie, saying words of love but deep down inside we wanted a part of our past. I thank God, and for friends who caught me before I fell deeper in the muddle I was already in. It was a sinking sand but thank God for miracles. I applied for a better job, a better paying job. Got hired. Was offered a chance of a new life, in a new place, with new faces and challenges to meet. I had a golden ticket. A ticket that would open doors of opportunity. And again, as one who is favored, I took the job, passed the training, met new friends, found a home away from home, got regularized and so here I am, blogging about my past... I know the future is still set ahead of me, that it's not too late. I am holding to my promise of youth. My life is still ahead of me and I can choose what I want to be. Not my own, but God's will be done. I am more careful now. I have learned that the person I love most possess the greatest power to hurt me. I am praying and I pray harder that the next time I give in to my emotion, it will be someone who loves God, more than he loves me or loves himself. In everything I had to go through, I can only be thankful that I was able to endure them, the strength and the reason I live is due to the fact that God loves me so much that He gave me a second a chance, more chances than I can ever imagine. I know there are more bumpy roads ahead, more challenging storms, but I have learned and have kept my ground, my anchor is the Lord.